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Reviews tagging 'Body horror'
Crescent City – Wenn die Schatten sich erheben by Sarah J. Maas
61 reviews
readwithde's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
inspiring
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
Action. Adventure. Romance. Mystery. Lore. Sacrifice. Character Growth. Secrets. Meaningful Choices. This book had it all.
This book read like the end of a trilogy, despite the fact that there are four houses (and supposedly a fourth book coming). Most of the main characters had their story arcs conclude, and there are only a few loose ends.Along with the obvious: How will Midgard be ruled now? Will technology survive? But these seem like simple worldbuilding questions, not future books or series of content.
Bryce and Hunt became less vital and important to me; the background characters became much more important. I love that the story focused on so many different paths and choices, all culminating in the final conflict of the book.
All that to say, it was good. I liked it. But I wanted more, and I'm not sure when or if that will happen.
This book read like the end of a trilogy, despite the fact that there are four houses (and supposedly a fourth book coming). Most of the main characters had their story arcs conclude, and there are only a few loose ends.
Bryce and Hunt became less vital and important to me; the background characters became much more important. I love that the story focused on so many different paths and choices, all culminating in the final conflict of the book.
All that to say, it was good. I liked it. But I wanted more, and I'm not sure when or if that will happen.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, War, Sexual content, Torture, Body horror, Cursing, Gore, Death, Violence, Confinement, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Gun violence, Racism, Misogyny, Toxic relationship, Colonisation, Fire/Fire injury, Addiction, and Kidnapping
Minor: Child death, Alcohol, Confinement, Classism, Fire/Fire injury, and Murder
laur_astor's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
inspiring
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
This book was an easy 5 ⭐️ read for me. The pacing was INCREDIBLE - every single chapter was exciting and I loved every POV (okay maybe some more than others, but damn I love all the CC characters). I think SJM handled the many complications and storylines VERY well. I tried to have very few expectations going in and only paid attention to theories here and there, and I think that helped me enjoy this book to the fullest.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Blood, Body horror, Death, Torture, Gore, War, Gun violence, Violence, Sexual content, Injury/Injury detail, Emotional abuse, Murder, Physical abuse, and Confinement
skillyillian's review against another edition
dark
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
this entire review is gonna have spoilers abound. buckle in, it's a long one.
(like for real i think this is the longest review i've ever written for a book.)
So idk what the fuck happened here but I have such mixed feelings about this book. I just. What happened here??? Let me clarify: it's not bad. It's really not. But there were a lot of letdowns for me here. And a bunch of really good moments, too. But I have some....concerns.
Bryce has a whole deal with the fae being misogynistic assholes, right? so she declares herself queen of the fae and when someone's like, "hey so are you gonna do anything about all that, now that you are the sole person capable of changing it?" and bryce just goes "nah. fuck that." granted, she does change her mind later, but at the time it was just a "what the fuck?" moment. she's spent ages fighting sexism. but the second she got a chance to do something about it, she said no without a second thought. why. and then got mad when other people were disappointed with her, and was like "well then you can uphold the tyranny, but i'm not gonna." girl where did that come from?? pull your head out. you are the one upholding the problems if you can change it and then decide not to.
sjm takes several big traditionally "feminist" stances, with bryce saying "fuck the patriarchy, we're more than incubators" and then lidia saying "does my being a mother somehow make my choices more palatable to you?" which like, loved it. but then we had these weird little moments that opposed what she was preaching. bryce sees someone's hair dye is fading and says some shit about seeing the "real female" underneath, as if someone can't be "real" while their hair is colored. feyre is mentioned about twice through the whole book, even during the acotar crossover, and is referred to as rhys's mate. Not feyre cursebreaker, wielder of the life creating cauldron, savior of prythian and high lady of the night court. just her relation to her husband. gross.
