Review: Surrender (The Ferryman and the Flame #1) – Rhiannon Paille

Surrender by Rhiannon Paille
Series: The Ferryman and the Flame #1
Published by CreateSpace on 2 October 2012
Genres: Fantasy, Paranormal, Young Adult
Pages: 402
Source: Netgalley
Buy on Amazon

Kaliel and Krishani are children of the earth, and the only love these elves will know is the love they have for the land. They have both received very cryptic parables from the Great Oak, ones it takes them a long time to understand. When Kaliel and Krishani meet by chance, they realize that they can have feelings for something else than the land, and as they fight their attraction, they feel more and more drawn to each other.

*I received a free ARC of Surrender from CreateSpace via Netgalley in exchange of an honest review*

In Surrender, Kaliel is a young girl who feels clumsy around her kinsfolk, she can speak to the trees and the merfolk, but she falls over everytime she needs to go somewhere. At the fire festival in Avristar, she goes to a waterfall one evening. Behind the waterfall, Krishani, part of the Amersil Brotherhood is watching her. When they meet, they both feel an attraction toward the other, even if they are hiding it at first. As Kaliel and Krishani go back to their own villages, the readers follow Kaliels adventures as she nears the time she will go to the mysterious great oak to get her parable. What the great oak tells her will rule the rest of her life, it is supposed to tell her what her goal in life is, but Kaliel cannot understand the meaning of the great oaks parable. It seems like whatever she will choose to do, it will only lead to disaster for Avristar and the people living there.

Surrender is a book that explores magic and the connection to the earth in a way that is very different from what I have read before. The premise is extremely interesting, the way people are shown the direction of their life from a very old tree who is supposed to guide them intrigued me. Kaliel is a young girl of 16, and she is not one to meekly follow orders. She wants to know why some things are forbidden. Like, swimming in the lake is forbidden because of the merfolk. Kaliel still goes there, and she can understand what they are saying. There is a very real danger in the water, though, and Kaliel finds that out the hard way.

Krishani is supposed to have great powers, but he has no way to control them. He either does too little, or too much. When he does too much the land and people around him are devastated by the force of his fire. The brotherhood even makes him leave, and sends him to Avristar to be trained by Istar, the sovereign of Avristar. Soon after Krishani arrives in Avristar to train, Kaliel is sent there as well, to be trained by Lady Atara, Istar’s wife. It seems that both Krishani and Kaliel carry a huge responsibility to their country and their fellow kinsmen, and at times, it appears impossible for them to be able to complete their tasks.

Surrender had everything to be a very good book, the premise, the world, the characters were all well done. However, the reading was a little jilted at times, and the pacing was very uneven. In some places, I also felt that the story was too wordy, with some explanations I didn’t really need. Because of this, it took me a long time to finish this book. However, because the premise is so promising, and the characters very attaching, I know I will read Justice and the other books in the series. This is a world that is completely different from ours, and even if Surrender ended with grief, there is still some sense of hope. And as long as there is hope, I want to know what happens next. If you’re up to a fantasy that takes you far away from our world, you should give Surrender a chance, maybe the great oak will give you some guidance as well.

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