You Really Got a Hold on Me - She & Him

Touch of Power
Healer, Book 1

Author: Maria V. Snyder
Pages: 392
ARC Acquired from: Mira via NetGalley

Brief Summary:
Avry hides out and tries not to get too close to people, since, should anyone discover her secret, her death will likely be imminent. Why? Because she is a healer, able to take on the diseases and pains of others, so that they can be healthy again. Healers are blessed with speedier healing. Unfortunately, the tide of public opinion turned against those with healing magic after they were blamed for causing a plague that slept the kingdoms and killed many. They received even more hatred for not healing the people of the plague, not knowing that healers could not heal from the plague themselves. Even though she knows the danger, Avry cannot resist healing a young girl from her illness, which results in her getting caught and put in prison to be executed. Rescue comes in the form of a grumpy man named Kerrick, who wants her to heal a man she hates...and he has the plague.

Review:
Oh my goodness. You're going to need to let me gush right now. I just love, love, love this book. Having finished, I almost want to go back to the beginning and start over or read every book Snyder has ever written. Almost from the first pages, I have just devoured this story, living in fear of the ending coming too soon (which of course it did). Book two should be out now! Waiting will be so, so painful.

Okay, I will try to be a little bit more helpful in my review now and explain why I am such a fan girl about this book. Like the main character in the Inside Out series, the only other books I've read by Snyder thus far, Avry is an incredibly strong woman (she's 20, so a bit older) with some serious emotional scarring. Unlike her counterpart, though, Avry has a much more likable personality by nature. She is vibrant, incredibly bright and stubborn as anything (I wonder why I identify with her so much, haha).

Another consistent factor in Snyder's writing is that she is completely stellar at building up romantic tension. Without resorting to any sort of torrid descriptions of the physical reactions every time the hero does so much as touch the heroine, Snyder makes the reader swoon for the heroes as they live vicariously. Honestly. The romance sections are just so amazing, even though she doesn't go into serious detail, you feel and imagine everything.

I also love the fantasy world she created. I mean, princes + magic + dystopian background almost cannot go wrong. And she did it well. Her world feels really well thought out. The different kinds of magic, the way they interact, and the fact that science in its way remains important despite these higher powers completely blew me away with the awesome.

The drama has only just begun, and, as you already know, I will be first in line to read book two. I recommend this highly to fans of The Goose Girl, Kristin Cashore, or Snyder's other books.

"I don't like you
But I love you
Seems that I'm always
Thinking of you
Oh, oh, oh,
You treat me badly
I love you madly
You've really got a hold on me
(You really got a hold on me)
You really got a hold on me
(You really got a hold on me)"