AND my biggest problem with the way sarah treats her female characters is that everyone is tiny. for fuckin what? I saw ONE character described as "full-bodied" and that was IT, through an entire 800+ page book. I will NEVER forgive her for how she did the ocean queen so dirty. the queen of the OCEAN, and she was described as a "tiny female." like sorry but hey what the fuck???? from my notes, and i quote, "the endless, 'depthless' OCEANS and she's tiny??? teeny tiny itty bitty little thing to represent the vast swells, deep rolling tides, and stunning, dangerous beauty of all the oceans of this world and you made her micro fucking scopic. ... the ocean queen should be big. make her plus size, make her fat, make her a TRUE representation of the beauty and intensity and power that comes with being the queen of an element that takes up more space than all the land on the planet combined. let her take up the space she deserves, the space she owns!!!!!" like why the FUCK was the OCEAN QUEEN not even past four feet tall, and when she got taller to intimidate them, she didn't even make herself taller than hunt. she was still smaller than the men in the room. NO, FUCK THAT. let her tower over them!!! let puny hunt athalar cower in fear of her!!! tell us about her fat rolls, her big tummy, the way her skin has stretch marks that are lighter than the rest of her skin, like the crests of waves!!!!
just... it feels like for every traditionally "feminist" statement she made, she negated it with weird little internalized misogyny digs at her other woman characters. it makes the rest of her feminist takes come off as performative and forced imho. making the ocean queen "tiny" is a major reason i'm docking points.
but moving on. bryce is a total asshole for most of this book. when she gets back from prythian, she just refuses to acknowledge hunt's trauma because it's making him hesitate on their mission. she says she needs "all of him" but won't give him the space to process the INSANE amount of trauma he went through. He goes through endless, unutterable torture and watches one of his friends chew off his other friend's hand to even try to escape, just to try to find her. and bryce? went on a long walk, watched a movie, and let someone else kill a bad guy. and bryce has the AUDACITY to say "i was scared i'd never see you again" like her journey was ANYTHING compared to hunt reliving his worst trauma but worse because he wasn't alone this time. like for christ's sake ruhn was DISEMBOWELED at one point. but bryce missed hunt and her grandma was a colonizer :( poor fucking baby. tbqh if bryce hadn't apologized to him i would've hated her by the end of the book. she picked random fights for no reason, using his refreshed trauma to make him feel like shit for not being all in. it felt like it was put in just to create conflict between them. this was not the bryce we saw in the last two books. she does have growth by the end of the book but she also went through this weird, insane regression where she had no respect for hunt or the others around her. and, in true bryce style, failed to tell anyone her plans or thoughts out loud until it was too late and they had no choice but to guess at her plan and try to keep up. that's so fucking irritating and not a good quality in a leader.
honestly, ithan and tharion's plots were the "this could have been an email" part of this story. every time we'd be in the middle of something exciting, it would switch to one of their POVs, and i'd roll my eyes and just suffer through it. it broke the immersion SO MUCH to be in the middle of a lore dump, fight, etc., and then be like "anyway back to wolf boy and fish guy, who can't do a god damn thing right to save their lives, or anyone else's." to ithan's credit he did get the rifle to bryce tho and his antidotes shattering were not his fault. it just felt wholly unnecessary for them to be brought to the forefront the way they were when they just felt like interruptions for the rest of the story. i would have loved to have seen more hypaxia and jesiba working together tho, like some crime procedural sitcom combination of hypaxia as the hofas queen and jesiba her second in command who knows more than she does. i would trade that for wolf boy and fish man without hesitating.
next, the crossover. good god. now, i am fully aware that the fandom caused a ton of hype for this and made it out to be the hugest thing to happen to fantasy since tolkien. but, that being said, sjm, her publisher, and marketing team all hyped the fuck out of this, too. all of the marketing for hofas was about the crossover, and she ended the second book with bryce meeting the whole inner circle. so why did she spend the entire crossover with only two characters from acotar. you'd think for a 15 or 16 book connected universe, the first true intersection of that would include more of the main cast. like i know nesta has her own book and az is super important, i'm not saying they're not, but we got no feyre, who was only acknowledged as rhys's mate, and not for any of her real accomplishments or epithets. and we saw seven whole seconds of rhys and amren. what it was, was nesta and az saying "we're not helping you" and no one else's opinions on it. and i'm not saying those opinions would have been different but i would've liked to have seen bryce have at least one full conversation with the inner circle. idk maybe i'm being nitpicky lmao but the crossover was not as much as i had hoped for or like i feel like they'd hinted it would be.
