Nadine K
It was dense, bleak, and many parts of it were unpleasant to read. I know for a fact that it would've been much harder to stomach had it been a movie (especially some bits in the beginning). But somehow this uncomfortable dark story also pulled off being charming and even funny.
There were despicable characters who were genuinely hard to read but there were also characters I loved and rooted for, including a fantastic romance that made me pray for a happy ending.
I was holding my breath for what felt like the entire time I was reading. A very gripping read, for sure.
4.5 stars but I'm rounding up because I love Fitz, I love the Fool, and the ending made me feel warm. I'm biased and vocal.
This book edged me, man.
Healed my heart then shattered it into pieces.
Thank you Robin Hobb for letting us return to Fitz and Nighteyes but also fuck you Robin Hobb for you-know-what-you-did.
I need a breather. How do I read 2 books in a row where the character nearest to my heart just
I had a rocky start with this book. It took me a while to warm up to it because I felt like the way the way the world was revealed to the readers wasn't as elegant or masterful as others I've read but once I became familiar with the worlds vocabulary, culture, and lore, it became immediately much more enjoyable. The characters were great, the world (after everything clicked for me) was so unique and different from the other fantasy worlds I've visited.
I also realize now that I'm a sucker for nautical fantasy. I love ships, and pirates, and dragons which is why this along with Robin Hobb's Ships of Magic and the Red Ships under Red Skies installment of the Lock Lamora series will be my go-tos for rereads.
Really excited to read the next one!
3.5 stars
I really liked it and thought it was a lot of fun up until the climax and ending. This may be purely on my personal beef with organised religion and how much I hate it when stories use religion like some kind of super power.
Otherwise, it was a good story that was very well written. It made me feel dread and fear and made me really care about the characters.
Again, pretty fun up until the end but that's mostly on me.
I started the year with the first book of this series ([b:The Bone Ships 43521682 The Bone Ships (The Tide Child, #1) R.J. Barker https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1553245088l/43521682.SX50.jpg 67688478]) and, though I liked it enough, I wasn't sure if I would be picking up the second book. Then I found the second book ([b:Call of the Bone Ships 50637119 Call of the Bone Ships (The Tide Child, #2) R.J. Barker https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1654468932l/50637119.SY75.jpg 75640964]) on sale so I obviously had to get it and I think that was one of my best book decisions this year.It was a wild journey and it was all so very fun. I think this may the most unique world-building I've seen in a fantasy series (and I have read many). A matriarchal naval society with sea-dragons, talking bird creatures that control the wind, a social hierarchy system based upon the ability to give birth. I loved it. Additional a bad-ass hero who is a greying older woman? FANTASTIC.At one point I was so sure a woman wrote this book with how well it treated all its characters, imagine my surprise HAHAEverything about this series is refreshing. I will definitely be picking up more of R.J. Barker's books.
4 stars! The story is finally picking up (after 18 chapters...) and I think this was the funniest volume so far.
I came into The Fire's Stone very excited with inflated expectations because I've been on a fantasy kick and when I first heard about this book sounded like it would hit all the right notes for me. Let me preface this by saying I didn't hate the book. I liked the message, I liked how the three mains played off of each other, and it had some solid writing.
That being said, my main issue with the entire story was that it was too simplistic. The world-building was barebones, the characters (even the 3 mains) seemed slightly underdeveloped, the plot and writing style were both equally basic, as in nothing new or innovative was done with the story.
More nitpicks include:
The cuts between scenes are so abrupt. The passage of time isn't the clearest. I always feel as though I missed a scene that happened offscreen.
The story is told in third person perspective but it shifts very often even within the same paragraph or consecutive paragraphs from one character to another so it's very hard to keep track of who's eyes we're seeing through at any given moment.
There were so many interesting concepts that Huff introduced that I feel like could've added so much depth had she given them more time and attention such as:
1. The Nine Gods Pantheon (and the rest of the religious systems in this world tbh)
2. The mechanics of the magic system they use
3. The different cultures of all these different countries in their world.
4. Locations and geography of the world (architecture styles, landscapes, climates, languages etc.)
Maybe I've been spoiled by all the other great fantasy stories I read last year that anything less than the standards Le Guin, Hobb, and Lynch have set are disappointing to me.
Lastly, this is very much a young adult story and I can definitively state that this is the book that made me realise that maybe I've grown out of the genre.
