Five hundred years ago, Jack made a deal with the devil. It’s difficult for him to remember much about his mortal days. So, he focuses on fulfilling his sentence as a Lantern—one of the watchmen who guard the portals to the Otherworld, a realm crawling with every nightmarish creature imaginable. Jack has spent centuries jumping from town to town, ensuring that nary a mortal—or not-so-mortal—soul slips past him. That is, until he meets beautiful Ember O’Dare.
I received this book in exchange for an honest review via NetGalley. I was drawn to this book by the gorgeous cover and the autumn-based mythology surrounding the Jack O'Lantern. It may still be Summer, but I'm craving the Fall so so bad! I was looking forward to jumping into the haunted, spooky world of The Lantern's Ember.
Jack is a mysterious and brooding main character. I enjoyed learning about his history and his position with Run as a Lantern for the Otherworld. I also like Ember, who is a charismatic and lovable mirror to Jack. I wasn't expecting to like the switching of Point of View between Jack and Ember, but it definitely enhanced the tension between the two characters and the others in the book. I also enjoyed the relationships between Jack, Ember and the other characters in the book. Rune's relationship with Jack was especially intriguing.
The Otherworld is extremely vivid, terrifying and chilling in all it's Halloween-esque and monster-infused glory. I loved diving into this unique place and getting to explore it with Jack and Ember. However, the real world that the story starts in and that Ember is from, falls flat by comparison. In the beginning of the book I constantly asked myself not only where am I, but when am I? While Jack's perspective lead me to believe we were based in the current year, Ember's language and references led to believe that we're in a much earlier year. While the entirety of the novel doesn't take place in our world, it definitely distracted me in the beginning.
While the summary and hook of this book promised a fast-paced and exciting story line, I felt like the story, in reality was much slow than I'd anticipated. I was about 20% of the way into the story before what I felt like the true plot was really began. The story really picked up after that point but I was disappointed with the amount of time it took to get to the point that I actually felt invested and excited about the story.
The Lantern's Ember has excellent characters and an exciting setting in The Otherworld. If you enjoy Supernatural and Halloween, you'll love the character-driven and tension-high story in this book. The author is excellent at writing point of view characters and has created a truly unique world. I struggled with the pacing of the novel and some aspects of the setting.