The Spark Within by Samantha Christopher

 

Summary (from the publisher): Even though her ability to control water endangers her in the outside world, Maya Mayfield yearns to be free from the isolated community in the mountains of Oregon. Her only hope of escape is through an arranged marriage that her mother has set up. She must decide between two genetically perfect matches that she almost immediately swoons over. That is, until she spends time with a rebellious and carefree recruit.

Outside Maya's sheltered existence rages a war between those who wield the elements of nature, Elementals, and those who don’t, Commoners. The strict rules of her community prohibit interactions with unmatched young men of the Legion who serve as their protectors. Wanting to make her own choices, she forges a forbidden friendship.

Maya committed to helping produce a powerful generation of Elementals by bonding with one of her matches. However, that was before she experienced the effects of pitting two good men against each other, vying for her love. This becomes more than a decision between love and duty as secrets unravel about the world outside her walls.

Review: This was such a unique and intriguing premise! Maya has been raised in an isolated community. Maya and those in her community have unique abilities related to the elements and are at war with commoners. Her mother, a geneticist, analyzes DNA to provide each young woman with two genetically ideal matches, in a unique twist on arranged marriages. Maya has been matched by her mother with two compatible young men and has a short period of time to decide which to marry. But along the way, she gets to know a third young man who opens her eyes to things about the outside world she didn't know and helps her start to question parts of her life that she has always taken for granted. 

I really appreciated that this is true young adult! By that I mean, many books in that category include explicit/inappropriate content. While the characters in this book are considering very adult paths (as they should in an upper young adult novel), this book did not include excessively violent or spicy content, which I really appreciated for this category. 

This book was not a love triangle but a love quadrangle. Multiple men vying for Maya's hand gave this a Bachelorette mixed with Survivor vibe. This felt like a lot to keep up with as a reader and just a lot in general, but I did like that Maya knows that her choice is not just for the man but for her long-term life and whether or not she will continue to blindly follow her mother's life choice for her or take a different path. 

I do wish the characters had had a little more depth to them. Maya comes across as very naive and immature, especially for someone who is supposedly ready to marry, but I understand in part this is because she has been raised in isolation. In the final chapters, the reader gets pulled in a lot of different directions on a lot of various subplots concerning the outside world, Maya's family, her love life, and more. Of course, it was necessary to set the scene for the next book, but it felt like almost too much going on. 

This novel really ends on a cliffhanger, perfectly setting us up for book two in the trilogy. 

Stars: 3