The Arrival is the first of The Birthright Trilogy by Nicole MacDonald, a proud Kiwi woman who’s bold blog title philosophy “Damsel in a Dirty Dress, screw being the damsel in distress!” is reflected in the attitudes of her four main heroines. Of all the highlighting features of this story, her characterization of these feisty females is by far my favorite. Miss MacDonald captures a perfect balance between the two extremes of the Xena and the fairy tale princess. Cat, Loi, Sian, and Kassie are hilarious at their highs and extremely sympathetic at their lows.

The way she captures the thoughts and feelings of her characters is by far the most unique feature of this novel. When I read something, I normally hate it when an author throws me into the mind of a single protagonist, then right as I’m getting to love them, throws me a sudden point of view switch to someone completely unrelated. The Arrival, however, employs a consistent shift of perspective between the multiple characters of the story to surprisingly great effect. While it took me a few pages to get the hang of such a unique writing device, I didn’t even notice once I got sucked into the action.

The plot itself has both light hearted and gruesome, romantic and tension-filled elements. The Arrival melds its interesting blend of contemporary and epic fantasy effectively into a way that is so believable, it made me get cravings every time it mentioned food! The many well thought out characters drove the action in the best possible way that left me anxious for them, even during the mellow parts of the story.

Overall, it was a damn enjoyable read and I recommend it to anyone who has a love of kick-butt heroines and not-your-average fantasy reads.