Review: Darkchylde (The Ariel Chylde Saga) by R. Queen

Title: Darkchylde (The Ariel Chylde Saga #1)
Author: R.Queen
Published: 31st October 2016
Rating: 3/5 stars

Summary: Ariel Chylde is haunted by horrible dreams, and on her eighteenth birthday sheds her skin as the nightmares emerge to act out her deepest, darkest impulses.But before Ariel can save her small town from the terror of her dreams, she must first save herself from the sinister secret of her subconscious. A secret guarded by unspeakable evil.

 

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*I recieved a free eARC of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

 

Review:

Based off the comic book series, Darkchylde follows Ariel Chylde who’s haunted by vivid nightmares after her mother’s death. She struggles to find a way to battle her inner demons, which aren’t all they seem.

I liked Ariel as a characters, she’s suffered a lot of hardship during her life but she remains strong. She’s resilient and is able to hold on to hope even in her darkest moments, this outlook on life helped her a lot over the course of the novel. Her struggles with herself were portrayed realistically, despite the supernatural elements involved. She’s a bit of a social outcast and this leads to her being bullied by the students at her school. I felt like more could’ve been explained about her relationships with the other students – such as how things used to be, especially with her ex-boyfriend.

Ariel becomes more content when a new guy, Perry, starts at school and is one of the first people to show kindness to her there. Perry has had difficulties in the past, so empathises with Ariel’s situation and the two quickly become close. Although I liked Ariel and Perry’s relationship, it felt a bit rushed, making it lose impact.

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“Light is easy to love. Show me your darkness.”

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This is a very dark novel and R. Queen did a great job at portraying the spooky setting. I also liked the switches from reality to Ariel’s dream world, a place even darker than Ariel’s real life. There were strange happenings in this novel, including some gory moments that some people may not like. The plot was fairly fast moving however I did have a good idea of where it was going from the beginning. This may have made it less enjoyable.

R. Queen’s writing seemed to switch from quite a detailed style, with Ariel’s thoughts and beliefs being insightful and interesting, to a less descriptive style. And although this was appropriate for tense, action scenes at other times it made the story feel choppy. I also found some of the scenes with lots of dialogue confusing to read. The speaker switched from one character to another with little action in between to distinguish who was who. As a result, I sometimes struggled to follow who was speaking.

Despite a few issues, this book was mostly enjoyable to read and I’d recommend it to those who are looking for a scary book to read.