Filling in the Blanks in Daimon

Daimon by Jennifer L. Armentrout

4/5 STARS

Genre: Young Adult, Fantasy (paranormal)
Author: Jennifer L. Armentrout
Published: May 2011
Publisher: Spencer Hill Press
Pages: 62 {e-book}

Original review on Goodreads

Daimon

Well that was one creepy novella. This series is just so terrifyingly good. This felt like an optional read if you wanted to know in more detail the events that sparked the story of Half-Blood in more detail, but being only 60 ish pages there’s not heaps too it. I suppose that’s what makes novellas so much fun though! If this was ever a question of whether I would bother to read this then the answer was always, obviously! I loved book one!!

What it Covers

This is the story of Alex and her Mum – the story revolves around the last position that they settled in during their ‘run away’ period. If you haven’t read Half-Blood then you can definitely read this one. It doesn’t give anything away for the main story as the death of Alex’s mum is a fact noted at the very beginning (and something that happens off-stage – hence this novella). This is just filling in the blanks to give you a proper run down of how that happened. Which is great! I love novellas when they’re not essential to the story but great to adding to the story when you’re impatient like me and just need more of everything.

Alex’s Character

I really enjoyed this as a novella by itself – it was fast paced and answered all and any questions I had about the untold stories behind the events of book one. We see a bit more of Alex’s character prior to her rollercoaster of a character arc throughout Half-Blood. It was interesting to see how she interacted with her friends and on the whole built a clearer picture of why she acted as she did around her friends from the Covenant – it just filled in the bits and pieces and allows you to understand where she fits in in the social scheme a bit better.

The other thing this was good for what showing how Alex copes by herself. We only get a very small glimpse of this in the first book, but in this one we see what she has to do to survive after her mum’s death. I won’t go into any further details but all up I enjoyed what this novella had to offer.

Summary

If you’re looking to expand your worldly knowledge of this series’ world then I definitely recommend picking this up. I would also recommend reading this after the first book – I feel reading it first would make the story here quite so-so. By itself, this is a reasonably bland taste of what Armentrout has to offer to us, but as a novella and companion to the series I think it was a great addition to just answer any questions us readers might have towards the ‘before’ to Alex’s know life in Half-Blood.

See my review of Half-Blood