Title: Akarnae
Author: Lynette Noni
Series: The Medoran Chronicles #1
Rating Out of 5: 5 (I will read this again and again and again)
My Bookshelves: Australian authors, Easy reading, Fantasy
Format: Novel
Publisher: Pantera Press
Year: 2015
5th sentence, 74th page: Talk about high definition.

With just one step, sixteen-year-old Alexandra Jennings’ world changes – literally.

Dreading her first day at a new school, Alex is stunned when she walks through a doorway and finds herself stranded in Medora, a fantasy world full of impossibilities.

Desperate to return home, she learns that only a man named Professor Marselle can help her… but he’s missing.

While waiting for him to reappear, Alex attends Akarnae Academy, Medora’s boarding school for teenagers with extraordinary gifts. She soon starts to enjoy her bizarre new world and the friends who embrace her as one of their own, but strange things are happening at Akarnae, and Alex can’t ignore her fear that something unexpected… something sinister… is looming.

An unwilling pawn in a deadly game, Alex’s shoulders bear the crushing weight of an entire race’s survival. Only she can save the Medorans, but what if doing so prevents her from ever returning home?

Will Alex risk her entire world – and maybe even her life – to save Medora?

I bought this book last week because it was $10 – and I wanted a new book. I finished it in a day because it was just AMAZING. I’m actually at a loss for words to explain how much I loved this book (which is rare, I assure you!) The fact that Lynette Noni is also Australian just made me want to buy the sequel even more. Which is exactly what I did the morning after I finished the book.

So what made this such an amazing book to read? Not only is Noni’s just beautiful technically speaking, she draws you right into Alex’s world. From that point, believe me, you are lost. Noni has created this beautiful, relatable and inherently sweet heroine who I couldn’t stop thinking about long after I finished reading her books.

The creation of Medora ticks all fantasy world boxes for me. It is so similar to our own reality that you can’t help but feel at home in the first few paragraphs. Yet it is different enough that I was constantly turning the page to discover the next adventure Noni was going to take me on.

I think that the part of the book that really drove Akarnae into my heart was Alex’s friendships with Bear and Jordan. These boys embodied everything that anybody could ever want in friends. They’re unerring, loyal and accept Alex EXACTLY as she is (coming from a different world and all).

Image source: Goodreads