and the finale. bryce being pulled into the black hole she made from the firstlight core was like, yeah that makes sense. opening a portal to essentially catch the black hole so she could enclose it like taking a fish out of its tank with a ziploc baggie was great. but when she watched the other asteri get sucked into the black hole, and then went "well, i have absolutely no way of getting back, despite being able to teleport and open portals to anywhere, and despite having just consumed a god's worth of magic. guess i'm stranded." and then she???? decides to make sure rigelus is going to go into the black hole by grabbing onto him???? make that make sense. the entire reason black holes exist is because their gravity is so strong they consume everything around them. rigelus was going in there no matter what. and bryce had no way of boosting them into the black hole, since apparently she can't teleport anymore for whatever reason. so they were just going to have to wait for the black hole to suck them in anyway because it's not like he had a way to separate himself. her grabbing onto him did nothing to ensure his demise and only made sure she was going to die without even trying to send herself back. and then hunt in the mecha piloted by the ghost of his centuries dead lover, ghost-guiding his hand to the missile button? or at least he could have sworn that's what happened. it was insanity. i don't know how we arrived at that point but it sure did happen and get published. like please try to explain that out loud to anyone who doesn't read sjm and listen to how insane it sounds.
also, i'm so tired of every single sjm character being painfully aware and yet unaware of their surroundings. please, it's in every fucking book, and you'd think after 15-16 books she would have moved beyond "could have sworn", and yet. this is probably me being a dick but the final count was 52 times (which, in an 800+ page book, isn't a ton, but it's in every single book she writes) where something happened, like for sure happened, and someone just "could have sworn" it happened. like please just say the damn thing happened instead of giving the impression that your characters are only half aware of their surroundings.
anyway moving on to greener pastures. ruhn and lidia carried the fuck out of this book. i like their romance better than anyone else's in all of CC. they're just so good despite their occasional dumb choices. i love them. plus lidia's connection to the galathynius bloodline was awesome, i really loved the big reveal of her being basically flame incarnate, definitely a cool moment. give lidia her own trauma recovery book like nesta got. come on sarah, don't be a coward. speaking of lidia tho, her killing pollux was so sick. all the revenge kills were great. pollux, sabine, the astronomer, good shit.
(like for real i think this is the longest review i've ever written for a book.)
So idk what the fuck happened here but I have such mixed feelings about this book. I just. What happened here??? Let me clarify: it's not bad. It's really not. But there were a lot of letdowns for me here. And a bunch of really good moments, too. But I have some....concerns.
Bryce has a whole deal with the fae being misogynistic assholes, right? so she
sjm takes several big traditionally "feminist" stances, with bryce saying "fuck the patriarchy, we're more than incubators" and then
AND my biggest problem with the way sarah treats her female characters is that everyone is tiny. for fuckin what? I saw ONE character described as "full-bodied" and that was IT, through an entire 800+ page book. I will NEVER forgive her for how she did the ocean queen so dirty. the queen of the OCEAN, and she was described as a "tiny female." like sorry but hey what the fuck???? from my notes, and i quote, "the endless, 'depthless' OCEANS and she's tiny??? teeny tiny itty bitty little thing to represent the vast swells, deep rolling tides, and stunning, dangerous beauty of all the oceans of this world and you made her micro fucking scopic. ... the ocean queen should be big. make her plus size, make her fat, make her a TRUE representation of the beauty and intensity and power that comes with being the queen of an element that takes up more space than all the land on the planet combined. let her take up the space she deserves, the space she owns!!!!!" like why the FUCK was the OCEAN QUEEN not even past four feet tall, and when she got taller to intimidate them, she didn't even make herself taller than hunt. she was still smaller than the men in the room. NO, FUCK THAT. let her tower over them!!! let puny hunt athalar cower in fear of her!!! tell us about her fat rolls, her big tummy, the way her skin has stretch marks that are lighter than the rest of her skin, like the crests of waves!!!!
