Booktober – Fallen Series Review

From one book series revolving around soulmates to another for me this Booktober; the next series on Niamh’s List is the Fallen Series by Lauren Kate. Move over Underworld and creatures of the night, this time we are dealing with Fallen Angels. This book series is inspired by the story in the Old Testament about Lucifer’s betrayal and The Fall and tells the story of Daniel Grigori and Lucinda (Luce) Price. I always reread this series around this time of year. It is not a Halloween story but I believe it ties in with the celebration of all souls day November 1st with the topic of soulmates.

The story begins with Luce as she tries to understand why devastating shadows haunt her and cause items to catch fire and people who get caught in the middle of it to die. As the story unravels, we are met with a battle between good vs evil, a trip through a number of past lives and join a love story where you decide if the battle is worth finishing the series which, in my opinion, it definitely is!

The next question to answer is what exactly is The Fall? For anyone not as nerd as I, The Fall refers to when a number of angels fell from heaven when they did not choose a side between God and Lucifer. They are doomed to live among us for all eternity. I will admit this genre of book is one you will love or won’t. It comes under Young Adult and fantasy. The series is made up of four books: Fallen, Torment, Passion and Rapture. The series is a continuous story and you would need to read the books in order to get a full understanding of the story itself. It is primarily a fantasy-romantic novel but Rapture includes a lot of the action scenes. Personally, I am fascinated with the concept of past lives so I devoured this series when it came out first and still do to this day. I simply adore this series and have reread it far too many times to count since its first release in 2009. Although I’m fascinated with the concept of past lives, much of my teenage reading when not stuck in the classics revolved around fantasy YA books and this series was by far my favourite storytelling involving angels.

Lauren Kate’s writing style is one that captured me instantly and drew me into her world. Personally, I devour books by the bucketload; however, back in 2009, I could rarely find storylines that I enjoyed that were written well. This series ticked all the boxes.

We begin with Fallen, the story is set in Swords & Crosses, a reform school for young adults. Luce is sent there after she is blamed for the death of her fellow classmate. She’s soon introduced to her new classmates. A tale as old as time begins to unravel as she begins to interact with her fellow classmates. Things to note about Fallen, I hope everyone adores my Penn as much as I do! Keep your eyes peeled during the history lessons you will get in this story, it will help with later books. Lastly, by the end of this book you will begin to choose a side between two different friend groups: Cam’s and Daniel.

In Torment we begin with an eighteen day truce to protect Luce against the Outcasts. She is sent to a school called Shoreline where humans and Nephlim attend side by side. In this book, we begin to explore Luce’s past lives with her. She receives help from two of my favourite characters in the entire series.

Continuing on from Torment is Passion, aka my favourite book of the entire series! This one is all about past lives! It begins after Luce jumps through an announcer. I adore each and every past life, Lauren Kate’s description and obvious research of different eras of history is a fascinating backdrop to the underlying angel theme.

Lastly is Rapture, the most action packed book of the series. Nine days to compete against Lucifer, find three relics and hope all prevails to win. I don’t want to give too much away with this one but I was gobsmacked by the revelation in this one. Fellow readers of this series that I have talked to have said that some saw it coming and others didn’t.

There are also three side novels that tie in with the Fallen Series: Fallen in Love, Unforgiven and Angels in the Dark. Which you could read as stand alone novels, however, the stories themselves would make more sense if you have read the main series. Fallen in Love is set during Valentine’s Day for our characters. I preferred the side characters to our leading characters stories here. Unforgiven is dedicated to Cam and to his heartbreaking story. If Cam ends up being one of your favourite characters, this is a must read! As for Angels in the Dark, this is a digital ebook dedicated to the side characters’ lives. One to read to understand why certain characters are the way they are.

Overall, the Fallen series is one of my favourite book series of all time. I am a sucker for a good love story alongside a story of adventure and suspense. These books I read from start to finish without stopping because I got extremely invested in the story and didn’t want to stop reading until I knew what was going to happen. I hope that if you decide to read it, you will enjoy the series as much as I did.