I was approached by Smith Publicity to be part of a blog tour for young adult novel Where The Lightning Goes by debut novelist Jackary Salem with the promise of intricate world-building, complex magical systems, and engaging characters—how could I say no to that? I haven’t read a YA series in a long time, especially one that involves magic. I’m so excited to dive in!

After a powerful wizard tears Elle’s soul apart and steals her memories, she’s locked in a house to rot. Her only remaining memory is of falling from the sky, though even that raises more questions than it answers. Upon her escape, she falls into a world that’s equal parts vicious and beautiful. Magic is everywhere, everyone is out for themselves, and every truth is accompanied by a lie. Her lack of memories grows maddening and painful. She’s positive that the key to recovering her memories is in the sky-castle from her dreams, but getting there will require magic she doesn’t have. Traversing an enchanted painting, stealing a sword from a dragon’s den, and outwitting a demon are only the beginning. And this time, she’s got more than freedom and memories on the line.

I can honestly say I’ve never read anything like this before, for better or for worse. For a YA book, it was a little complicated to get through. I’m not sure I would have if I were in my teens, but I powered through it because I owed a review—and ultimately, I’m glad I did. I’m not sure I’d seek out the sequel, but if it fell into my lap, I’d definitely take a read, for sure.

What didn’t work for me

The world-building: It was super cool that the reader is just as confused as Elle in the beginning and that you learn about the world around her as she does, but I feel like despite getting bits and pieces of information along the journey, we never really get a full picture of the world at large. All of a sudden, there’s a dragon, for instance, and it’s sort of understood that magic is everywhere, but not everyone has it (who? And how do they figure it out?) and that some places accept it and others don’t. I just really couldn’t draw you a map or even explain what kind of world this is. And I’m still not fully sure I understand the god/demon part of it all.

Elle: I won’t say that the character as a whole didn’t work for me, but there were some inconsistencies that I couldn’t get past. When we’re introduced to Elle, she knows very little about her surroundings, to the point that when she’s introduced to Adair, she has a hard time understanding basic nouns and concepts. Fast-forward a day or two in the story, and all of that has fallen to the wayside. Though she’s still naive, she seems to understand everything perfectly clear from that point forward and it just didn’t sit well with me.

The fight scenes: It could just be that I’m not a fight scene kind of person, but they went into detail that brought me out of the plot instead of in. That could also just be that Salem is a debut author—I have confidence that it will get better as she progresses through the series.

What I liked

The ending: I don’t want to give anything away, so I will leave it vague but I didn’t see the ending coming at all. Some people said that it seemed obvious to them, and maybe I was just looking for something else originally, but I didn’t piece it together until Adair did. It’s something unlike anything I’ve ever read and I give some serious kudos to that! Plus, it means anything further in the series will also be completely different from the first book, which is really interesting.

Honeycutt: Gotta love a badass, bearded female dwarf! Once she gets introduced into the fold and into the found family of the group, it really picks up. She juxtaposes Adair well and gives Elle a female influence that she needs. I loved her.

3.5 STARS

“What did it say about Adair—about Leslie—that he was proud of her for choosing to learn magic over all else? And what did it say about Elle, to have gained the approval of a man who was literally without a heart?” —Jackary Salem, Where The Lightning Goes

Thank you to NetGalley and Smith Publicity for the advanced copy of the book in exchange for my honest review.