This is gonna be a spoiler free review so I'm gonna omit anything that even alludes to the twist(s) because I feel like that would rob anyone interested in picking this book up of its best parts. Let me start off by saying that I love this book. I loved it! I'm writing this review 2 days after I finished it and after reading one other (critically acclaimed too!) and yet this is the book I'm still thinking about.It took me back to the books I was assigned to read in elementary school in the sense that I came in with an open mind not knowing what to expect (and maybe because the books I was assigned to read in elementary school included [b:Where the Red Fern Grows 10365 Where the Red Fern Grows Wilson Rawls https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1518702249l/10365.SY75.jpg 115] and [b:Hatchet 50 Hatchet (Brian's Saga, #1) Gary Paulsen https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1385297074l/50.SX50.jpg 1158125]) and just falling in love.As much as I loved it, it took me almost a month to get through this relatively short novel. It starts off slow and stays slow for most of the story, and there are many instances of very deliberate foreshadowing thrown in that effectively informs us readers that something terrible is just in the horizon. It's a creeping sense of dread that was hard for me to push through at times because I am a sap and I don't like it when bad things happen to characters I love. Don't let this put you off because even through the feelings of impending doom, Griz is such a natural storyteller and beautiful mind that there is warmth and comfort interspersed between the harrowing story of a kid exploring a mostly abandoned world. But then it hits that MASTERFUL twist and things go from 1 to 100 at light-speed. It was like being doused in cold water in the best possible way. A shock to your system that makes you want to reread the entire book again with the new lens you are given. The last part of the book is so different from the start and middle. I was sweating, my heart was beating fast, I needed to turn the page to see what happened next. And I needed to know whether the whole journey I took with Griz through the ruins of a world that this character never experienced, that was once my home, was worth it.So was it worth it? That's for you to find out :)
I wrote this review when I was only halfway done with the book and hoped that it would get better and I would have to scrap what I've already written, but it didn't. So here are my issues with this book:1. Chunky blocks of exposition, all done through dialogue where one character is explaining something to another.2. One dimensional characters, most of whom are just unlikable.3. Stiff dialogue, many of the conversations feel unnatural. Sometimes they use phrases and words that just don't fit the setting and it really takes you out of the book.4. Some things just happen so conveniently that when the character's accomplish something it feels un-earned.5. A lot of terrible cliches that make my eyes roll.6. The pacing is... not great.7. There's so much superfluous detail added in that doesn't add to either the plot progression or the storytelling.It's very hard to immerse yourself in this book.The concept was really exciting, I was drawn to it even before realising that the author was a co-creator of ATLA, but overall I feel very let down.The only compelling storyline was that between Zanobius the tulpa and his creator, I found myself wishing I was reading about them instead every time I had to slog through another chapter with the kids and Pietro. But even his story got progressively less interesting as the story progressed.I would be harsher to it if not for the fact that I know this is a middle-grade read and I am by no means its target audience, but that being said I've read plenty of middle-grade books that I could rave on and on about ([b:The Thief Lord 113304 The Thief Lord Cornelia Funke https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1327960342l/113304.SY75.jpg 3313414] by Cornelia Funke comes to mind), with vibrant characters, gorgeous world building, and emotional payoffs that feel significant and don't read like an insult to the reader's intelligence.DiMartino is super in your face about the moral takeaways of this story, almost to a point where its offensive. Maybe this would've worked out better as an animated series like Avatar was but for sure a novel was not the media to go with for this story or author.
3.5 rounded down.
Love a good werewolf story, and this was an okay one. The illustrations by Bernie Wrightson were gorgeous but spoiled the story as I read it. The story itself was fairly straightforward and so easily digestible as most King books are.
I liked it and it will look pretty on my bookshelf. :)
An undeniable masterpiece. Holy shit.
Dan Simmons is an evil genius. What an ending.
The way the story is structured and unfolds is a work of art. The way he gives such distinct voices to each of the main characters is mind boggling. THE WORLD BUILDING.
How do you write like this? Is it innate talent? Can you learn it?
I'm kinda in awe.
A fun urban fantasy thats funny, smart, and -in more ways than one- magical. It reads like a comic book, colourful, dynamic, and full of memorable characters.
This novel really exemplifies my idea of Urban Fantasy as a British counterpart to South American Magical Realism wherein instead of the South American approach of “that's just how it is” when it comes to the fantastical, we see an approach more like “that's not right but also none of my business,” that is so delightfully British.
Told through the voice of Constable Peter Grant who finds himself plunged into the world of wizards and magic hidden in plain sight, it has that great, signature, British dry sense of humour that juggles the absurd and mundane fans of Hitchhikers Guide would not be strangers to.
Peter plays the straight man much like Arthur Dent does in HGTTG but in a refreshing way where he isn't fumbling, bullheaded, and infuriatingly in constant denial of his new reality. Instead we see a protagonist that is smart, capable, and endearing in a way you'd want most main characters to be. Kudos to the author in how his character was unfurled to the readers, he really is my favourite part of the book.
Credits also to the book's clean, straightforward storytelling, though not the most complicated of all stories it is filled with so many characters with their own interests and agendas. It was nice that I, queen of short attention spans and lack of focus, was able to keep track of everyone and not mix any of them up. It was a fun and satisfying read from beginning to end.
The only minor gripe I may have with the book is how Peter sometimes talks about women he finds attractive (it's a very boys books so some degree of it should be expected). Nevertheless, I don't think it really took away from the story, it may have even added some gross realism to Peter's character, nobody's perfect after all. He does get called out on it at one point by an angry river spirit which I do appreciate.
As Peter says in the book to the spirit of the London mob, they have to leave us wanting more. I think they succeeded in that aspect, at least with this reader.
Creepy, a bit disturbing, with beautiful art. Great atmosphere, great panelling, compelling characters. 4.5 start, will continue reading.
Ever since I read the Narnia series in middle school I've loved it but it's undeniable that there has always been an undercurrent (sometimes overt) racism, sexism, and overall xenophobia. We can excuse it and say that it was a product of it's time but it's just as valid to view it from a modern lens and say that it was problematic.
This book, the conclusion to the series, is the most egregious offender lmao. Not gonna list all instances coz I think it would be a fun offensive scavenger hunt for people who do decide to read it, but damn it wasn't good.
Hopefully Greta Gerwigs adaptation of the material can somehow improve upon it (I don't think this is a big ask lol).
4.5 stars!
I think my love for this one stems from how similar Ged is to Fitzchivalry Farseer in the later Realm of the Elderlings books
