A Touch Mortal - Leah Clifford

A Touch Mortal  (A Touch Trilogy #1) 

- Leah Clifford

Grade: YA

Rating: 4/5 stars

Eden didn't expect Az.

Not his saunter down the beach toward her. Not his unbelievable pick-up line. Not the instant, undeniable connection. And not his wings.

Yeah.

So long, happily-ever-after.

Now trapped between life and death, cursed to spread chaos with her every touch, Eden could be the key in the eternal struggle between heaven and hell. All because she gave her heart to one of the Fallen, an angel cast out of heaven.

She may lose everything she ever had. She may be betrayed by those she loves most. But Eden will not be a pawn in anyone else's game. Her heart is her own.

And that's only the beginning of the end. (Description from Goodreads)
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I started 'A Touch Mortal' knowing almost nothing about it except that bloggers I follower adored the book. I seem to be developing a habit of this. I feel that sometimes it's good to have no prior knowledge of a book, it means you're super surprised when events are thrown your way, like I was in 'A Touch Mortal'.

Eden is a mysterious main character. A pathless human, made immortal by death. You're probably thinking 'vampire' or 'zombie' if she's 'made' immortal; but no, nothing so known. Eden is a Sider (suicide victim), made that way because of her pathless life; having no future in the human world. But being a Sider isn't all about immortality. Siders are full of Touch, a strange power that's described as being like a virus that must be passed onto humans and can affect their emotions. Add to this the fact that angels, some of which travel to Earth frequently, seem clueless about the Siders' existence and you have yourself an amazing plot.

The mystery of the Siders still has me stumped, and I'm dying to work out what their purpose is, especially with the way Eden's special gifts seem even more unknown than normal; it puts an extra spanner in the words. I'm also still not completely sure what Touch is made of, or at least why the Siders accumulate so much of it. Is it because of their lack of path as humans, that they're compelled to leave a part of themselves on someone else? Maybe I missed something while reading, but I hope to get more answers in the future because I'm really interested to know more about Touch.

'A Touch Mortal' really focuses on the Siders and introducing us to the possibility that there's more to them than in known. But what I was really curious about were the Angels. Three types: the Bound, angels who cannot lie, the type you'd expect to find wearing glowing halos; the Fallen, those who have sinned and given into darkness; and then you have the winged angels, ones that have been kicked out of Heaven and are stuck between world, forced to make a choice, to use their wings to fly home and admit their sins or to fall. There wasn't nearly enough angel action for my liking. I wanted to know more about each world and the people who are a part of them. I hope we see more in the next book.

The book has a confusing beginning. So many terms are being introduced at once and little is being explained. You have to learn about the Angels, Siders and Touch as you read and even then you're still left with questions. There is a lot of learning to be done. I think Leah took a risk with the confusing plot, because there's a chance for readers to be frustrated by only getting bits and pieces of the puzzle. I found that the lack of explanation made it impossible not to want to know more. I know being left in the dark can sometimes be unsettling, like you're lost without a guide; but trust me, the confusing aspects start to become the norm and it's easy to be caught up in the moment when you get past this lost feeling. I was so curious to see how everything fell into place that I had to keep reading.

I was a little sad about all the time we seem to miss. We're thrown into the relationship of the story almost on the first page. Az and Eden meet and then we skip two weeks into the future, not really getting the chance to see their feelings and connection develop. One minute they're meeting and the next they're in love. I wanted to see more of their time together. It's not the only time jump we come across. We miss a lot of Eden learning to be a Sider and discovering what makes her so special. It's a bit rushed. The book covers a really large time period in terms of what would normally happen in books. Instead of being a few major events over the course of a week, 'A Touch Mortal' occurs over a few months, so I understand that not every day can be included in the mix, because that'd make the story a bit boring, but I would have liked to see a bit more of what happened in between, including more scenes with Az, Gabe and Kristen. But despite this I still found the story super exciting.

Dying to find out what happens next, especially with the way it ended.

4/5 stars


Kim
(Originally posted on Goodreads)