Review: Floresha (Metamorphosis#1) by L.C. Perry

Floresha (Metamorphosis#1) 

by L.C. Perry

Seventeen year old Ringzette Almer is a Torosapien that lives in a world that is just as gripping as it is beautiful. The world, Floresha, has taken the place of Earth which was destroyed centuries ago by an unknown power. There are four main tribes that live as a part of its inhabitants: The Chayas, the Marconnis, the Wielders and the Juugulars. 

Ringzette, a Chaya, is plunged deeper into her world when she comes across a mysterious man who implants a gem on her stomach. As if things couldn’t get any stranger, she is told that her claimed to be dead brother may not be dead after all and a father she never knew has left her with an unfeasible mission that he himself was unable to complete. Now with her whole world on her shoulders, Ringzette must break the forbidden rule of travelling to the other tribes and find the six guardians that are born to protect this planet. She not only has to race against time, but also the enemies destined to destroy the very same people she must find and protect. To make matters worse, she will have to accomplish all this while managing to survive the treacherous lands of the tribes she's only heard of from her textbooks. As a lazy teenager born from a tribe of peacekeepers, what are her chances of making it through this alive?

My Take:

All Ringzette wants is another hour of sleep. But that's not going to happen, with the fate of the entire planet on her shoulders. A mysterious wizard hands her a huge gem that embeds itself into her stomach, a gem that will help her detect the Six Foreigners, whose reincarnated destiny is to save the world from an impending entity bent on its destruction. 

The six Foreigners are in the forbidden lands of the other Torsapien species, lands not only off-limits to the Chayas, but deadly as well. To make matters worse, the Foreigners have six counterparts, the Terrestrials, whose only goal is to slay the Foreigners before they can be awakened to their powers and destiny. Without any authority, without any abilities, without any plan other than to get moving, Ringzette must somehow save the world. But hey, that's what heroes do.

Content:

Drug Content:
G – There is very little alcohol in this novel, and no substance abuse. 
 
Violence:
PG-13 – There's a lot of violence, a lot of blood, and characters nearly burned to death. A healer really has her work cut out for her here.
 
Language:
R – The F-bomb is dropped almost 50 times here, with a lot of other coarse language spewed out, mainly from one race of creatures in this party. I get it, it's a plot device, to show the differences between the prim Chayas and the down and dirty Juugulars. But it's a bit to wade through.
 
Adult Content:
PG – The Juugulars are a violent race, and there are several attacks leading towards rape of one of the characters. Nothing occurs specifically onscreen, but there's a lot of adult language and innuendo scattered around..
 
Christian content:
Not a bit. This isn't a hymnal, and it's not the book of common prayer. It's a hard and fast adventure story, and none of the characters in the novel seemed to show much faith other than in one another or themselves. That having been said, I did discover that some characters that seem irredeemable turn a corner, and several are willing to die for one another, or at least get in harm's way to protect each other. So there's that. 

  

Final Analysis:
The Good Parts first: Floresha was a good start to what looks like an excellent epic fantasy, with stunningly detailed worldbuilding, a nicely defined main character arc, reasonable side character development, and acceptable banter. Hints of romantic interest added just a touch of spice. Floresha contained plenty of action, lots of complex battle scenes involving multiple supernatural powers. There were places where I found the book difficult to put down. But unfortunately those times weren't the majority. The fight scenes were frenetic and a little confusing, and moved so fast I had to reread a few passages to figure out who nearly killed who. There was plenty of action, which kept coming over and over again. The bad guys (and girls) were sufficiently bad, but their taunts and actions seemed a bit one-dimensional. The language was a bit much also, and kept kicking me out of the story. I read and review a wide range, and am ok with language in a book (though I'll report what I find here of course, it's what I do). But this seemed a little gratuitous.

All in all, the best things about this book were the worldbuilding, the plot, and the stakes, which couldn't have been higher. I'm a fan of epic fantasy, and this book did deliver the goods, but the dialog and pacing just didn't send me. Four Stars!

About the Author:

L.C. Perry is a young Black bi aromantic/grey-ace author who’s both socially awkward and distractingly imaginative. She has a BA in Creative Writing from Emory University and is a proud binge-watcher of anime and horror movies. She also knows too many Spongebob quotes, can’t dance to save her life, and has an unhealthy obsession when it comes to vanilla almond milk and caramel cake. Her goal as a writer is to continue writing YA while elevating underrepresented voices. Her areas of expertise are the Fantasy, Dystopian and Contemporary genres for the YA audience.
When she isn’t writing, reading, or binge-watching, she’s visualizing original stories inside her head—with the help of music, of course.

Feel free to follow her on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/L.C.Perry3350/