Star Daughter

2.5☆

This book started very very promising by making me cry within the first 2 pages,,,tho getting further in the MC just started to annoy me.

The idea and the world of this book is really interesting but it's just too slow paced for me. I might pick it back up eventually but for now it's a DNF

Dit boek stond ongelezen op mijn boekenplank sinds ik het kreeg in mijn toenmalige Owlcrate-abonnement van augustus 2020. Ik weet nog dat ik toch vrij enthousiast was over dit boek toen ik het kreeg, maar toch ben ik er tot nu nooit daadwerkelijk aan toe gekomen om het op te pakken.

Dit bleek uiteindelijk een prima op zichzelf staande YA-fantasie te zijn.
Aan de ene kant hield ik erg van de beelden en het leren over een nieuwe mythologie, maar aan de andere kant voelde het een beetje onderontwikkeld en te vaag. Het las alsof dit verhaal geschreven was voor mensen die al bekend waren met de mythen en legendes.

Maar op zich zeker een goed afgerond verhaal, wat een hele prestatie is voor een standalone met deze thema's. Het einde was ook vrij oké, bevredigend.

Ik zou dit waarschijnlijk leuker hebben gevonden als ik jonger was. Nu kan ik het gewoon waarderen vanwege het feit dat ik denk dat de beoogde doelgroep dit wel geweldig zou vinden.

The writing style was beautiful; lyrical sentences

i am so sad that i didn't love this book as it had so much promise but didn't reach quite what i wanted from it. while i did appreciate the nods to hindu mythology, the complex governing star politics, and the motivation to save her dad, the writing did not work for me. i couldn't tell if my main issue was the YA speak or the pacing or the repetitiveness, but i wish that more of the word count had been spent describing this beautiful world that was crafted and less on... kissing dev. however i believe there's lots of potential for great books to come from thakrar!!

At times fascinating and at other times frustrating, this was one of the more culturally interesting books I have read recently. Star Daughter pretty much does what it says on the tin - it is the story of the daughter of a star, where the star came to Earth to act as a muse for someone, fell in love and had a child. The cultural interest came from the Indian cultural nods that pervade this story - this is no western YA fantasy. I really have not read much in the way of Indian fantasy and myth, and this story certainly throws you in the deep end with some of it. It is definitely refreshing to read something outside of ones cultural norms, so for that reason alone I would have been glad to have read this story.

The frustration comes from some of the inanity of the characters. The lead character somehow decides that breaking into other peoples rooms to prove her innocence of something that noone is exactly challenging her on seems like a stupendously bad idea. Somehow, that stupendously bad idea leads to nothing and that plot line almost peters out. I am also slightly disturbed by her obsession with feeding someone blood (and how slow she is to realise that her own blood will do, once she has completed her transformation). The whole competition at the center of the plot is also a bit bizarre - it all just seems very contrived.

The cultural interest here is good and I do appreciate being exposed to different cultural references, but the plot and the characters are a bit lazy and tropey

I didn't love the book, but I really enjoyed it. I couldn't connect with Sheetal, but I liked her character.
The plot was really interesting and I liked the twist at the end, I didn't expect that to happen.
Loved the Stardust by Neil Gaiman vibes.

CAWPILE Breakdown:
Characters: 7
Atmosphere: 9
Writing: 9
Plot: 5
Intrigue: 7
Logic: 5
Enjoyment: 8

I was honestly pleasantly surprised by this book. I had pretty low expectations and was worried about another one of those action-filled competitions that make no sense. But this one was art-based and played to each person's strengths. This book is definitely in that new category of contemporary fantasy. Other than being part star and traveling to where the stars live, this could be a contemporary book abotu someone learning who they truly are.

Tl:dr beautiful cover leads reader to story that expands cultural horizons but not much else
Beautiful book, gorgeous artwork on the cover. I fell deeply in love with all the vocabulary being thrown around that I had to hunt for, which only further drew me in and helped with the imagery. It was refreshing to not have the author giving me a mini history or culture lesson every time something culturally specific came up.
There were some problems for me with dialogue and action occasionally. Placement of characters being closer or further than I'd thought making the next sequence of events highly impractical if not improbable. Natural human reactions to fire being left out completely (I'm sorry, if there's fire then a person's going to back up) and adding to the placement issues. Also I didn't feel like anything was actually resolved in Sheetal's favor?

I had quite a bit of fun seeing stories from Hindu mythology and so many of the names that are very familiar to me represented in this way in a YA fantasy debut. But it also made me feel old when compared to the protagonist, so I think younger readers will appreciate this one more than me. Still a fun read and I can only hope for more amazing things in the future from this author.