Review: Sanctum by: Sarah Fine

Sanctum by: Sarah Fine (Guards of The Shadowlands #1) (Oct. 2012)

433 pages

Genre: YA/Fantasy

Publisher: Amazon Children's Publishing

Source: The Library

Purchase: Barnes and Noble | The Book Depository | Amazon

Goodreads Summary: “My plan: Get into the city. Get Nadia. Find a way out. Simple.”

A week ago, seventeen-year-old Lela Santos’s best friend, Nadia, killed herself. Today, thanks to a farewell ritual gone awry, Lela is standing in paradise, looking upon a vast gated city in the distance—hell. No one willingly walks through the Suicide Gates, into a place smothered in darkness and infested with depraved creatures. But Lela isn’t just anyone—she’s determined to save her best friend’s soul, even if it means sacrificing her eternal afterlife.

As Lela struggles to find Nadia, she’s captured by the Guards, enormous, not-quite-human creatures that patrol the dark city’s endless streets. Their all-too-human leader, Malachi, is unlike them in every way except one: his deadly efficiency. When he meets Lela, Malachi forms his own plan: get her out of the city, even if it means she must leave Nadia behind. Malachi knows something Lela doesn’t—the dark city isn’t the worst place Lela could end up, and he will stop at nothing to keep her from that fate.

My Review

At the very beginning when I first started reading this book and I was like "meh," it’s just a fancy way to get a message across to young people about how bad suicide is, (I want to point out that that isn't a bad thing, it just wasn't what I was in the mood to read) even though I did immediately like Lela I wasn’t sold, and then a few pages later I was completely captivated and refused to stop reading! I had one of those moments where I took a quick pause from reading and was like “this just got real interesting.” Oh and keep in mind...I may have thought it was just okay at first, but it didn't take many pages into the book before I changed my mind.

Sanctum is unique, has an awesome hard core heroine, has a swoon worthy male love interest, has evil creatures, and is addictive.

I finished this book and my first thought was…GIVE ME MORE! I can’t wait until the second one comes in at my library. I of course put it on hold the second I finished this one.

Reasons Why You Should Read Sanctum

• The main character, Lela, is very strong, but also loving. She has had a hard life, but fights for what she wants and stops letting her past get in her way.

• Malachi is amazing. That is all I need to say about that.

• All the action! The fighting is hard core.

• There aren’t any info dumps. I gave Sanctum major points for that, because who doesn’t love well done world building?

• The ending was perfection.

• This book is dark, but there is just the right amount of humor thrown in to balance it out.

• It's unique. I can't say that I have ever read a book quite like this one before, which was very refreshing. 

• Basically you should just read this book. (I know I already mentioned most of these points in this list earlier in my review, but I just wanted to really get my point across and elaborate a little more on them.)

So what are you waiting for? Get your hands on a copy of Sanctum. I’m pretty sure I have given you enough reasons by now as to why I loved this book to convince you. There are always going to be some people where a book just doesn't work for them, but in my opinion I think it's worth your time to see if it's a match for you!

**I am so thankful that Nicole over at The Quiet Concert got me to read this.