just... it feels like for every traditionally "feminist" statement she made, she negated it with weird little internalized misogyny digs at her other woman characters. it makes the rest of her feminist takes come off as performative and forced imho. making the ocean queen "tiny" is a major reason i'm docking points.
but moving on. bryce is a total asshole for most of this book. when she gets back from prythian, she just refuses to acknowledge hunt's trauma because it's making him hesitate on their mission. she says she needs "all of him" but won't give him the space to process the INSANE amount of trauma he went through.
honestly, ithan and tharion's plots were the "this could have been an email" part of this story. every time we'd be in the middle of something exciting, it would switch to one of their POVs, and i'd roll my eyes and just suffer through it. it broke the immersion SO MUCH to be in the middle of a lore dump, fight, etc., and then be like "anyway back to wolf boy and fish guy, who can't do a god damn thing right to save their lives, or anyone else's."
next, the crossover. good god. now, i am fully aware that the fandom caused a ton of hype for this and made it out to be the hugest thing to happen to fantasy since tolkien. but, that being said, sjm, her publisher, and marketing team all hyped the fuck out of this, too. all of the marketing for hofas was about the crossover, and she ended the second book with bryce meeting the whole inner circle. so why did she spend the entire crossover
and the finale.
also, i'm so tired of every single sjm character being painfully aware and yet unaware of their surroundings. please, it's in every fucking book, and you'd think after 15-16 books she would have moved beyond "could have sworn", and yet. this is probably me being a dick but the final count was 52 times (which, in an 800+ page book, isn't a ton, but it's in every single book she writes) where something happened, like for sure happened, and someone just "could have sworn" it happened. like please just say the damn thing happened instead of giving the impression that your characters are only half aware of their surroundings.
anyway moving on to greener pastures. ruhn and lidia carried the fuck out of this book. i like their romance better than anyone else's in all of CC. they're just so good despite their occasional dumb choices. i love them. plus
overall, i think this is one of sjm's weaker books for sure. it was entertaining and gripping enough, but mostly because i wanted to find all the lore connections and easter eggs, and my bestie and i read it together, which makes reading anything fun. fuck, she could make the bible fun. the plot was fine, if not drawn out in some places, but i wasn't ever, at any point, invested in ithan or tharion. the ending was a little rushed compared to the other 800 pages of the book, but i like that she acknowledged the consequences of destroying the ruling class and that there would be a power vacuum there.
also, hunt finding out about
anyway sjm is someone you read for the characters and worldbuilding, not necessarily for incredibly strong plots, prose, or descriptions.
But also, credit where credit is due, connecting three different series across nearly a dozen and a half books is an insane feat of storytelling. the easter eggs and lore connections were great. i feel like she laid a lot of groundwork for other connections. she ended cc3 as if it was the end of the series, and i think it should stay that way imho. as much as i'd love more ruhn and lidia, i have had enough bryce and hunt for probably forever. this book did a lot, and carried a lot of weight for the maasverse, but i think it ended up being kinda messy. i wish the crossover had been better and that the characters weren't so prone to poor life choices for the sake of conflict. AND THE OCEAN QUEEN SHOULD HAVE BEEN FAT.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Blood, Death of parent, Medical content, Torture, Child death, Genocide, Sexism, Body horror, Colonisation, Grief, Cannibalism, Misogyny, Death, Physical abuse, Confinement, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Gun violence, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual content, Murder, Medical trauma, War, Self harm, and Cursing
Moderate: Sexual violence, Excrement, Slavery, Kidnapping, Rape, and Sexual assault
thevietvegan's review against another edition
adventurous
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.0
Lidia and Ruhn’s storyline is the only thing that kept me reading this. Bryce and Hunt lack any kind of chemistry and they keep fawning over the title of being each others and calling each other husband and wife. Tharion I think is supposed to have a redeeming arc but he ’s just an idiot and I actually really liked Ithan’s storyline more than I thought I would even though it started out kind of ridiculously.
SJM’s descriptors of arousal are so weird. One scene she specifies how a character’s balls tightened at arousal and I know that happens but it’s just a really oddly specific line.
