Review: Poison by Bridget Zinn

Sixteen-year-old Kyra, a highly-skilled potions master, is the only one who knows her kingdom is on the verge of destruction—which means she’s the only one who can save it. Faced with no other choice, Kyra decides to do what she does best: poison the kingdom’s future ruler, who also happens to be her former best friend.

But, for the first time ever, her poisoned dart . . . misses.

Now a fugitive instead of a hero, Kyra is caught in a game of hide-and-seek with the king’s army and her potioner ex-boyfriend, Hal. At least she’s not alone. She’s armed with her vital potions, a too-cute pig, and Fred, the charming adventurer she can’t stop thinking about. Kyra is determined to get herself a second chance (at murder), but will she be able to find and defeat the princess before Hal and the army find her?

Kyra is not your typical murderer, and she’s certainly no damsel-in-distress—she’s the lovable and quick-witted hero of this romantic novel that has all the right ingredients to make teen girls swoon.

Description taken from Goodreads

My Review

Poison was a delightful, intriguing, adventurous, and cute read.  It really started out with a bang, pulling you right into the story.  Which is always a good thing, you don’t want the beginning dragging out and then have your reader get bored and stop reading.  But after about 50 or so pages, it kind of became dull?  Maybe, dull isn’t the right word, but nothing really seemed to happen to really make me think, “Holy crap, it’s gonna be one of those nights where I don’t sleep.”  I really wanted it to be because it has all the makings of a magical novel.  But sometimes it just fell flat. 

The characters were great.  Kyra, our main character is strong and independent.  She doesn’t take shit from anybody and I definitely loved that about her.  We don’t get much of her upbringing as I would have liked.  So, we as readers, are kind of left to our own to imagine what happened when she was young.  I mean, we get some back story, but it’s just enough to tease us.  I would have liked so see more in the beginning instead of getting it all at the end.  It all clicked at the end but through out the story I felt a little empty because of this.

Our next character, Fred, is a delight.  I loved him.  I found him quirky and swoon worthy.  Again, I would have liked to know more about him in the beginning instead of just surface stuff and then bombarding us at the end with information.  But I think it’s justified, to a point.

Ariana is our princess.  She’s a little spoiled in the beginning, when we learn about her through Kyra’s flashbacks.  But she definitely redeems herself throughout the story and quickly became a bad ass. 

The whole story was so interesting.  It really reminded me of a Disney movie.  Like Tangled, with adventure and Flynn Rider and Rapunzel.  Also like Brave, where there are two girls who don’t want to conform, they want to do their own thing.

It’s truly a magical journey.  Full of potions and poisons.  Princesses and witches.  Goblins and gypsies.  Friendships, sacrifice and loyalty.  Really, a wonderful world Bridget created and I wish I could thank her for sharing it with us.

Like I said before, the story didn’t exactly drag on but I felt that the end of the beginning towards the middle of the book, was a bit slow and I found myself losing interest.  I just wasn’t getting a lot of answers to questions that I wanted and needed.  But I did read on and had all of my questions answered.  And it was wrapped up nicely but a little too quickly for my likely.

I also found out that Zinn has since passed away.  That was kind of heartbreaking for me.  But she left behind a wonderful world that we can read about.

So, if you enjoy Disney movies as well as historical fiction books with a bad ass heroine, like Grave Mercy, then I suggest Poison.

3.5/5 hearts