The Elementals is by far one of my favorite books that I’ve read recently, as its plot is well thought-out, and the research behind the roles of the characters were planned carefully. The book The Elementals is a combination of the five books within the series. Each of them blends easily, so instead of discussing each book on their own, I’m going to cover the characters within. I would define this series as a young adult fantasy, mixed with equals parts romance and action. Some may call it historical as it references past Greek religions and traditions as the main characters heavily rely on Greek god-like figures within the story. Aside from the plot, the five main characters in the story are heavily dynamic and make many changes throughout the series.

The first character, and the main character, is Nicole. She acts as the narrator for the story in a first-person fashion. She moved from a different school into this mysterious new one in the very first book. The first few chapters of this book are basic and truthfully boring. It felt more like the beginning of a basic high school drama movie rather than what it turned out to be. Continuing, after moving into this new school, she was put into a class of what seemed like a bunch of awkward high school kids. She had only noticed one guy, setting up the slight romance in the story. However, it was very clear that this guy was taken, as the girl next to him could have killed Nicole if looks could kill. She later began to realize that this class she was in wasn’t just a regular high school class, but a hidden class for “witches”. Sidenote, the witches in this story aren’t stereotypical witches with pointy noses and chipped black nail polish, but instead they’re just regular people with a magical gift. For any Harry Potter fans, this is a very similar scenario where the magical beings aren’t necessarily creepy. Nicole at first refused to believe that she was meant for this class, but then much later realized that she was the lead of it. She met her best friends, whom of which are also the other main characters within the story, their names being Blake (the guy she noticed), Danielle (his girlfriend), Chris, and Kate. 

Going down the above list, starting with Blake. He was the main guy protagonist in this story as him and Nicole had undeniable chemistry throughout the series. There was more than one romantic relationship in this series as well, but theirs’s was definitely the main one. He turned out to be my favorite character. He has an incredibly charming personality; however, you must discover that yourself. At the very beginning, he comes off as a mysterious individual, maybe causing me to be more intrigued by him, but to be fair I don’t know. He was my favorite from the start. There isn’t much to say about this character as he isn’t technically the main character, and he also wasn’t the focus of the story. With Nicole being the main focus, Blake would often come in second. He did however cause a lot of conflict between Nicole and other characters, specifically Danielle.

On the topic of Danielle, this was Blake’s girlfriend in the first book. As the series goes on, their relationship does make some changes, however they still maintain some form of a relationship throughout the entire book. I really liked the constant conflict between characters as it maintained the drama factor throughout the story, and it kept me hooked into the characters dynamics. It helps the reader to stay engaged in the story, rather than feeling like they’re just reading words on a page. Moving back onto to the topic of Danielle and what she is in the story; she almost acts as a slight antagonist in the very beginning. Danielle had a constant attitude with Nicole as it was clear that Nicole felt some form of way towards Blake. Danielle took this as a threat, therefore leading Nicole to be on Danielle’s bad side. Aside from this however, Danielle later became a savior for the storyline. Readers will only begin to notice this in the last book or two, so I’d highly recommend staying for the entire ride of the series to catch the switch in Danielle’s intentions. She was definitely my least favorite, not because her character development was bad, but more so I just didn’t like Danielle’s personality. 

For the last two characters, Chris and Kate, I’m just going to combine them into one paragraph as they were the smaller main characters of the bunch. Kate was an incredibly shy, but also incredibly smart young girl. She somehow became one of the biggest problems of the story however, as they had gotten into a battle with Medusa, (one can assume how that battle went). Chris stayed decently mutual for most of the series as well, at least until the very end. I will not spoil this ending, but all I must say is that I have only bawled my eyes out three times due to reading before, and this was definitely one of them. I remember sitting down for a long, long time just thinking about what Chris had done. I would suggest reading this series to anyone who generally gets attached to books. This book just pulls at your heart strings and really causes you to stay up into the night just to read it. 

So for my overall review, I would definitely give this book somewhere around a 7/10 – 10/10. I saw that because it heavily relies on the reader to understand some form of Greek mythology. As a Greek mythology nerd, I would give this book a solid 10/10, but for someone who may not be as into mythology or simply doesn’t have enough time on their hands to read a 700+ page book, they may rate it differently. Despite that however, I would recommend this to almost anyone willing to read a long book that might make you lose some sleep.