Book Review : The Autumn Palace by Ebony McKenna

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The Autumn Palace (Ondine, #2)
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Product Details

  • Paperback: 304 pages
  • Publisher: Egmont Books (UK) (February 2011)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 1405256389
  • ISBN-13: 978-1405256384
  • Available on: Amazon / The Book Depository
Synopsis
One boy, one girl, one plot to be foiled! Hamish the gorgeous man (and part time ferret) has a new job with the Duke as a spy in his Autumn Palace. So Ondine goes with him. She imagines a hugely romantic escapade together that involves lots of kissing. What she hadn't imagined was having to do endless laundry, go to school and keep Hamish the man a secret. All the while trying to find out who is plotting to kill the Duke. And if that weren't bad enough, it seems that Hamish is more interested in getting the Duke's attention than hers. Plus he's always in ferret form. Things can't go on like this! Can Ondine foil the would-be assassin, save the Duke and get her man back in gorgeous human form? It's going to take a little bit of magic, a lot of stolen kisses and some ferreting around...

Review
The Autumn Palace is also known as the 'Palechia' in Brugelish. If you're not informed about this, Brugel, the place where Ondine lives in, is a fictitious country ruled by a Duke. In this book, Ondine's boyfriend Hamish/Shambles was recruited by the Duke to act as a spy in the palace to see if anyone has ill intentions towards the Duke. Unable to stay apart from him even for a day, Ondine decided to follow him to the Palace and got herself a job as a laundress.

Basically, this book doesn't have much action in it, but for some reason, I actually like it. The story is cute and the content is clean except for a few stolen kisses between Ondine and Hamish/Shambles. The characters are quirky, in a good way. The dialogues are often witty and have a Scottish feel about them.

Some of the words/phrases are created by the author herself, so there is usually an explanation of what it means in Brugelish at the bottom of the page. That shows the author's creativity, but it also irks me slightly to have to keep on referring to it because it breaks the flow of reading.

To sum things out, this quick, light book has its charm, but there is still room for improvements. I would recommend it to teenage girls aged 13 and above.

Rating: 3.685

About The Author
Ebony McKenna
The decision to leave a career in journalism was a logical choice for Ebony. There wasn't enough time in the day to write the fictional stories she wanted to tell, against the factual that she had to tell. She followed her heart towards writing science fiction, romance and young adult adventures. Ebony now writes full time and lives in Melbourne, Australia, with her husband and young son.

Website :: Blog :: Facebook :: Twitter
http://www.memphisloveskids.com/images/love_symbol1.jpgOndine & Shambles on Facebook http://www.memphisloveskids.com/images/love_symbol1.jpg

Also
Summer of Shambles (Ondine)

2 creative remarks:

Heather said...

This was such a fun, light read! Those are getting hard to come by lately. It's one of my little sister's favorite novels!

vvb32 reads said...

such a pretty cover.