Seen at Bookish Antics! 
 Snow Like Ashes is easily one of the most hyped YA fantasy novels from the past couple of years. Critics and reviewers alike have fallen for this novel and countless individuals have compared it to Graceling, which is one of my all-time favorite books. Though Snow Like Ashes does introduce an exciting, magical world, it has a slow opening that's plagued with info-dumping. This book does have a fair amount of action, but for the most part the plot is romantically driven. 
 The Kingdom of Winter has been essentially destroyed and the only hope left for it are Meira and 7 other refugees. Meira has fallen in love with Mather, the future King of Winter, even though she knows they can never be together. She is tired of being on the side and waiting for Angra, Winter's enemy to destroy her little Kingdom, so she decides to try to rescue the locket that could restore magic to Winter. Soon Meira gets entangled with the prince of another kingdom and she has to balance her feelings for both guys. 
 Snow Like Ashes does introduce a new world with some original concepts regarding magic, but there were too many pages of just plain ole info dumping. I wish Raasch had incorporated this information in a more fluid manner, one that didn't really interrupt the flow of the story. Despite this all, I really loved the world that Sara Raasch created because it was extremely intriguing and wasn't your average fantasy world. I liked the idea of a world divided into seasons, but a part of me wished the Winter and Spring Kingdoms had less obvious names. The magic system of this world wasn't totally new, but it complemented the world perfectly. 
 It took longer than I expected to get into this book because I didn't expect it to be quite so romantically driven. There are very few actions scenes in this novel, but they were extremely well-written, thrilling and captivating. Since the romance drives the plot, I was a bit weary at first but I really became engrossed in the love triangle, much to my surprise. Love triangles are usually my kryptonite, but Raasch's triangle is better than the majority of ones I've seen in YA novels. Both guys definitely have their perks and I can definitely see why Meria likes both of them, even though I have a clear favorite. 
 Snow Like Ashes is a good start to a new fantasy series and I'll definitely read the sequel because Raasch definitely has potential. I truly hope the pace is fixed in book two because that's the only major issue I really had with SLA. Snow Like Ashes is one of the better YA fantasy novels of the year and I'd definitely recommend it to those looking to read an excellent romance.