The Boy with the Hidden Name by Skylar Dorset ~ ARC Review

The Boy with the Hidden Name (Otherworld #2)
By Skylar Dorset 

Rating: 5+

'I look at my aunts, hesitate, and then say, "What-"

My aunts have gone back to knitting, even more furiously than before.

"You're going to be late for school," Aunt True says, and that is the end of that attempt at conversation.

My aunts hate it when I ask questions. It tends to destroy the world.'

You can't hide from your destiny forever.

Selkie Stewart has been through the adventure of a lifetime. Now, all she wants to do is be a normal girl who does normal things - such as eating ice-cream and complaining about unreliable faerie quasi-boyfriends.

The only thing standing in her way? The Seelies who are planning to take over the world when the clock strikes twelve. 

With the end of Thisworld drawing closer with every tick of the clock, Selkie has not choice but to leave all thoughts of a normal life behind as she sets out on a journey to find the key to saving the world.

Because if anyone can find something, it's Selkie. Whether she knows it or not.

Plans, prophecies and painful predicaments lie ahead.

Selkie needs to find the other three fays - and fast - if they want to fulfil the prophecy and keeping the invading Seelie at bay. But the only person who might know where those three fay are is Benedict Le Fay's mother. 

The same woman that Ben left Selkie to search for. A woman not exactly known for her trustworthiness, and who has been missing for many years.

With mixed feelings where Ben is concerned, Selkie joins her friends on a trip to the Unseelie Court to search for Ben's mother and Ben. 

But the line between friend and foe isn't clear cut, and there's more than one Otherworld creature who would gladly manipulate or even kill Selkie to stop the prophecy from being fulfilled. 

Never trust a faerie...especially with your heart.

With the fate of the world on her shoulders, Selkie's only hope is the prophecy. She needs to be the girl everyone seems to believe she is, no matter what it takes. This fight is no longer about her, or about the Seelie Court. It's about the people she loves and the people she can't leave behind. 

But one little secret will change everything.

Because those around her have kept a part of the prophecy secret - a part that not only predicts the loss of someone she loves, but that also fractures Selkie's faith in her own destiny.

Is Selkie the one who'll save the world? Or is she the one who'll brings it to its knees?

With spot-on humour, Wonderland-esque logic, and magical twists and turns, Skylar Dorset's The Boy with the Hidden Name is an example of YA fiction at its best.


My thoughts on the book:

Where do I even begin?!
This series is pure dynamite. An explosion of creatively constructed characters and wacky comedy, it's a delightful shock to the 'reading senses', so to speak.

As I'm crazy-obsessed with this book, I'm going to take this chance to share my top 3 favourite quotes (there are heaps more, but this post can't go on forever!)

#3: Will's Clock Logic:

"Selkie?" Will says from the foyer. "Ready?"
"The clock stopped," I call down to him.

"What does that mean?" he asks. 

I look down at him in surprise. "I thought you would know." 

"Why would I know what that means? It isn't my clock. But I'm going to assume, based on recent events, that it is probably another portent of ill to come and we should get moving and not spend time winding it." 

I am already on my way down the stairs. "Fine," I say to him. "I didn't need a speech." 

#2: Will Proves That Wizards Don't Know Everything:

"Aren't you a wizard?" I ask. "Just magic it open."

"Sorry, I was busy learning important spells like disguising silver boughs to smuggle into prison for you and casting a protective enchantment over an entire city. I didn't bother to memorise the spell for opening subway train doors."

"You don't know the spell to open things?" I say in disbelief. 

And then the doors slide open.

I look at Will, who looks back at me, and then we both turn our heads. 

Safford is replacing the emergency door release handle. "What?" he says at our looks. "Didn't you want to open the door?" 

#1:  Where Ben Expects A Different Kind Of Welcome

"Are you okay?" he demands again, and his face swims back into my vision, his unclassifiable eyes and that beautiful mouth he has and all that artfully tousled hair.

I am furious with him. I lift my hand and give the side of his head a solid whack.

"Selkie," he exclaims, as if he is surprised that this is my reaction to him. Surprised!

I sit up as he rubs at the side of his head and looks hurt. "You look fine," I complain to him, because he ran off and left me and he looks as if he went on vacation.

"What?" He looks bewildered. 

"You're fine. You idiotic..." I struggle for a word to call him. "You idiotic faerie." 

"You're angry with me for being fine? I just saved your life."
"My life was only in danger because you left me." 

**A big thank you to Netgalley for the chance to read and review an ARC of this amazing book, as well as to Skylar Dorset - because without her The Boy with the Hidden Name would never have been born :) **