Shadow and Bone

3,5 out of 5 stars.
My thoughts:


the titles for the grisha are extremely confusing and after finishing the entire book i'm still not entirely sure what is what and who is who and what rank it portrays
Alina is DUMB, but I love Genya and the darkling so much

When Baghra completely random pulls alina apart and tells a few things alina throws the whole thing around and it ANNOYS ME. I honestly still don't understand how Baghra is still alive if the darkling is so old? And if she's an amplifier as well, does that mean she was the darkling before him? But no one ever asks or explains and it just leaves me confused as to how that works. Nonetheless, I thought it was a bit weird of a twist.


Reading the rest of the story I wished alina had stayed at the castle and had found out about darklings plan only when he already foun: the stag or when they'd be in the shadow fold and he'd go and threaten everyone. I honestly also didnt enjoy mal & alina's trip to find the stag. Alina finding sudden strength in the stag also goes against what she's been told by both Baghra and the Darkling and that makes it a bit of a weird twist for me to make her suddenly able to overcome the Darkling's commands.


The ending is not too good, but I enjoyed the extra chapter about Genya a lot. It gave me more insight to her as character and to her background and the same goes for the Darkling who appeared in this character.

Besides the point above I just don't enjoy Mal too much. It's probably influenced by the fact I wanted Alina to stay at the castle and find out later and the fact I didn't enjoy their ‘camping trip' but he's not very interesting to me.

I LOVED the writing though and besides the fact the titles are confusing the lore and worldbuilding is amazing and interesting. I'd only wish we had gotten to know more about this land, but I have two books to go and I'm both very curious and excited about reading them.