Carnival of Souls by Melissa Marr

The Carnival of Souls - The City where daimons exist and the place that was created by witches, only to ban them from the grounds when daimons became more powerful.

Mallory lives with her father (adoptive, not biological) who is a witch. Mallory is not a witch herself, but she knows about witches and daimons. She has been taught her whole life to hate daimons and kill them when she sees them.

In 17 years, she's never dated a boy before. It was all about learning to fight, staying in shape, perfecting her shooting range.

Then Kaleb comes into the picture. This is the first time a boy has caught her attention.

So, naturally, it would mean that he's a daimon, the species she learned to hate.

Kaleb lives in the Carnival of Souls. He's in the Marchosias's Competition, a fight to the death. This competition will allow the winner to go up in status, in class, and allow the winners to rule with Marchosias - the ruler of The City.

Aya is another competitor - the only female in history to go into the Marchosias's Competition and now she's one of the top contenders. But she went into this competition with an agenda in mind: win and not have to breed. She has a secret that she can't allow anyone in The City to find out.

When Marchosias changes the rules about the winner of the competition, it changes everything. The ruler, if male, will marry his living daughter when she turns 18 and be a part of the elite blood family - Marchosias's family. If female, she will marry Marchosias himself and produce another heir to his blood line.

And his daughter? None other than Mallory, who doesn't know she is a daimon.

Now Aya is trying to find another solution since she forbids to ever have children. And Kaleb, who is already falling for Mallory, needs to get out of a job he took to kill Mallory.

Things are about to get interesting for everyone in The City and in Mallory's world. Read Carnival of Souls to find out how it will end!

My Thoughts/Reflections
I love Melissa Marr. I loved her Wicked Lovely series, which I've reviewed on this blog, and she has created another amazing world full of daimon's and witches.

There are so many characters in this book that at first it was a little overwhelming - but now I couldn't imagine this novel without every single one of them.

Of course, I didn't mention all of them in my overview above. Adam is Mallory's "father" (the witch) and Evelyn is Adam's older sister, who is also one of the most powerful witches in the world and can be a little bit...intimidating.

Kaleb is probably my favorite character. He is extremely devoted to his family, which is just him and Zevi, another daimon is who also a cur like Kaleb. A cur is a person who can shift into a stray dog - they get razor sharp teeth and talons and their humanity disappears when they are in this form.

There was so much information in this novel that I'm not sure my review and overview does it justice, but I do want to say that I think everyone should read this!

The narrators of this novel alternate, through MANY characters. Here are the ones I remember: Kaleb, Mallory, Adam, Aya, Zevi, Evelyn, and more that I've probably missed.

So this novel should be read by everyone, no matter what gender or age. The cover is even gender friendly as there is no romantic scene to chase the guys away from picking this book up.

I can't wait for the next book in this series, though I don't know the name of the novel or even when it comes out (this is a very new novel that was just release, so I'm just being impatient).

I do know that I will be putting the next novel on my "To-read" list and sit on the edge of my seat until I get it!