Graceling

Title: Graceling
Author: Kristin Cashore
Year: 2008
Series?: Graceling Realm #1
Format: Trade Paperback (library checkout)
Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy, Adventure, Romance

What's it about?: Because I cannot write a better one (or anywhere close to as good as this one) here is a synopsis from Goodreads:
http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/3236307-graceling

My opinion: For some reason, I find it difficult to write a review for a book I love. When I really love a book all I want to do is poke someone with that book until they are so fed up with me that they read the book themselves and then fall in love with it as well. These are my exact feelings toward Graceling, I absolutely fell in love with it and I am kicking myself for not having read it sooner when everyone else was bugging me to. I do have to say, the book starts out very slowly and only began to pick up for me about eighty pages in. Katsa reminds me of Alanna from the Tamora Pierce series, except she is better because Graceling is developed in a way that the Lioness Rampant series never was. At the beginning of the book Katsa blindly follows her uncle's orders, her reasoning being that she has no choice but instead she is trapped by her own shame at the things she has done for him in the past. Once she meets Prince Po, all of this changes. Po becomes a great friend, someone she trusts and someone who seems to understand her like no one else. Po is the one who encourages her to follow her own path, to be happy whether or not it be under King Randa's rule.

I LOVE that Po understood Katsa for who she was and never tried to make her something she wasn't; this is a rare trait to find in a leading man in a book in an age where all of the female readers seem to love and domineering and controlling man (*cough* Fifty Shades and Twilight *cough*). The parts of the book where Katsa was totally unaware of the fact that she was attracted to and falling for Prince Po were hilarious. The scene where she finally realizes everything about the two of them and their feelings for each other was brilliantly written, I found myself backtracking a few times just to reread it. If there were a theme for a book, it would be control. To learn to control oneself, and to not suffer under the control of someone else. There is so much more that I loved about this book, and I'm sure as time goes by I will come back and add more to this review. I only want to say that this book was staggering and breathtaking and I highly recommend it to readers or any genre.

I rate this book 5 out of 5 stars!