Oddly enough I found this book way more tolerable than the first two. The writing style is so graphic and crass in a lot of parts and her use of swears is so liberal they lose any sort of meaning. But this was better than the first 2 for sure
SJM’s descriptors of arousal are so weird. One scene she specifies how a character’s balls tightened at arousal and I know that happens but it’s just a really oddly specific line.
Oddly enough I found this book way more tolerable than the first two. The writing style is so graphic and crass in a lot of parts and her use of swears is so liberal they lose any sort of meaning. But this was better than the first 2 for sure
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Death, Torture, Violence, and Body horror
unsuccessfulbookclub's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.25
Maybe my fave SJM to date? The characters really GO THROUGH IT but the moral and ethical dilemmas as well as social and political commentary are far more complex and deeper than prior books/series.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Confinement, Emotional abuse, Murder, War, Domestic abuse, Xenophobia, Blood, Child death, Gore, Medical trauma, Death, and Body horror
Moderate: Pregnancy
traceyanderson's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cursing, Genocide, Child abuse, Death, Blood, Emotional abuse, Cannibalism, Colonisation, Hate crime, Torture, Body horror, Misogyny, Slavery, Child death, Classism, Physical abuse, Sexual content, Toxic relationship, Confinement, Fire/Fire injury, Gaslighting, Gore, Grief, Murder, Injury/Injury detail, Kidnapping, Medical content, Vomit, and War
losthought323's review against another edition
adventurous
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.75
I don't think SJM books are for me anymore. This was an okay story--all the plot questions from the previous books are addressed, and all the usual SJM writing hallmarks are here. But, the answers to these questions are either huge exposition dump of information that probably should have come up earlier, or a character has magically figured out a solution that no one else has at the last possible second, and the reader never really gets clued into how or why they find this answer.
The pacing is breakneck on this one. There's a conflict, there's the outcome of that conflict, and then the characters have about three lines of witty dialogue about how messed up that all is before they're running to put out the next fire. I know time is supposed to be limited, which is supposed to add tension, but It leaves the character and their development feeling topical at best.
My specific problems with this book:
1) THE POV CHANGES IN THE MIDDLE OF CHAPTERS???? WHYY???? And it's always awkward to jump from a cliffhanger to a separate plot thread that ends in another cliffhanger? Round and Round it goes.
2) I hate Bryce in this book. She constantly rages against The Astari and the Fae Lord and Ladies of the World for using their powers to abuse people, but half the time, she's just as bad as the people she hates.
-Early on Selene gives a condensed world history lesson to Bryce. Bryce spends the entire time ranting about how selfish it was for the sisters not to save the people behind her when she portal-ed away. Then, Bryce immediately takes two powerful weapons she doesn't know how to use, awakens an Ancient, and endangers two strangers and the entire planet because her world, her answers, and her people are more important than everyone else.
-She doesn't want to be a Fae Queen or associated with the Fae, but she will play the royal Fae card whenever it's convenient or necessary to save her friends and family.
-Towards the end of the book, Bryce uses the horn to contact Nesta to give her the death Mask and sends her human parents to the other world to get the powerful mask. But also admits she's just sending her parents because they're humans and in danger. There's a whole argument about not having enough time to save civilians. But there's enough time to call a helicopter, her friends, and her allies's friends to Allowen and fly to Nena, but not enough time to take a couple more people and send them to the non-Astarhi world.
3) Every problem, small or large, in this plot follows the same formula: The characters gather together and ask how we are going to take on this problem. Bryce is says she has a plan. During the plan, she fakes her way through and says something like, "I'm not sure what I'm doing," and then magically figures out exactly what she needs to do at the right time. Cue fawning side characters, mates and enemies---saying i knew she could do it!
