3 out of 4 stars
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I rate this book 3 out of 4 stars.
When I first started to read Raven’s Peak, I was prepared for the typical drivel that usually comes with this kind of Supernatural genre. With the prologue having this all-powerful macho kind of a feel, I was prepared for a male-dominated, dense plot, with very little substance other than a man punching things he shouldn’t be able to.
What I actually got was the exact opposite.
After the initial prologue, the book continues through the voice of Haatim, who is a college student originally from India who, in the book, lives in the United States. He’s the perfect choice as the protagonist of this book-- a shy lead who knows nothing about the world but is deeply involved in it in ways he couldn’t imagine, allowing the reader to discover everything they need to know without feeling as though they’re being led through by some random nobody. He’s a likeable, well-rounded character with purpose, but the story isn’t his.
The story, in fact, belongs to Abigail, the girl who introduces him to the world of Demons and magic and teaches him everything he needs to know. She’s the classic independent woman archetype, but she doesn’t feel like a cliche, because along with her stubborn nature and blatant disrespect for the rules, she remains human in all aspects. She doesn’t wear her eyeliner sharp enough to kill a man or any of those other tired ideals, she simply gets the job done. Not to mention that Cole makes her black, meaning that this is the first book I've read in a long time that doesn’t focus around white, western ideologies.
And having Abigail be black and Haatim be Indian makes sense. They aren’t just thrown in as the token people of colour, it’s for a reason. With Haatim, for example, his religion and faith plays a huge part throughout the book, becoming a plot point that in the end aids both him and Abigail greatly in the final scenes of the book. Cole does an incredible job of making Raven’s Peak flow without forcing the characters into situations they simply wouldn’t be in. He works them into a corner and does every possible thing to stop them from getting out of it, and it makes for an incredible read.
In fact, one of the only negatives I could find was the sporadic cliffhangers that Cole seemed to rely on to get the reader to carry on reading. For me, it interrupted the flow of the book, and the varied length of the chapters made it a little frustrating to get through as I couldn’t estimate how long it would take me to read each chapter, meaning at times I’d have to stop halfway through one, but it’s a small price to pay for the enigmatic story that lies within.
Overall, Cole’s Raven’s Peak takes a place on my bookshelf as a darker, smarter Derek Landy, as he expertly weaves the supernatural into reality without using the same old tired cliches and characters. It’s refreshing and unmissable-- and I can’t wait to read the next one.
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Raven's Peak
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