Book Review: Forsaken by Jana Oliver

Forsaken by Jana Oliver
MacMillan Children's Books
Release Date: February 7th, 2011 (UK)
Rating: 3 out of 5
Recommended? For fans of demons, yes!
Buy the Book: Amazon US | Amazon UK

Seventeen-year-old Riley, the only daughter of legendary Demon Trapper, Paul Blackthorne, has always dreamed of following in her father's footsteps. The good news is, with human society seriously disrupted by economic upheaval and Lucifer increasing the number of demons in all major cities, Atlanta’s local Trappers’ Guild needs all the help they can get – even from a girl. When she’s not keeping up with her homework or trying to manage her growing crush on fellow apprentice, Simon, Riley’s out saving distressed citizens from foul-mouthed little devils – Grade One Hellspawn only, of course, per the strict rules of the Guild. Life’s about as normal as can be for the average demon-trapping teen.

But then a Grade Five Geo-Fiend crashes Riley’s routine assignment at a library, jeopardizing her life and her chosen livelihood. And, as if that wasn’t bad enough, sudden tragedy strikes the Trappers’ Guild, spinning Riley down a more dangerous path than she ever could have imagined. As her whole world crashes down around her, who can Riley trust with her heart – and her life? - Goodreads Page

Forsaken sounded like a fantastic read. I love demons, demon hunters *points at the demon-fighting Winchester in the banner* and all things supernatural, and so I couldn’t wait to get stuck into this book. Unfortunately, I finished it feeling a bit let down.


Don’t get me wrong, I did enjoy the novel, but I found myself getting frustrated with the main character so many times. And if you’ve read my reviews in the past, you will know that an annoying main character could easily mean the death of a book for me.

I’ll get the negative stuff out of the way. I found the main character, Riley, to be very immature and annoying. The girl was supposed to be a demon trapper (meaning, she catches and sells demons rather than killing them) in training, and I just assumed that would mean she was as badass as Rose Hathaway. Instead, Riley turned out to be a bit of a whiner and this became very annoying very fast. She also seemed to get over a certain event far too quickly. If the same thing had happened to me I would be curled up in bed for weeks, but then again I guess that would make for a boring novel. Plus, Riley was raised in a world very different to ours.

On to the better stuff!

The other main character is Beck, who is good friends with Riley’s dad, and someone Riley used to have a crush on. Beck started off annoying, but he became a lot better towards the end of the novel. I liked reading things from his point of view, and I definitely wasn’t expecting that. He’s actually kind of sweet, under that hard shell of his.

Simon, the love interest, was very average. I don’t have much to say about him. He was nice. Yeah.

Which leads me onto Ori. Oh my GOSH, Ori! He was only in a couple of scenes in this novel, but I fell in love. What more can I say? He’s amazing, badass and totally hot.

Anyway, I found the demons in this novel fascinating. There were so many different types – another thing I wasn’t expecting – and I loved reading about the differences, and discovering which demons were more evil than others. There were a couple that were just plain cute!

The pacing of this novel started of very slow. It was an average read at the beginning. That said, the book majorly picked up in the final few chapters. I am so happy I continued reading, otherwise I would never have met Ori, and I would never have read that awesome climax!

I’ve given this book an average rating, because Riley and Simon just weren’t doing it for me, and it took a while to get into. However, I still definitely recommend this if you’re a fan of demons and the paranormal. I’m about to pick up the second book in the series, Forbidden, after I’ve posted this review. Fingers crossed for more Ori, eh?