Official Review: Divided by Billie Kowalewski
Posted: 08 Mar 2020, 21:30
[Following is an official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Divided" by Billie Kowalewski.]
In her second book in the Enlightened series, Divided, author Billie Kowalewski tells the story of a world beyond our own, with reincarnated souls who live hundreds of lives on Earth as lessons in their system of education. Picking up with the cliffhanger of the previous book, Harmony has been separated from her soul mate, Kaleb, who returns to Earth for another human life while Harmony remains at home. In order to prevent any pain and disasters that might accompany being separated, Harmony is given the task of spiritually returning to Earth to guide Kaleb. There, Harmony shares with Kaleb the tale of how they met in a previous life, their connected souls always able to find each other in their lives on Earth.
Divided is part of a young/new adult paranormal romance series that takes a look at deep topics such as what happens in the afterlife with a major theme of reincarnation. I read the first book in the series before I read this book, because I find the concept of reincarnation extremely interesting and I wanted to know the entire story before jumping right into the middle of it. I'm really glad that I read the previous book first, and I would recommend that anyone who is interested in picking up this book to start at the beginning of the series as well, just because the first book gives a lot of background about how the reincarnation system works. That was definitely my favorite part of this book. It's unlike anything I have ever read about before, and I loved the lives and lessons that the characters went through, leading up to the events in Divided.
Although this is the second book in the series, the majority of the story takes place prior to the events of the first book. It sounds like it would be difficult to keep all of the timelines straight, as there are several characters and different lives on Earth that Harmony, Kaleb, and their other classmates go through. However, I found that this wasn't the case at all. The perspective shifts from Kaleb's point of view in his current life to Harmony's point of view in a previous life, but it is very easy to keep up with when everything is happening and in which lifetime.
As I previously mentioned, my favorite part of the story was the unique concept of how reincarnation works. However, this was much more prevalent in the first book of the series and much less so within this book. Divided focuses more on one specific life, with lots of details of how Harmony and Kaleb met in that particular life. I estimate that almost half of the book takes place when they are 8-9 years old. I had a really hard time getting into this part of the book, and it was a big chunk of the book. I just found it a little bit awkward reading about innocent children in one chapter and then switching to present-day characters engaging in mildly erotic scenes a few chapters later. I think the flashback of their childhood could have been shortened to a few chapters, and the story still would have flowed just fine. I was more interested in reading about their current story, anyway.
There were quite a few errors scattered throughout the book as well, mostly in the form of possessive/plural mix-ups and your/you're or then/than word choice errors. Because of these errors and my minor disinterest in the childhood portion of the story, I give this book a rating of 3 out of 4 stars. I would recommend it to those who enjoy young adult or new adult paranormal romance and have an interest in the concepts of reincarnation or soul mates.
******
Divided
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon | on Smashwords
In her second book in the Enlightened series, Divided, author Billie Kowalewski tells the story of a world beyond our own, with reincarnated souls who live hundreds of lives on Earth as lessons in their system of education. Picking up with the cliffhanger of the previous book, Harmony has been separated from her soul mate, Kaleb, who returns to Earth for another human life while Harmony remains at home. In order to prevent any pain and disasters that might accompany being separated, Harmony is given the task of spiritually returning to Earth to guide Kaleb. There, Harmony shares with Kaleb the tale of how they met in a previous life, their connected souls always able to find each other in their lives on Earth.
Divided is part of a young/new adult paranormal romance series that takes a look at deep topics such as what happens in the afterlife with a major theme of reincarnation. I read the first book in the series before I read this book, because I find the concept of reincarnation extremely interesting and I wanted to know the entire story before jumping right into the middle of it. I'm really glad that I read the previous book first, and I would recommend that anyone who is interested in picking up this book to start at the beginning of the series as well, just because the first book gives a lot of background about how the reincarnation system works. That was definitely my favorite part of this book. It's unlike anything I have ever read about before, and I loved the lives and lessons that the characters went through, leading up to the events in Divided.
Although this is the second book in the series, the majority of the story takes place prior to the events of the first book. It sounds like it would be difficult to keep all of the timelines straight, as there are several characters and different lives on Earth that Harmony, Kaleb, and their other classmates go through. However, I found that this wasn't the case at all. The perspective shifts from Kaleb's point of view in his current life to Harmony's point of view in a previous life, but it is very easy to keep up with when everything is happening and in which lifetime.
As I previously mentioned, my favorite part of the story was the unique concept of how reincarnation works. However, this was much more prevalent in the first book of the series and much less so within this book. Divided focuses more on one specific life, with lots of details of how Harmony and Kaleb met in that particular life. I estimate that almost half of the book takes place when they are 8-9 years old. I had a really hard time getting into this part of the book, and it was a big chunk of the book. I just found it a little bit awkward reading about innocent children in one chapter and then switching to present-day characters engaging in mildly erotic scenes a few chapters later. I think the flashback of their childhood could have been shortened to a few chapters, and the story still would have flowed just fine. I was more interested in reading about their current story, anyway.
There were quite a few errors scattered throughout the book as well, mostly in the form of possessive/plural mix-ups and your/you're or then/than word choice errors. Because of these errors and my minor disinterest in the childhood portion of the story, I give this book a rating of 3 out of 4 stars. I would recommend it to those who enjoy young adult or new adult paranormal romance and have an interest in the concepts of reincarnation or soul mates.
******
Divided
View: on Bookshelves | on Amazon | on Smashwords