Early in the book, Bryce is with Nesta and Azriel in tunnels. The story at the time is in Bryce's POV. Azriel notes her hand scraps aren't healing, but her knees are. Bryce makes an excuse that she's half human, and that's why it's not working. As a reader, I know Bryce, at this point, is in a strange world, with people she's not sure she can trust and seeking dangerous answers. I know she's holding her cards close to her chest for a reason. But the writing never gives us a hint of her intentions. We get context clues of whats coming-Nesta mentions the wyrm monster, the cave shakes, and i think we see the a dead one's bones. So it's not totally out of left field when Bryce is like haha, i have summoned the Wyrm with my blood as a distraction so I can run off. But why even have this chapter in Bryce's perspective if we never really get to be in her head? Wouldn't there be more stakes and tension here if Bryce explained even a bit of her actions and how she hid them from Nesta and Azriel? (The only way I can justify her not once not thinking about any plans whatsoever here is maybe she's worried about Rhysand hearing her thoughts. But it wouldn't be hard for there to be a line about her being paranoid he's listening.)
Another 'what the f***' moment of this for me was when Bryce portals home and "is held hostage" in her house. For most of the scenario, while she is home, there are no clues that she went there on purpose. She opens the chapter by saying my powers have a sense of humor for slamming my face into that wall. Then she whines and complains and banters with her dad for about two chapters, during which they trade information. Then, Bryce reveals she was faking being a hostage, stole a key to unlock her magic handcuffs from Ruhn's room (THAT'S SUPER CONVENIENT), and was just using her villainous' dad's massive ego to figure out the information she wanted on the magic blades and her star powers. Do we see her search for the key? No, we did see her hide in her borhters room and cry about her brother and husband being tortured on his bed. THE WHOLE CHAPTER IS IN HER POV--so why aren't we, as readers, privy to her master chess moves?
Bryce pulls out a notebook she stole from the Autumn King to barter with Morwen. When did she take that?
Bryce figures out how to use the swords when she thrust them inside Pollack's ribcage. How? She's collected the three-star magic batteries of her evil ancestors, so she just knows how to do it i guess?
The only reason this sort of Sherlock Homes' Suprise reveals work in other media is that the clues are visible if you look for them, and the convoluted answer as to how they arrived at that solution is also revealed dramatically in a conversation or internal monologue where they tell you had they did it. Bryce's surprise reveals you are just surprised out of the left field that is convenient to get her to the next plot point and gives us no insight on her actual character.
3) What is the point of Sigrid's character? Ithan could have had a perfectly compelling reluctant leader of the Pack arc without her. Instead, we get 65% of the book of him running around trying to resurrect her just so he can bump into Jezebel and Hypaxia, who will offload some more ancient history exposition and conveniently have all the tools they need to save Bryce from death.
4) What's the point of Baxian's character? His mate was killed, all of his rebel allies were killed, and he was tortured. He also reveals a tragic backstory about why he became a monster before switching sides. But hey, look, the pegasus are back. Baxian's lost his mate and part of his soul, been tortured, and lost all of his rebellion allies--sorry all your friends are dead, but hey, alien parasites didn't eat your mate's soul, she's in heaven. Please don't immediately unalive yourself. Instead, keep acting as a steward to Bryce's country because the ancient Pegasus has returned.
5) Characters withholding important information for dramatic reveals.
-Jezebel is the caretaker of a wiped-out human civilization history that explains a time before the Astari. Her people died 1500 years ago to protect this knowledge and ensure it wasn't forgotten. She proceeds to make sure it is forgotten because a demon cursed her and because it is not really powerful--just theoretical math books or literature. Even though knowing there was a world before the Asteri would have been helpful for the main character to know two books ago.
-The Prince of Hels doesn't tell Hunt he has the power to override the inked crown on his head because Hunt had to suffer/be tortured or else they would find out he was Hel test tube baby. The also don't tell Bryce any of the information Helena or Silene had infor dumped earlier on because she wasn't ready yet.
-Danika is still a character who knows the secrets of everything and everyone in the book. Everyone attributes some aspect of the rebellion's success or their character development to her.
6) Love heals mass amounts of trauma and tosses away what could be interesting explorations of complex and deeply hurt characters by making them mates.
-Hunt's got PTSD the size of an entire universe about being a commanding officer of the army and watching his friends die because of his orders and decisions. Bryce tells him to get over it and that she loves him. Hunt does.
-Ruhn has a hard time coming to terms with the fact that the woman he was in love with is a double agent who betrayed him and his sister, helped torture him, and historically has murdered and tortured lots of people. Then he finds out she did everything cause she's a mom and also thinks she's hot. What trauma? We're mates now.
