Time for a mini-review again! I haven’t done a list review in forever, and I think it’s time. Especially because I’m so conflicted about The Path Keeper – it’s an okay book, and yet I struggled to get through the first half of it. Might be personal reasons, really – so I’ll try to lay out all of my complicated feels about it!

The Path Keeper is about forbidden love between people who never seem to get to meet. And yet one day, they do. And everything goes haywire. Ella, the main character, can’t seem to understand why Zac, the one she desperately fell for, won’t answer her questions and seems conflicted – wants to love her, and yet, keeps avoiding her and disappearing. Speaking about which, Ella doesn’t even understand why she fell for Zac like that at all, without really knowing much about him. There are many questions to be answered, and it will all come together at some point – but before that happens, Ella has to go through a lot. And remember who she truly is. Or rather, learn about who she and Zac truly are and why their love is forbidden.

Who The Book Is For And Who It Isn’t For

• The Path Keeper is based on a reincarnational idea of life. If you’re not comfortable with that, it’s not for you
• If you’re Christian and religious, also maybe don’t read it because the story talks about Jesus in this fictional world and it might not go down very well or make you uncomfortable if you’re a strict believer in the Bible. I won’t say it exactly challenges the Bible, but you might not be comfortable reading it
• This book has quite a lot of sex scenes. I didn’t expect it, and although I normally skip it, I felt like they were written okay. So if you’re not comfortable with it, it’s one of those books where skipping works, but if you don’t like skipping – the book isn’t for you
• Triggers are: mass death, war, rape, violence, abandoned mothers, teen pregnancy, being an orphan or just being abandoned or mistreated by your parents, suicide, suicide of family members

The Good Stuff

• It centers on love that breaks the barrier of lives, and that’s beautiful! We’re not just talking romantic love, although that is largely the focus, but also just family relationships and friendships that continue on and on throughout lives. The book has this vibe long before it reveals anything, so I don’t feel like it’s much of a spoiler, especially as the blurb hints about it too
• It’s not a short book, so if you fall in love with the characters, you will be able to have a long nice relationship with them, so to say
• It’s very nicely written and readable

The Not So Good Stuff

• And yet, I had difficulty getting through the first half. I did like how it reads and flows, but something kept stopping me from reading for days at a time
• It doesn’t really get anywhere until like 50%, and I mean literally. And it’s LONG. Or at least, it felt long? I mentioned that if you loved the characters, that would be fine, but… I didn’t love the characters.
• More about that… The characters kept being hot and cold and changing their mind, and a lot of them did that. It took away from the story cause it felt like the author was rewriting the characters on the spot. They tended to make huge life decisions on a whim in this book, and I mean all of them. It was a little bit odd.
• I especially didn’t like Ella, the main character. She’s so wishy washy and needy, although she admits it… but she just felt really unlikable. Maybe just for me! That might be why I didn’t enjoy the first half much, but Ella is still a very valid character and personality type, so it’s just my preference – it won’t hinder others from loving the book.
• The ending baffled me, until I remembered this is part of a series. Then it sort of made sense, but was still quite unsatisfying.

The Bad Rep Stuff

• I know I’m anal about this, and I’m happy the main character is curly, but AT NO POINT do naturally curly girls COMB their hair, if they want to STAY curly (which the character is portrayed doing multiple times.) Read literally ANY curly girl forum to find out. I am always very touchy about how curly girls are portrayed because they’re never portrayed right, especially because many curly girls are faced with a lot of shit stereotypes (at least where I live), so I’m just overly sensitive about it. I guess I should be thankful the main character is curly at all and not be anal about this little detail, but it’s just how I feel and I felt like I had to mention it. (Update: I talked to the author and she says she can’t even imagine how this slipped through, especially as she was curly during periods of her life as well.)
• And now that I mention it, there were a few details that bothered me as well. Like the use of the phrase ‘exotic gypsy girl’ or a Chinese girl being described as looking as a ‘China doll’. I maintain that’s the editor’s fault – any good editor should weed this out. These phrases belong in the 80’s at the latest, if at all anywhere. They have no place in books of today for reasons I’m sure you all understand so I won’t explain.

I thank the publisher for giving me a free copy of the ebook through NetGalley in exchange to my honest opinion. Receiving the book for free does not affect my opinion.

Read about The Path Keeper, a love story throughout centuries: the good, the not so good and the bad – ★★★☆☆ 3 stars: Click To Tweet

So have you read any other books where love spans centuries and lifetimes? Which books were these?