Review: Greta and the Goblin King by Chloe Jacobs

Greta and the Goblin King by Chloe Jacobs
Publisher: Entangled
Publication date: November 13th 2012.
My rating: 4 stars

While trying to save her brother from a witch’s fire four years ago, Greta was thrown in herself, falling through a portal to Mylena, a dangerous world where humans are the enemy and every ogre, ghoul, and goblin has a dark side that comes out with the eclipse. 

To survive, Greta has hidden her humanity and taken the job of bounty hunter—and she’s good at what she does. So good, she’s caught the attention of Mylena’s young goblin king, the darkly enticing Isaac, who invades her dreams and undermines her will to escape. 

But Greta’s not the only one looking to get out of Mylena. An ancient evil knows she’s the key to opening the portal, and with the next eclipse mere days away, every bloodthirsty creature in the realm is after her—including Isaac. If Greta fails, she and the lost boys of Mylena will die. If she succeeds, no world will be safe from what follows her back...

Vampires, werewolves, shape shifters, dragons what else is really left for paranormal books to delve into? How about goblins? Those crafty shifty looking buggers from Harry Potter immediately came to mind, but in Greta and the Goblin King we are faced with a whole different kind of goblin, a goblin king who’s fierce, arrogant, infuriating, and confident but most importantly when he growls was hot? Yes ladies forget about the preconceived images you already have of short goblins with sharp claws and razor like teeth, because this goblin will leave you in a trembling mess.

As you can already see Isaac the goblin is easily taking up the majority of my thoughts, this is how much of a great impression he left on me. Anyway I digress; I will come back to Isaac in much more detail later. Greta and the Goblin King was a book which took me highly by surprise. As soon as I started this book I knew Jacobs had lured me in a world that I didn’t want to leave any time soon. A world where poor Greta finds herself thrust into. A world she’s the suspecting victim of, with goblins and fairies and who knows what other creatures. Who become even more rabid, and display large amounts of bloodlust during the eclipse that Greta has to be locked away until they calm down, how has Greta managed to survive? And why was she specifically chosen for this insane world? These are the questions that were on my mind throughout. It was such a dangerous and scary world how the heck did a girl of Greta’s age manage to cope? Losing everything back home I know I would be a complete mess, and realising some of the creatures you actually dreamed about when you were younger actually exist? Greta was lucky as she stumbled out into a crazy world, but she found someone who took her in, knowing about the dislike of humans in Mylena, Luke trained her well, she knew how to defend herself and keep herself hidden and to herself when necessary. But then an unexpected turn of brutal events forces Greta to go on the run, with god knows what after her, she is immediately thrown into a game of cat and mouse with the newly crowned Goblin King Isaac and in the process stumbles across something she never imagined.

The first few pages Greta and the Goblin King was brimming with brilliant fast pace and action. But as soon as the unfortunate incident took place, Jacob’s upped the ante a whole another level that I found myself flying through the pages at a frenzied pace with my heart thrumming against my chest at a high accelerated beat. With one particular mission in sights, knowing she had to be willing to sacrifice her own life and with the eclipse looming even closer, Greta had it all to deal with, but I truly admired her strength and stubbornness she displayed. She knew she had the easy option she could take at any time, but she showed the will and courage to battle on. The group of characters which emerged in her path along the way were a nice surprise, in a lot of ways they reminded me of The Lost Boys from Peter Pan, stuck in a world with deadly creatures and no parents but they still showed the will to survive. I was so torn between Greta remaining with this group, because they needed her help the most and the bottom line was that it was the right thing to do. But then there was the infuriating yet hot goblin Isaac who insisted on protecting Greta and threatening to find her anyway. What was his underlying reason for pursuing Greta? Of course all of Mylena disliked humans, so could she really trust him?

Greta and the Goblin King is a book sure to keep you on your toes, with its endless surprises, constant questions at the tip of your tongue, it’s positive to keep you fired up. I was torn about which path I wanted Greta to take, but was satisfied with the way the majority of things turned out. There are some aspects which were left unanswered but I’m hoping these will get tackled in the next instalment.

I highly praise Jacobs for her alluring and beautiful writing; she was quick to hook you in with her tantalising pace and was also able to throw a few curveballs that further damaged my helpless heart. If you’re looking for something different and want to get lost in a mystifying world of rampage, destruction and addictive characters I hugely recommend picking this book up.

Favourite Quote:
"I'll take care of myself
Stubborn human. I will find you.
Arrogant goblin. I dare you."