Review: Zodiac by Romina Russell

Title: Zodiac

Author: Romina Russell

Series: Zodiac

Publication: December 9th, 2014

Goodreads / Amazon

Summary: Rhoma Grace is a 16-year-old student from House Cancer with an unusual way of reading the stars. While her classmates use measurements to make accurate astrological predictions, Rho can’t solve for ‘x’ to save her life—so instead, she looks up at the night sky and makes up stories. When a violent blast strikes the moons of Cancer, sending its ocean planet off-kilter and killing thousands of citizens—including its beloved Guardian—Rho is more surprised than anyone when she is named the House’s new leader. But, a true Cancerian who loves her home fiercely and will protect her people no matter what, Rho accepts. Then, when more Houses fall victim to freak weather catastrophes, Rho starts seeing a pattern in the stars. She suspects Ophiuchus—the exiled 13th Guardian of Zodiac legend—has returned to exact his revenge across the Galaxy. Now Rho—along with Hysan Dax, a young envoy from House Libra, and Mathias, her guide and a member of her Royal Guard—must travel through the Zodiac to warn the other Guardians. But who will believe anything this young novice says? Whom can Rho trust in a universe defined by differences? And how can she convince twelve worlds to unite as one Zodiac?

DNF

I have been waiting for a while to read this book. It always on the back of mind. Then, finally when I get the time to read it, it was so disappointing. The plot and the characters were so boring; I reached up to 44% of the book and had to convince myself that this was not my kind of book.

Zodiac is about a young girl named Rho who has the special skill of reading the stars differently than her peers. I didn’t quite get the whole star-reading part, but I went along with it. After a terrible tragedy on her planet, Cancer, she is chosen to be the next leader—the “Holy Mother”—for the House of Cancer. Eventually, she predicts some bad omens, and no one believes her. So of course that’s where the adventure is supposed to begin. But from what I have read, it did not feel like such an exciting or life-changing one.

The characters and the adventure were both boring. Rho, Mathias, and Hysan were so flat—Hysan was a bit less. There was barely any personality from any of them. Mathias just exists to protect Rho. I feel like Hysan is just there to be the other part of the love triangle and to annoy Mathias. Rho’s family doesn’t even play a huge role; we don’t even know much about Rho’s mom. Rho states that she doesn’t want to talk about her much, but at least give us so more details on why her mom was no longer part of the family. Her friends play more of a role, but they’re always pushed to the background.

Besides the lack of character development, what also irked me was the terminology related to the world they lived in. Most of the time, I was struggling to figure out what the author was trying to write that I lost my attention to the overall scene I was reading. For instance, I struggled to identify things like the “Wave” or “Scan” or “Psy.” These words are very common in English so it was quite confusing. When it comes to objects or tools or even slang from an imagined world, I’d love to get as much description and information about them so the story can be easier to read and enjoy.

I feel like I would have enjoyed this book if the characterization was better, and the love triangle had less attention, and the writing was made clearer. The world Russell created had great potential for a great book. But in my opinion, it was poorly executed. There should be more attention on the world building rather than the character's love triangle.

I'd recommend this book if you like reading about fictional worlds and want to see how this one operates. But if you can't overlook the presence of a love triangle like I did, I do not think Zodiac may be the best choice for your next read.

#zodiac #review #dnf #ya #scifi #1star