Review – White Hot Kiss by Jennifer L. Armentrout

White Hot Kiss by Jennifer L. Armentrout
Series: The Dark Elements #1
Also in this series: Stone Cold Touch
Published by Harlequin Teen on 2/25/14
Genres: Love & Romance, Paranormal, Young Adult
Pages: 400
Source: Library
My content rating: Mature YA (Characters have sex, Some language)
My rating:

One kiss could be the last

Seventeen-year-old Layla just wants to be normal. But with a kiss that kills anything with a soul, she's anything but normal. Half demon, half gargoyle, Layla has abilities no one else possesses.

Raised among the Wardens—a race of gargoyles tasked with hunting demons and keeping humanity safe—Layla tries to fit in, but that means hiding her own dark side from those she loves the most. Especially Zayne, the swoon-worthy, incredibly gorgeous and completely off-limits Warden she's crushed on since forever.

Then she meets Roth—a tattooed, sinfully hot demon who claims to know all her secrets. Layla knows she should stay away, but she's not sure she wants to—especially when that whole no-kissing thing isn't an issue, considering Roth has no soul.

But when Layla discovers she's the reason for the violent demon uprising, trusting Roth could not only ruin her chances with Zayne…it could brand her a traitor to her family. Worse yet, it could become a one-way ticket to the end of the world.

This series could easily become an obsession. It has everything I love in a YA paranormal romance – lots of supernatural action, unique paranormal elements (gargoyles, really?), and a bad boy who isn’t a jerk.

What I LOVED:

• Layla. Layla is one of those characters that I just instantly connected with. She has spent her life feeling out of place in the world she’s lived in – while the Wardens took her in as a child, she has never felt like one of them – her Demon side has always prevented that. She’s also been lusting after the guy she was raised with, Zayne – but she can’t have him because if she were to kiss him, she’d take his soul. Layla struggles constantly to keep herself in check because the desire to take a soul is always overwhelming. Because of this, she can’t help but feel like she is, at heart, somehow bad. Meeting Roth turns her impressions of herself (and her life) upside down!
• Roth. Roth is the perfect bad boy love interest, in my opinion. He’s dangerous, sexy, snarky and sometimes arrogant, but never a jerk (unlike a certain other Armentrout love interest who started out pushing my buttons in all the wrong ways (**cough** Daemon **cough**). Roth is a Demon, and he’s proud of it – he’s happy with his somewhat questionable side and he teaches Layla to embrace her “other” half as well – something that she sorely needs in order to truly accept herself. The chemistry between Roth and Layla is off the charts too (which is why this is definitely mature YA). Oh, and he is definitely a bad boy with a heart of gold (my favorite kind!)
• Shades of gray. Are you guys sick of me saying this yet? I LOVE a story where the good guys and the bad guys aren’t so easily defined, and this is definitely one of those stories. Layla herself is half Demon, half Warden, but she’s always done her very best to deny the Demon part of her. Then she meets Roth. He shows her that perhaps everything she’s always believed about Demons isn’t true – at least not for all Demons. He also shows her that the “bad” half of her is still a part of her and that she can’t dismiss it out of hand. Then there are the “good” guys – some of whom are really not good. I love it!!
• The ending. Argh! Armentrout, you kill me! (That’s all I will say about that).

The Negatives:

• Love triangle. There is a bit of a love triangle in the book with Roth and Zayne, but it’s mostly one-sided (toward Roth) in this book. But, I warn you that Armentrout makes it much tougher for you in book #2 (a little foreshadowing for you there).

I LOVED this book and couldn’t wait to read the next one. Luckily, I didn’t have to. Check out my release day review on Tuesday to see what I thought of book #2! 5/5 stars.

About the Author:

# 1 NEW YORK TIMES and USA TODAY Bestselling author Jennifer lives in Martinsburg, West Virginia. All the rumors you’ve heard about her state aren’t true. When she’s not hard at work writing. she spends her time reading, working out, watching really bad zombie movies, pretending to write, and hanging out with her husband and her Jack Russell Loki.
Her dreams of becoming an author started in algebra class, where she spent most of her time writing short stories….which explains her dismal grades in math. Jennifer writes young adult paranormal, science fiction, fantasy, and contemporary romance. She is published with Spencer Hill Press, Entangled Teen and Brazen, Disney/Hyperion and Harlequin Teen. Her book Obsidian has been optioned for a major motion picture and her Covenant Series has been optioned for TV.

She also writes adult and New Adult romance under the name J. Lynn. She is published by Entangled Brazen and HarperCollins.

 

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