After finally getting this out of my forever TBR pile; I finally have a new series to binge read and for that I'm grateful because I have been in a massive slump. I actually remember buying my copy at Dymocks Bookstore in Sydney and when I was about to pay for it; the cashier suddenly said how much she loved this book. It just took me about 2-3 years to actually open the book and read it. I know, I have problems. 
 Okay, so Daughter of Smoke and Bone was basically a 3.75 for me. I added in the 4 star rating because the ending made me want to read the next books. At the start I kind of got confused at first because I didn't know if I was about to jump into urban fantasy or high fantasy since apparently, Karou had two different worlds to juggle. Thankfully the writing was good enough to not make me slack off; nothing was off about the sudden switch of tone in the story. 
 If I were to talk about my favorite character in the book, it would definitely be Zuzana. She's just that one friend of Karou that had no idea what was happening but despite all of the mystery Karou had, she never really bitched about it and kudos to her for that. Like she did at the start but that was because she knew Karou was lying but after that, she became super understanding and funny. I loved her reaction when she met Akiva for the first time; she basically said what was on her mind which was "Oh, hell. Must. Mate. Immediately." and honestly... same. 
 How Akiva was described in the book, of course, who wouldn't think he's attractive? The author kept repeating how people would look twice when it came to seeing him so I can just imagine his perfection radiating from the pages itself. So speaking of Akiva, his relationship with Karou was 65% insta-love for me. When Akiva was introduced, his love for Karou was pretty much predictable already. It didn't help when they actually saw each other because their story arcs suddenly became the typical "hot protagonist meets beautiful girl" kind of thing and yeah, wasn't a fan. However, the good part about this book is that towards the last chapters, when Akiva mentioned how he "knew" her, things started to shift and it was all for the better. Ultimately, what I'm trying to say is that the plot twist jolted me back to my senses to read it until the end. 
 Karou - your normal blue haired art enthusiast was apparently Madrigal. Okay, when they were at the part where they broke the wishbone, I really really really got confused because Karou was nowhere to be seen or /read/ and it was suddenly all about Madrigal. Then I put two and two together and came up with the conclusion that Karou was Madrigal. Aside from the obligatory, "I knew it" reaction; I kind of felt iffy about Karou being this all magical powerful figure (kind of like Maleficent if you ask me lol) but yeah, it would've been super interesting if Akiva had a past with Madrigal but will fall in-love with Karou as herself. At the same time though I think that the connection they had in the past will make things more intense along the way so I'm excited to read about it. 
 At the end, Akiva apparently did something crappy and ended up killing Brimstone and the others because he didn't know at the time that Karou was Madrigal....... ok. I'm not really mad about it because this "anger" Karou will have with Akiva would be an obstacle their relationship would have to overcome. Meaning, more angst and drama and I'm hella ready for it. Because let me tell you, the relationship they both had here in the first book, it could've been better. Hopefully, the second and third book won't disappoint!