It took me a long time to start reading Sharon Shinn. For whatever reason I just wasn't sure that she would end up being the type of author that I really liked. This was all put to rest when I read both Mystic and Rider and now Archangel. 
 Archangel takes place in the future in a place called Samaria where Angels and humans co-exist. There are very strong religious tropes applied to the book, but never once did I only think it was a book about God. It's a book that occurs in a time and place where people believe in the existence of god (or Jovah in this case). Where angels sing to Jovah in order to show their devotion and faith and to help take care of the planet / human population. It's as simple as that, and Shinn doesn't get preachy with the beliefs. They just are. 
 Gabriel is an Angel and in six months time he will ascend to the role of Archangel (bascially the head angel above all the others). Every Archangel must have an Angelica (or wife) that will sing at the Gloria (a yearly ceremony praising Jovah, this year will also mark the changing of the Archangel). The people believe a lot in predestination. Gabriel's angelica is predestined for him, but he has yet to find her. As time grows short, he grows weary. No one wants to suffer Jovah's displeasure if there is no angelica to sing at the Gloria. Luckily, Gabriel finds that his angelica is actually a slave girl in a human home. He is able to take her out of that home, but there's plenty of conflict along the way. 
 Rachel has been a slave for 5 years since her Edori people were attacked and killed. She hasn't had an easy life. She was orphaned at a young age and then her people are killed and she's taken into slavery. Until Gabriel finds her she believes that she will spend the rest of her days as a slave. 
 Rachel was a very complicated character. You sympathize with her situation(s) you want her to have all that is good, but she makes this very difficult. She full of a lot of anger for all the things that have happened in her past. She sees being chosen as Gabriel's angelica as another form of imprisonment and she's very stubborn to concede to living with the angels. I understood her hesitancy and her stubborness, but there comes a moment when she was almost stubborn for the sake of being stubborn. She demanded that the other angels / people of the Eyrie didn't like her because she was a slave and didn't get to know her, yet she would also not put forth the effort to get to know many angels / people either. She wanted them to understand where she was coming from, yet she made no show to understand them. When she would finally acknowledge her feelings, she would still shut herself off for unknown reasons to me. I didn't understand a lot of her actions, specifically towards the end. She finally admited to herself that she loved Gabriel but wouldn't stay because he didn't ask her to. Why couldn't she make the first move? 
 Gabriel is the other side of this coin. Like Rachel, he is very proud. He doesn't feel like he needs to justify his actions and when he is asked to, he gets angry. I was less confused by many of his actions than I was by Rachel's. Maybe it was just that I was less irritated with his actions. I think it's because he started to make more of an effort with her early on than she did with him. He would make and effort and she would shoot it down so they would take about 2 steps back on their progress with one another. 
 The relationship between Gabriel and Rachel was a main focus of the story. How or would these two ever get on the same page? Would they ever admit their feelings for one another? 
 The current archangel Raphael with another conflict in the story, although I almost thought that it seemed a bit too casually thrown in there. Raphael doesn't want to give up his position of power amoung the angels. Upon investigation Gabriel discovers that Raphael has not been doing his job as well as he should have been these past twenty years. I liked this storyline and wish it would have been explored just a little more. Shinn throws into the mix the fact that Raphael was the one responsible for Rachels parents dying when she was young as well as her adoptive Edori tribe being eradicated and her being thrown into slavery. I think that's an interesting twist, but we don't real get a reason for it. I assumed it was becuase Raphael knew that she would be the next angelica and he wanted to prevent that from happening, but as far as I know, we were never given a definative reason as to why she was apparently singled out. Because of that, this whole storyline seems kind of throw away. 
 I really did like the book though. I do wish that we could have seen Rachel and Gabriel exploring their relationship more when they had finally figured out what they wanted out of it. I thought that the world Shinn created here was very unique and interesting. I know that each book takes place in varying times and with different characters around Samaria. That kind of makes it difficult to form an attachment with the characters, especially if the next book takes place 150 years in the future and the characters we've just learned about in Archangel are no longer there. But I guess we'll see. Until Then!