Review: Shadows by Paula Weston

Title: Shadows (The Repham #1)
Author: Paula Weston
Published: July 2nd 2012
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It’s almost a year since Gaby Winters was in the car crash that killed her twin brother, Jude. Her body has healed in the sunshine of Pandanus Beach, but her grief is raw and constant. It doesn’t help that every night in her dreams she kills demons and other hell-spawn.
And then Rafa comes to town. Not only does he look exactly like the guy who’s been appearing in Gaby’s dreams—he claims a history with her brother that makes no sense. Gaby is forced to accept that what she thought she knew about herself and her life is only a shadow of the truth—and that the truth is more likely to be found in the shadows of her nightmares.
Who is Rafa? Who are the Rephaim? And most importantly, who can she trust?

This is so hard for me to review simply because I don’t want to offend anyone’s feelings. Don’t get me wrong, I liked this book, but since everyone was so excited about me reading it and saying how much they adored it? Um, I just don’t want to disappoint anyone by saying that it wasn’t as amazing as I thought it would be.

“Most stories are based on something real.”

Alright, so I just need to get this out of the way: THESE COVERS ARE FREAKIN’ GORGEOUS!!! *stares* Love them! There better not be a cover change. Ok, um. I really liked that the book was set in Australia. Loved Rafa of course, how could I not? He’s the comic relief in most of the situations and he did bring the feels for me, already at the very beginning. Oh, that reminds me! I really thought I was going to DNF it at first since the beginning was so.. weird O.o

Firstly, you can always tell it’s an Aussie writer since their style is recognizable. It’s something I still haven’t gotten used to, but it’s very brief and straight to the point. Secondly, I found it incredulous that every single character was basically okay with these supernatural creatures in our world. Like, what? Humans are curious by nature, but they’re also afraid of the unknown and how everyone took this in without much more than a few questions? I just couldn’t help but roll my eyes. There are some things that come out later so it makes a tad more sense, but still. Also, why in the world would Gaby and Maggie tell Jason anything? Let him believe what he wants to believe. You just met the guy, can you not spill all these secrets to a stranger? O______O

I didn’t form any connections with the characters. Perhaps it’s because Gaby has so much to figure out and there are all these bits and pieces here and there, but just as her, I don’t know what to think or believe. Then again, I didn’t really feel any strong emotions towards any of the other characters either. I did like the whole mythology part of the angels: Fallens, Demons etc, and how fast paced this book was. I’m glad that we got some answers, but there are still so many unanswered questions and that’s the part I’m most looking forward to in the sequels, especially some regarding Gaby and Rafa (one thing in particular and if you’ve read the book, you probably know what it is).

I’m aware that this seems more like a negative review, but believe me, it’s not. I had a lot of fun (and feels too) with this read, but I clearly had issues too. I can’t wait to read the sequel and the third one just came out, so yay! This one put a different spin on angels and I’m very excited to cover more ground on the questions looming over all the why’s and how’s. I hope we will meet a certain someone in the flesh next book and one will have some answers for us. If not, then perhaps one will join our MC-s to uncover all the secrets that lie between us and the answers. Decent read, but unfortunately not a favorite.

Overall rating: 3.3 out of 5.0
Stars: ★★★

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