When the synopsis of P.C. Cast's Divine by Blood landed in my inbox, I felt I had to take a chance on a story that started out with a woman from a parallel universe being freed from a tree into modern-day Oklahoma. Even though I had not read the first novels in this series, I just had to find out what kind of story could come of that beginning so I picked it up and started reading.

After a lengthy introduction to the history of the Partholon universe, we are introduced to Morrigan Parker, an 18 year-old who feels that she doesn't fit in with the rest of the girls she knows. Raised by her grandparents after her mother died giving birth to her, Morrigan at last finds a place she feels comfortable – the Alabaster Caves, which are filled with dazzling crystals.

All her life Morrigan has heard voices, which her grandparents told her to ignore. Who was it speaking to her, perhaps her long dead mother? Morrigan didn't know, but hoped someday she would find out. That someday came when she toured the Alabaster Caves and found that the crystals in the cave were talking to her. If she touched them, they would light up with energy and speak to her.

Sharing this news with her grandparents, they finally told her the truth of her birth. Her mother was in reality a woman from a parallel universe where the Goddess Epona ruled all. Her mother had been Epona's Chosen One but had taken a path toward evil and been cast out of that world and into a forest in Oklahoma where she had been trapped in a tree until the eve of Morrigan's birth. Morrigan found that her grandparents feared she would share her mother's fate and follow the dark God Pryderi if she listened to the voices in her head.

Morrigan knew that couldn't be the case, the way the crystals had called her "Light Bringer" and the power she felt in the cave couldn't be evil, it just couldn't. She had to find out for herself and went back to the Alabaster Caves in the dead of night only to find herself transported to that other world called Partholon, where Epona ruled all. What in the world was she going to do now?

Divine by Blood is Ms. Cast's last book in the Partholon Novels series. Since it is a continuation, a lengthy portion of the book is an introduction of the previous storyline updating the reader on the connection between Partholon and Oklahoma as well as the history of the main characters in the previous stories.

I have not read the other installments in the series so that may affect my view of this book, but in general I found Divine by Blood to be incredibly disappointing. With a creative and complex storyline behind it and such wonderful reviews given to the first few novels, I was surprised to find Divine by Blood predictable and just plain boring.

The characters are shallow and self-centered and I really had to push myself to finish the book because I didn't care at all what happened to them. I hoped Ms. Cast would salvage the book with a surprise ending, but she didn't. It ended exactly as I suspected it would, even as a first time reader of the Partholon Novels.

I can't in good conscience recommend Divine by Blood to anyone who has not read the previous installments. It does not stand strongly enough on its own as a story and you won't find much to like in its characters or attempted romance. If you have read the other Partholon Novels then perhaps you should read it to gain closure with your well loved characters, but I'm afraid you will be disappointed. 
 
Reviewed By Sabine Maurier
© March 2008