Book: The Siren by Kiera Cass

Published January 2016 by HarperTeen|327 pages

Where I Got It: I borrowed the hardcover from the library

Series: None

Genre: YA Fantasy/Re-Telling

Love is a risk worth taking.

Years ago, Kahlen was rescued from drowning by the Ocean. To repay her debt, she has served as a Siren ever since, using her voice to lure countless strangers to their deaths. Though a single word from Kahlen can kill, she can’t resist spending her days on land, watching ordinary people and longing for the day when she will be able to speak and laugh and live freely among them again.

Kahlen is resigned to finishing her sentence in solitude…until she meets Akinli. Handsome, caring, and kind, Akinli is everything Kahlen ever dreamed of. And though she can’t talk to him, they soon forge a connection neither of them can deny…and Kahlen doesn’t want to.

Falling in love with a human breaks all the Ocean’s rules, and if the Ocean discovers Kahlen’s feelings, she’ll be forced to leave Akinli for good. But for the first time in a lifetime of following the rules, Kahlen is determined to follow her heart.

After reading (and loving) The Selection series, I knew I had to read The Siren.  Partly because I wanted to read something else by Cass, but also because I love a good re-telling, and I thought it would be cool to read something about Sirens, which don’t seem to come up very often.  And I liked The Siren, but not as much as I thought I would.

I thought it was a cool idea, and I liked that it wasn’t about re-telling the tale of Greek gods/goddesses, but instead focused on re-telling the story of Sirens.  We got such a good picture of how girls became Sirens, and what life was like as a Siren.  That actually really surprised me, because The Siren is a stand-alone and fantasy and just over 300 pages…and yet you get such a clear picture of the world and the hold that the Ocean has on these girls.  For me, that more often than not, spells disaster, and it never seems to work well, but it did with this book.

Could things have been explained more?  Of course, but all things considered, Cass did a better job with it than I expected.  It has its cute moments, and it goes by fast.  And it’s an interesting idea, so I definitely wanted to keep reading to see how things turned out.

I thought the Ocean was really confusing at times- She did seem motherly at times, and yes, She did tend to go about it a little weird, but there were also times where I thought She made sense.

I’m not sure how I feel about any of the girls.  There’s certainly a bond between them, but Kahlen seems so different from Elizabeth and Miaka, and even Padma.  She did seem depressed (which I understand why), and she did seem more traditional than the other girls, but that’s probably because she’s older than the other girls. By how much we’re not sure, at least in the case of Elizabeth and Miaka, but definitely a lot older than Padma.

I don’t know how I feel about Akinli, and I really wish we saw more of him.  I get why we didn’t, but the fact that we didn’t really see him is probably why I didn’t completely love him or their relationship.  It felt a little bit too insta-love for me, and I wish we saw it develop more.  I think I might have been able to believe in the whole soulmates thing if we saw more of them together.

I was surprised by the ending- I’m not sure how I expected things to end, but it was a surprise, even though I’m not sure how I feel about it.

It was more dull than I thought, and I had a hard time getting into it.  Ultimately, I liked it, and the idea of the book was enough that I’m willing to overlook everything else.  I wanted more action, and it was definitely a slow-paced book.

3 stars, because the idea is a pretty cool, and more developed than I thought, considering it’s a stand-alone fantasy that’s on the shorter side.  But I also thought it could have been more developed in some areas, namely the romance.