Theorion is an immature guy who just wants to have some fun and continually makes bad decisions because he's unwilling to face his own emotions. Then he gets married, and he's suddenly ready to be a hero.
7) The smut in this book all felt like the same scene written over and over again regardless of the parties involved.
The pacing is breakneck on this one. There's a conflict, there's the outcome of that conflict, and then the characters have about three lines of witty dialogue about how messed up that all is before they're running to put out the next fire. I know time is supposed to be limited, which is supposed to add tension, but It leaves the character and their development feeling topical at best.
My specific problems with this book:
1) THE POV CHANGES IN THE MIDDLE OF CHAPTERS???? WHYY???? And it's always awkward to jump from a cliffhanger to a separate plot thread that ends in another cliffhanger? Round and Round it goes.
2) I hate Bryce in this book. She constantly rages against The Astari and the Fae Lord and Ladies of the World for using their powers to abuse people, but half the time, she's just as bad as the people she hates.
-Early on Selene gives a condensed world history lesson to Bryce. Bryce spends the entire time ranting about how selfish it was for the sisters not to save the people behind her when she portal-ed away. Then, Bryce immediately takes two powerful weapons she doesn't know how to use, awakens an Ancient, and endangers two strangers and the entire planet because her world, her answers, and her people are more important than everyone else.
-She doesn't want to be a Fae Queen or associated with the Fae, but she will play the royal Fae card whenever it's convenient or necessary to save her friends and family.
-Towards the end of the book, Bryce uses the horn to contact Nesta to give her the death Mask and sends her human parents to the other world to get the powerful mask. But also admits she's just sending her parents because they're humans and in danger. There's a whole argument about not having enough time to save civilians. But there's enough time to call a helicopter, her friends, and her allies's friends to Allowen and fly to Nena, but not enough time to take a couple more people and send them to the non-Astarhi world.
3) Every problem, small or large, in this plot follows the same formula: The characters gather together and ask how we are going to take on this problem. Bryce is says she has a plan. During the plan, she fakes her way through and says something like, "I'm not sure what I'm doing," and then magically figures out exactly what she needs to do at the right time. Cue fawning side characters, mates and enemies---saying i knew she could do it!
Early in the book, Bryce is with Nesta and Azriel in tunnels. The story at the time is in Bryce's POV. Azriel notes her hand scraps aren't healing, but her knees are. Bryce makes an excuse that she's half human, and that's why it's not working. As a reader, I know Bryce, at this point, is in a strange world, with people she's not sure she can trust and seeking dangerous answers. I know she's holding her cards close to her chest for a reason. But the writing never gives us a hint of her intentions. We get context clues of whats coming-Nesta mentions the wyrm monster, the cave shakes, and i think we see the a dead one's bones. So it's not totally out of left field when Bryce is like haha, i have summoned the Wyrm with my blood as a distraction so I can run off. But why even have this chapter in Bryce's perspective if we never really get to be in her head? Wouldn't there be more stakes and tension here if Bryce explained even a bit of her actions and how she hid them from Nesta and Azriel? (The only way I can justify her not once not thinking about any plans whatsoever here is maybe she's worried about Rhysand hearing her thoughts. But it wouldn't be hard for there to be a line about her being paranoid he's listening.)
Another 'what the f***' moment of this for me was when Bryce portals home and "is held hostage" in her house. For most of the scenario, while she is home, there are no clues that she went there on purpose. She opens the chapter by saying my powers have a sense of humor for slamming my face into that wall. Then she whines and complains and banters with her dad for about two chapters, during which they trade information. Then, Bryce reveals she was faking being a hostage, stole a key to unlock her magic handcuffs from Ruhn's room (THAT'S SUPER CONVENIENT), and was just using her villainous' dad's massive ego to figure out the information she wanted on the magic blades and her star powers. Do we see her search for the key? No, we did see her hide in her borhters room and cry about her brother and husband being tortured on his bed. THE WHOLE CHAPTER IS IN HER POV--so why aren't we, as readers, privy to her master chess moves?
Bryce pulls out a notebook she stole from the Autumn King to barter with Morwen. When did she take that?
