Daughter of Smoke and Bone

Daughter of Smoke and Bone (2011) is a fantasy novel by author Laini Taylor. The narrative follows seventeen-year-old Karou through a fantastical war between angels and demons. It was as New York Times bestseller and received a good deal of critical praise. It was a finalist for the Andre Norton Award, which is one of the top honors for fantasy writing. The sequels include Days of Blood and Starlight (2012) and Dreams of Gods and Monster (2014). Its themes include love across the ages, the meaning of betrayal, and false memories.

Karou, an art student, lives in Prague, in the Czech Republic. She has bright blue hair, memorable tattoos, and a great talent for martial arts. She likes to explore the city with her best friend, Zuzana. She has typical boyfriend problems and trouble getting all her school work in on time.

But at night, she’s a messenger for Brimstone, an ancient wizard-demon with a Ram’s head and the body of a dragon. She herself is a demi-demon. Brimsone is Karou’s father-figure, and out of a sense of familial duty, she’s happy to travel through magical portals around the world to steal human teeth and return them to her father. He rewards her with tiny objects that can grant her various wishes. After awhile though, the work starts to bore Karou. She dislikes dealing with gamblers and grave robbers.



For the past 17 years, Karou has been raised by three other chimaera, mystical creatures whose bodies are made up of different parts of humans and animals. They live in a place called Eretz, that Karou visits only on occasion; her guardians have forbidden her from exploring the land of Eretz.

One day, Karou finds that all of the magical portals have been locked and scorched beyond recognition; the handlebar also has a black handprint on it. The locked doors mean that Karou cannot return to Brimstone and the other chimaera who raised her.

She learns that Akiva, an obscenely beautiful man with giant angel wings, is responsible for locking the doors. He tries to kill her with his sword, but Karou manages to escape through a secret door. The door leads her to Eretz, and soon enough she runs into Brimstone. But instead of being happy to see his daughter, Brimstone is furious that Karou has ventured this far into Eretz. He sends her back to earth and destroys the door through which she gained entry into Eretz.



Back on earth, Karou wastes no times in looking for ways to return to Eretz and see her family again. But all the usual portals have been scorched and have a black handprint on the handle, meaning that a Seraphim--like Akiva, or his brother and sister, Hazael and Liraz--has destroyed the portal.

Karou uses one of her wishes to gain the power of flight.

She travels to Marrakech, in Morocco, to make a deal with a fallen angel, Razgut, who can take her to Eretz.  Before setting out on that journey, she acts as a good friend to Zuzana by flying to her puppet show. There, unexpectedly, Karou is confronted by Akiva. She beats him in combat and drags him to her apartment for interrogation. Upon seeing Karou’s wishbone necklace, Akiva declares that he knows who Karou really is. He doesn’t immediately tell her about her secret lineage, but he promises to stop trying to kill her.



Through a series of flashbacks, the reader learns that Akiva has been part of a 1,000-year war between Seraphim and Chimaera. The Chimaera, led by Brimstone, were collecting human teeth to bring one of the Chimaera who had been killed back to life. In a shocking twist, it turns out that Karou is one of those reincarnated chimaeras who died in a previous battle. She was formerly called Madrigal Kirin and had a love affair with Akiva, despite the fact that she was a devil and he was an angel. As punishment for her betrayal, the Chimaera executed her.

Akiva helps Karou regain the memories of her past life by breaking the wishbone necklace. Suddenly, Karou remembers everything. In vivid detail, she sees herself as a full chimaera: she had a human torso and head, but deer legs, bat wings, and a sizeable horn. She encountered a wounded Akiva on the battlefield; something about him moved her to pity, and instead of killing him, she tended to his wounds and helped him heal.

Sadly, Karou also learns that in his effort to end the epic war between Seraphim and Chimaera, Akiva successfully burned all of the portals to Eretz, so that no more teeth could be taken back to the battlefield to reanimate fallen Chimaera. He also murdered all of Karou’s family.



Karou is torn: she is devastated that her family is dead, but she also loves Akiva. She considers killing Akiva bu instead, she journeys back to Morocco to find Razgut. Along with Akiva, they journey back to Eretz to begin a new life in her old home.