Review: Florence By: Ciye Cho

Title: Florence

Author: Ciye Cho

Published:  July 1st, 2012

My Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

Goodreads Summary:

Seventeen-year-old Florence Waverley is out of her depth. Literally. Kidnapped and taken below the waves to the mer world of Niemela, she is the ultimate gift for merman Prince Kiren: a human familiar tied to his side. But nothing is what it seems amid the beauty and danger of a dark ocean.

Every Niemelan has a role to play, from the mermaids who weave towers out of kelp to the warriors who fight sea monsters. But in trying to survive, Florence will end up in the middle of a war between the mer and the Darkness. A conflict that will push her between two brothers: Kiren, the charmer inexplicably drawn to both her and the monsters; and Rolan, the loner who has been pushing her away since the day they met. But in order to take a stand--and find out where she belongs--Florence will have to risk it all: her life, her heart... and her very soul.

My Thoughts:

I received this book from the author in exchange for an honest review.

Ok, so I have to admit I was super hesitant going into this book only because mermaids are not really my thing and the one other book that I read about mermaids really disappointed me. But, Florence was absolutely amazing, this book completely redeemed mermaids with me and I loved this book from beginning to end.

Ciye Cho has an amazing ability to write with words that paint a picture in your head, the descriptions of all of the characters and the world that Florence was in were beautiful and they flowed throughout the book giving it an almost whimsical feel in my opinion.

Florence was a great main character and I really became attached to her throughout the book. When we first meet Florence she is heading down to the beach for a field trip with her class and all she wants more than anything is to not be noticed by anyone, she is very shy and a complete loner. I really connected with her in this way, growing up I was painfully shy, I didn't like people's attention on me so, I could really understand what she was going through.  Living on an island her class gets the awesome field trip of going to the beach and snorkeling and observing the animals in the ocean for their assignment. I kept thinking sign me up, if I had the opportunity to do that in high school I would have been so excited. As Florence is snorkeling through the water she sees a strange man with vicious looking teeth coming straight for her, this is when everything changes for her. After being knocked out and dragged to somewhere to the very bottom of the ocean, Florence is now a prisoner of the merman city of Niemel. 

I loved reading about the Niemlans, they sounded so beautiful through Florence's eyes and I can only imagine what they look like! I actually really enjoyed the love triangle in this book because I didn't see the triangle  coming. I could tell that Prince Kieran, was going to be her love interest because he was charming and seemed totally fascinated by her but, he takes a turn for the worse and who he was really surprised me. Now Prince Kieran's brother Prince Rolan was the one I was so surprised to see as a love interest to Florence only because he was so rude to her and really seemed to want her out of their world as soon as possible but, as the story progressed he grew on me and definitely came to be the one I was rooting for, to win her heart.

Overall, this book was a beautiful and descriptive read full of adventure mermaids and a story of finding out who you really are, it was so enjoyable. I recommend this book for anyone who enjoys mermaids and even people that don't, it definitely changed my mind about mermaid reads. Check it out!

Happy Reading!

Kristin