The three main point of view characters are Amar, Kesari and Aleida.
Amar is suffering from a curse that has made him immortal, and is travelling with two companions, Mitul and Saya, on a quest to find out how to rid himself of it.
Kesari is a young girl with a mysterious past. She is a magic user, or Tarja, bonded to a fire spirit named Lucian who hides within a lantern whenever they approach people. There is a sense of shame that she was too young when she bonded with the spirit of a dead Tarja. She was desperate to gain magic but has not used it for two years and now wants to break her bond with Lucian, whose smirks and sarcasm made him my favourite character in this book. She has already forfeit half of her life, and Lucian will most likely cease to exist if their bond is cut. She is impetuous and jumps into decisions too quickly - that’s how she ended up bonded before she became an adult. She is determined not to go with the group to her hometown, but capitulates really easily and circumstances there finally force her to face her past. I thought the depiction of her panic attacks and PTSD were well done as we finally discover her tragedy in a coming of age story arc, and she develops into a braver, more well-rounded young adult.
Aleida is an assassin, bonded to a powerful dragon spirit. She hopes that hunting down immortal Amar will provide a cure for her dying brother, since time is running out for him, yet Amar does not age. There is much more to the dragon spirit, Valkyra, than meets the eye, and this brought an unexpected twist to the end of the story that was a welcome surprise for me.
Not far into the novel Amar is killed by Aleida, which packs quite a surprising punch and seems to set the scene for an exciting, action-packed story. Being immortal, Amar revives, but remembers nothing about himself or his past and recognizes no one. This amnesia and the anger it causes him become his defining characteristics for the first half of the book. I found him really unlikeable from this point until the second half when his personality reverts back. He has no patience with his companions, who are determined to help him. I couldn’t understand why he chose not to talk more to them and find out as much as possible about himself. The complete character change from caring leader to Mr Angry just didn’t work for me.
After having killed and then lost Amar, Aleida is doggedly pursuing the group and torturing people to find out their whereabouts. The ease with which she tortures people and kills Amar seems inconsistent with her caring personality when we see her with her sick brother and his carer.
Each of these main characters seemed so intriguing and had a lot of potential - but I felt that it took the majority of the book until they were fully fleshed out. They felt a a little two dimensional for part of the story.
A lot of emotions were a little too watered down or simply not present for my liking. Captain Rutledge is happy to have the group travel on her ship again in future despite them being pursued by an assassin who just caused a sea battle with a bunch of pirates, and much damage to her ship! There were a few instances like this which didn’t ring true for me.
The death of Amar so near the beginning of the story made me feel like the book would be faster paced and filled with exciting events, however the first half seemed to be a lot of travelling and not much action. The characters were explored and developed during the travelling, however I needed some more action!
The worldbuilding is solid - the group visits a lot of places which are well described and easy to visualize - I just needed something more to happen in each location. Religions are touched upon and historical details of some of the places they visit are given, but not too much all at once.
Luckily the pace picks up nicely towards the end of the book and it definitely gets more compelling in the final quarter, with a wonderful cliffhanger ending which makes me more likely to read its sequel.
All in all Tethered Spirits is an enjoyable YA adventure with a positive message about facing your fears, but it missed some emotional beats for me.
SPFBO score 6.5/10.
