Angelfall by Susan Ee book review

It's been six weeks since angels of the apocalypse descended to demolish the modern world. Street gangs rule the day while fear and superstition rule the night. When warrior angels fly away with a helpless little girl, her seventeen-year-old sister Penryn will do anything to get her back.

Anything, including making a deal with an enemy angel.

Raffe is a warrior who lies broken and wingless on the street. After eons of fighting his own battles, he finds himself being rescued from a desperate situation by a half-starved teenage girl.

Traveling through a dark and twisted Northern California, they have only each other to rely on for survival. Together, they journey toward the angels' stronghold in San Francisco where she'll risk everything to rescue her sister and he'll put himself at the mercy of his greatest enemies for the chance to be made whole again.

My rating: 5/5

“I am an ant in the battlefield of the gods. There's no room for pride or ego, and barely enough room for survival.”

I’m sorry I’m a bit speechless by how FRICKEN AWESOME THIS BOOK IS.

You want a heroine who is brave? Who is smart and sassy and loyal as hell to those she loves??

You want a hero that is sexy but not rude? Sarcastic and awesome??

Amazing worldbuilding? Fast paced? Sleepless nights until you finish a book??

Angelfall starts six weeks after the angel apocalypse, when angels came down from the sky and, after Gabriel its leader and messenger was shot, they wrack havoc in the world causing a world-scale collapse of civilization and living people to fend for themselves not only against murderer angels but also against the gangs that have taken over.

Penryn is a teenager who is in charge of her sister Paige, a seven year old who has to be moved around in a wheelchair (you can imagine how practical that is during an apocalypse) and is also in charge of their mother who suffers from Schizophrenia, and who was the causal of Prim’s condition.

 I particularly enjoyed, if I'm being honest, her relationship with her mother. We hardly see characters with mental illness in books, not to mention being played correctly and not as a mock or as something "cute". Penryn understands her mother's illness, but she doesn't try to downplay her or ignore her, instead she knows what she wants and needs.

Despite having to be constantly moving around to find food and escape gangs and angels while being constantly on the lookout for her family, Penryn never complains and that is something that I loved about her. She doesn’t see her family as a burdain at all, on the contrary, she loves her sister and her mom and would do anything for them, regardless of the cost.

This is proven when her sister Paige is taken by angels. During one of their moves they come across a fight in between angels in which one is taken down and the others cut off his wings. Desperate to save her family, Penryn helps the fallen angel, only to buy time for her family to escape but things go wrong and as a punishment, one of the angels takes her sister.

But something strange happens, as Penryn watches the angel fly away with her sister, he doesn’t drop her but instead takes her somewhere else. It had not been the first time they had seen them taking children and, convinced that she can still help her she forms an unsteady alliance with the fallen angel, Raffe.

I loved the heroine, I loved the world, so dark and gritty that had me praying for everything to turn out alright. I loved Raffe, of course and his smartass personality.

Try not to move around too much so you don't bleed again. The bandages aren't that thick and blood will soak through pretty quickly.”

“No problem,” he says. “Shouldn't be too hard not to move around as we run for our lives”

I also loved that this was not instalove, the romance in here is very subtle and real. It’s about two enemies realizing they have more things in common than they thought, and discovering they could actually get along, if not more.

The end, however, I must warn you… it’ll leave you wanting more.