Review: Behind Every Illusion by Christina Harner

Behind Every Illusion by Christina Harner
Publisher: Two Trees Books; 1 edition
Pub Date: May 31, 2009
500pp

"All creatures born of human parents must be human and therefore must be ordinary." Even the soft-spoken eighteen-year-old Tatiana Lewis wholeheartedly accepts this logic. So when she begins to experience unusual changes, she has no clue where to turn and instead keeps her new abilities a secret. But her best friend and brother, Isaac, sees past her illusions and together they explore the significance of her differences and search out the meaning behind them. Amidst tragedy, unimaginable transformations and an unexpected friendship, Tatiana has to learn to reveal the girl hidden behind her illusions and what it means to face the world in order to preserve not only the forest but her very existence.

This is such an original and unique story. Imagine if humans evolved in to mystical creatures ….

It’s refreshing to see a different side of the “fairy tales.” Christina crafted a beautiful story with a wonderful purpose that involves a lot of the issues that our planet is having today. Global Warming, Pollution, Recycling and saving the Trees are issues that we face today and saving the environment is a major theme in this book as it relates to humans evolving for the purpose to help save the world.

I really enjoyed Christina’s writing style. The plot and what it entails is so different from what I’m use to reading. Just going by the cover, I automatically thought “Ooh another fairy story,” but it’s so much more than that.

The characters in Behind Every Illusion are quite interesting in ways that I’ve never met anyone so focused and passionate about saving the earth, I will admit that I know I could be more environment friendly than I am at this point. I guess I can only conclude that until saving the environment becomes an urgent threat, only then will people realize how we need to wake up and start making changes.

Overall this was a good read. “Save The Planet” was a constant theme throughout and it seemed to be slow at certain points – maybe the length had something to do with this, but it always seemed to keep my attention because I had to know what would happen next.

I will definitely read the next book in this series!

Rating: 3 ½ out of 5 Stars

**Side note – Christina Harner informed me that the ARC I received had been cut 25000 words, so that’s like 7 chapters less. I honestly believe if I had the final version I would have given this book 4 out of 5 Stars.

This book was reviewed as part of Traveling to Teens.