**You can see this full review and more at Book Briefs: http://bookbriefs.net** 
3.5/5

Illusionarium is a young adult fantasy novel that is super vivid. The sky is the limit with Heather Dixon's Illusionists, and the world(s) she created are both captivating and freaky-deaky. I blew through Illusionarium in one quick sitting. This book grabbed me right from the start and I couldn't put it down. The concept was crazier than I initially thought it would be, and I enjoyed the twists and turns that Heather had in store for Johnathan and the readers.

Set sometime in the future, London as we know it is no more. Instead people live on airships. A deadly disease called the venem is spreading so rapidly. It is only affecting women, but once infected with the disease, 100% of the victims die within a week. Scientists are working as quickly as possible to try and find a cure. The nations best scientist and Johnathan's father (the second best scientist) are called in to try and find the cure. Lady Florel is the top scientist and she has discovered that the cure may lie in this new drug, called Fanatalium. The drug causes shared hallucinations, and scientists can illusion things to happen while using it. In these illusions, Lady Florel thinks they can manipulate time to speed up so they can test out potential cures and see the effects. It was kind of a cool idea. But I didn't really understand why only scientists could be illusionists, and I didn't really understand why there only seemed to be 2 main scientists in their whole part of the world. Either way, Johnathan, as his father's apprentice goes on a quest with Lady Florel to illusion a cure for the drug. but things are not always what they seem, and along the way so many twists and turns happen that derail the experiments. I won't ruin anything, because those are the heart and fun of the story.

There is not really a romance in this one, and I am unsure if there is going to be a second book or not. It was kind of left open ended. I would really like to see another book, because I think there are many different avenues that can still be explored and I really liked traveling into this crazy world. The idea of illusionists were really cool. I think that some people may take issue to the idea of the drug use with the fanatalium that causes the shared hallucinations, but the dangers of the drug are explained later in the book, so I don't think it glorified drug use or anything like that.

If you like inventive young adult fantasies and don't mind little to no romance, this would be a great book for you to check out. And I have to say, the cover is beautiful and the hardback book is intricately designed. I am so in love with the way everything looks. From the cog designs on each chapter to the color scheme of the actual hardcover. It is just beautiful. This was a really cool read.

 This review was originally posted on Book Briefs