Book Review: Greta and the Goblin King

Greta and the Goblin King

By:  Chloe Jacobs

Publisher:  Entangled Publishing, LLC

Publish Date:  November 13, 2012

Format:  eARC

Genre:  YA Fairy Fantasy Romance

Series:  1st in Mylena Chronicles

Recommendation:  Oh heavens yes, for YA and Adult readers alike.  Very strong female lead and smart even though naive with boys.

Synopsis:
While trying to save her brother from a whitch's fire four years ago, Greta was thrown in herself, falling through a portal to Mylena, a dangerous world where humans are the enemy and every ogre, ghoul, and goblin has a dark side that comes out with the eclipse.

To survive, Greta has hidden her humanity and taken the job of bounty hunter -- and she's good at what she does.  So good, she's caught the attention of Mylena's young goblin king, the darkly enticing Isaac, who invades her dreams and undermines her will to escape.

But Greta's not the only one looking to get out of Mylena.  An ancient evil knows she's the key to opening the portal, and with the next eclipse mere days away, every bloodthirsty creature in the realm is after her -- including Isaac.  If Greta fails, she and the lost boys of Mylena will die.  If she succeeds, no world will be safe from what follows her back...

First Sentence:
When she'd set out to track the foul beast hunkered down in the cavern ahead, Great hadn't counted on gale force winds and an ice storm engulfing three goblin territories descending like a bitter, frozen plague to torture her.

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My Thoughts and Summary:
Seventeen year old Greta has been stranded in Mylena for four years making her living as a bounty hunter as her patron taught her, rescuing missing goblin children by hunting the creatures lost to their raw creature pulls.  In rescuing the children, she remembers how she got here, saving her little brother from the fate of this world.  Greta has to hide she's human as humans bring the cry for blood in Mylena.  The creatures here blame humans for the endless winter and the curse upon them by turning the two moons against them.  Isaac, the new young goblin king, has had his eye on Greta since they meet a fortnight ago.  There is an attraction between the two, and it grows from Isaac's intruding and spying in Greta's dreams.  He is interested in her and tricked her into letting him invade her dreams.  Wanting to know more of her he keeps visiting her on the occasional night asking her to share her secrets, promising to be lenient with her if she tells.  Greta comes home with her own aching wounds to find the wood sprite who took her in four years earlier to Luke bleeding from an obvious battle in their home.  Lucius's dying words are a warning that He knows the key and sounds as trouble is stirring for humans.  Could the one Greta is fighting her feelings for and now the Goblin King be the one she can trust with her secret and life?  Could he, would he, help her - a human - and all human kind?  Being the Goblin king he is looking out for the safety of his people, and in his forest.  Greta goes out on her own with Isaac fresh in her dreams, asking to help her, she finds others like her.  Her own band of Lost Boys.  With the eclipse seven days away the beasts inside are freeing and the people all change to loss control.  Greta may not be safe for them to be around with the turning hunters after her and the dangerous man trying to get to the human world.

There is a connection between the guarded Greta and flirty goblin king Isaac.  You hope they could be together but know he, in his position which he didn't want when they first meet, and she, being the hated human thought to be a  sprite, can't work out.  But still hope they could come together.

Isaac is the next hot thing around!  So what he's a goblin.  To have this man in your dreams, and in the flesh...dreamy... His human form and what's inside will have girls willing to have him in control of their souls and happiness.  He has a flirty bad boy feel, BUT there is more to him and he cares deeply.  I do love the way he gets under Greta's skin, good and bad, or is that in her dreams...  I do look forward to her dreams where he's present.  There is a fire between these two, challenging each other.

Then we meet Wyatt and his band of Lost Boys.  Wyatt is different from Isaac and I instantly melted for his kindness.  Where Isaac's sure of himself and muscled, Wyatt is kind and smart and quick thinking with this world, and good to Greta.  And he's human.  Something Greta thought she'd never see again.  Wyatt brings new pieces of information to us, pieces Great wants and no one else in Mylena will share.

This story was full of action in a world being turned up on it's nose with the curse of the eclipse.  There is trouble at every turn, and it's compounded with hunters now hunting Greta.  There is a growing thread we learn of a terrible secret up in the mountains.  And Greta is determined to learn more about it, and save who she can once she finds the truth.  Wyatt helps Greta greatly, but Isaac is always there on her tail.  This is also about a young girl having lost so much and learning to become what she needs to be in a strange dangerous world, now put more on the defensive when the world learns what she really is.  Greta has to learn to trust someone, but who will that be?  Greta also has to make a choice, one she never thought she would have to.

Wonderful action packed fairy/fantasy read.  They are not all the happy creatures you would think, and Greta's stuck in the middle of a world that blames humans for their curse, while the curse is changing them sending them into a blood fury for a night.  Action and a touch of love in this Young Adult read that I loved.  This was a great tale to keep me flipping, wanting more of Isaac, Wyatt, and even little Jacob along with others in the Lost Boys.  Not only is there a touch of romance but action and danger to keep me wanting more.

I do look forward to future stories with Greta and all the others.



**I won a copy of this from the publisher in turn for an honest review.