Wasn't able to read and give feedback before book was removed from e-reader


Two young women, with intertwined fates centuries apart, must protect the secret of the powerful, all-healing mushroom known as amakuna

• The gripping story includes mystical visions, shamanic rituals, past lives, an ancient lineage of medicine women, love, betrayal, conspiracies, and murder

• Set concurrently in modern times and in 1492 during the Conquistadors’ takeover of the Canary Islands

If you're like me, you're going to read the description of this book and think that it's so interesting you can't pass it up. Although it's a massive book, over four hundred pages, I devoured it in under five hours, and I believe that you could too if you wanted to. Romy, from Germany, is feeling impulsive after learning that her friend, Thea, has cancer. Usually they rock climb together, but because of her illness, she hasn't been able to in a long time. Though Romy is confident in her skills, mistakes happen, and climbing without a harness is one of them. Of course, she falls twenty five feet.

But that's when something strange happens. She's knocked unconscious for over seven hours. While she's out, she has a kind of vision, of a girl named Iriome, who lives in the Canary Islands. She learns about a healing ceremony, and watches as the aged medicine woman takes her own life and warns her students of men who will come and take from them, and don't care about anything but themselves.

She wakes up unharmed, with a strange taste in her mouth, and her life is forever changed. She spends a long time after that tracking down the origin of the ritual, in a race against the clock to heal her sick friend. But that's not all this book has to offer. It's also a tale of Iriome, losing her identity and whole community as a war takes place around her in 1492.

The first thing I have to say about this book, is actually two things, and they are that I usually don't like historical fiction, and I don't usually like stories with two points of view, but this book is a game changer. The characters are very realistic, not only in how they act but what they do, and I think anyone would do the same thing if they were in the character's place. I think my favourite character is Iriome, just because she goes through so much and is able to come out somewhat clean on the other side.

The world that the book is set in is present day Germany, and 1492 in the Canary Islands. It was really interesting to see this parallel to the world that we live in, and I really enjoyed the blurb at the back that explained what actually happened, in out lives. I'm not really sure what to compare this to, but I think that if you think it's something you would like, you should definitely give it a shot. It's easy to get into, and once you start it, you can't put it down.

Thanks for reading!
(Radioactivebookreviews.wordpress.com)

An absolutely fantastic and wholly original book. The story and characters will draw readers in and the fantasy and mystical elements will capture and hold the reader's attention.
4 Stars

I loved this book.I'm not normally a fan of books that go back in time but this is so well written I couldn't stop reading.