Songstone

***

3 Stars/5

Kita has always been an outcast in her village, as she was found in the forest as an infant and is believed to be one of the mysterious Huwi tribe. The village medicine man, Makito is her master, but though everyone in the village likes and respects him, he is hiding a dark secret, he uses black magic with Kita’s blood. This is why she has never told anyone that she can meld song into stone, for fear that Makito will be able to use it for evil purposes. That is until Pono, a journeyman from a tribe on the other side of the island come to take back a storyteller to his village, Kita sees this as her opportunity to escape. But there journey is fraught with danger, will they survive to complete their mission.

Songstone is an enjoyable book based around the New Zealand Maori traditions. This book is very describitve as you could really see the island, however, the plot was a bit slow and it felt like there were two different stories in one, the mission to go to Pono’s village and their time with the Huwi.

I liked Kita as she was nice yet very much struggled to fit in anywhere, but I did find her a bit weak as I felt she relied too much on Pono to save her. Pono is brave and is willing to fight against those who put him down, but I felt we did not know him very well. The romance felt forced as there was no spark between Kita and Pono.

I would recommend Songstone to fans of Broken Aro by Jen Wylie and Unknown by Melissa Pearl.