The Summer of Shambles (Ondine)
Ondine: The Summer of Shambles (Book 1)by Ebony McKenna
This is a brilliantly witty story with a furry tail ending. One girl. One boy. One spell to be broken. Ondine de Groot is a normal fifteen-year-old who lives with her family in the European country of Brugel. She has a pet ferret called Shambles. But Shambles is no ordinary ferret...He's Hamish McPhee, a boy cursed by a witch. A witch who happens to be related to Ondine. When Shambles turns back into Hamish temporarily, Ondine knows that she has to help him break the spell. He is the most gorgeous boy she has ever met and her one true love! He just can't remain a ferret forever. Can he? (goodreads.com)
Ondine is a book that caught my eye a year or so ago. I saw it on a UK-based blog, not sure if it was Wondrous Reads or Dead Book Darling or some other random one that I can't recall. I just know that something about the cover made me head over t I o the Book Depository and add this to my wish list. There was always something else that I just HAD to buy when I'd make a BD purchase so Ondine waited a good long while to be chosen by me. The day I made my decision to spend money I didn't have on a BD order to cheer me up two weeks ago was the day she was chosen. I needed something that had whimsy and light. This was just the book I needed.Things that struck me about the book as I read it:One, the story is set in current day time but it doesn't feel like this at all. I found myself thinking I was reading a fantasy world when in fact the year probably isn't that far off what it is now. The story has this great mix of fairy tale and present day and it explains the lack of tech gadgets in an amusing footnoted way. When present day would sneak back into the story it didn't seem out of place at all. I loved this mixture of contemporary and fantasy.Two, knowing that Shambles is a person in ferret form right from the start was refreshing. Although I found it hard to remember that he was a person in ferret form for much of the story. I sort of wished he was just a charming, talking ferret. :) With knowing what Shambles/Hamish was you knew that wouldn't be the focus of the story, so I was eager to find out just what exactly Ondine and Shambles were about to get themselves into.Third, THIS is the way romance should work in a story. None of that crappy, cop-out instant-love with no chemistry or reason for it. I actually believed the connection between Ondine and Hamish and I was rooting for them by the end of the story. Their relationship (friendship to more) was sweet and believable and extremely charming. I might have accidentally "awww'd" out loud at one point.Finally, I found this book to be exactly what I was looking for with the mood I was in. Fun, funny and a pretty good mystery was just my cup of tea. The sequel is out now I believe and I know it will be on my next Book Depository order no matter what.(One thing that confuses me is that I don't know whether or not to classify this book as YA or MG. It's sort of a mixture of both, but there are some themes in the book that would make it a little more on the YA side. Not anything overly serious, but enough that as I was reading thinking "Oh, good little MG book!" I'd come across something and think "Hmm, but that might be a little more YA." If you're a parent of a middle-grader, I'd read this before and decide yourself. ;))Ondine