Bryce figures out how to use the swords when she thrust them inside Pollack's ribcage. How? She's collected the three-star magic batteries of her evil ancestors, so she just knows how to do it i guess?
The only reason this sort of Sherlock Homes' Suprise reveals work in other media is that the clues are visible if you look for them, and the convoluted answer as to how they arrived at that solution is also revealed dramatically in a conversation or internal monologue where they tell you had they did it. Bryce's surprise reveals you are just surprised out of the left field that is convenient to get her to the next plot point and gives us no insight on her actual character.
3) What is the point of Sigrid's character? Ithan could have had a perfectly compelling reluctant leader of the Pack arc without her. Instead, we get 65% of the book of him running around trying to resurrect her just so he can bump into Jezebel and Hypaxia, who will offload some more ancient history exposition and conveniently have all the tools they need to save Bryce from death.
4) What's the point of Baxian's character? His mate was killed, all of his rebel allies were killed, and he was tortured. He also reveals a tragic backstory about why he became a monster before switching sides. But hey, look, the pegasus are back. Baxian's lost his mate and part of his soul, been tortured, and lost all of his rebellion allies--sorry all your friends are dead, but hey, alien parasites didn't eat your mate's soul, she's in heaven. Please don't immediately unalive yourself. Instead, keep acting as a steward to Bryce's country because the ancient Pegasus has returned.
5) Characters withholding important information for dramatic reveals.
-Jezebel is the caretaker of a wiped-out human civilization history that explains a time before the Astari. Her people died 1500 years ago to protect this knowledge and ensure it wasn't forgotten. She proceeds to make sure it is forgotten because a demon cursed her and because it is not really powerful--just theoretical math books or literature. Even though knowing there was a world before the Asteri would have been helpful for the main character to know two books ago.
-The Prince of Hels doesn't tell Hunt he has the power to override the inked crown on his head because Hunt had to suffer/be tortured or else they would find out he was Hel test tube baby. The also don't tell Bryce any of the information Helena or Silene had infor dumped earlier on because she wasn't ready yet.
-Danika is still a character who knows the secrets of everything and everyone in the book. Everyone attributes some aspect of the rebellion's success or their character development to her.
6) Love heals mass amounts of trauma and tosses away what could be interesting explorations of complex and deeply hurt characters by making them mates.
-Hunt's got PTSD the size of an entire universe about being a commanding officer of the army and watching his friends die because of his orders and decisions. Bryce tells him to get over it and that she loves him. Hunt does.
-Ruhn has a hard time coming to terms with the fact that the woman he was in love with is a double agent who betrayed him and his sister, helped torture him, and historically has murdered and tortured lots of people. Then he finds out she did everything cause she's a mom and also thinks she's hot. What trauma? We're mates now.
Theorion is an immature guy who just wants to have some fun and continually makes bad decisions because he's unwilling to face his own emotions. Then he gets married, and he's suddenly ready to be a hero.
7) The smut in this book all felt like the same scene written over and over again regardless of the parties involved.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual content and Torture
Moderate: Death, Emotional abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Blood, Colonisation, Body horror, Child abuse, and Cursing
Minor: Genocide
justbooker's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
The conflicts between Hunt and Bryce felt unnecessary and, frankly, annoying. Bryce also felt a bit wishy-washy in terms of her goals and overall feelings. One moment she's Queen, the other she wants to burn it all down, and then she's right back to Queen mode . There's also Ithan, who I could not have cared less about for most of the book. It felt like he only became truly relevant at the end. I understand what his character development was supposed to be throughout the book and why everything happened with him. However, ever chapter from his perspective felt like a slog.
On the other hand, I believe this book has the best lore building moments of the series. The information dumps were easy to follow and engaging. With the lore building in the first book, it felt very scattered and needlessly confusing. This books had smooth, consistent lore that felt properly woven between character dialogue.
As far as characters go, Lidia is probably my favorite. I appreciate the depth and growth that she shows with Ruhn. Every development between her and Ruhn kept me on the edge of my seat, desperately rooting for them. I would love to seeher children be further developed in the next book.
Overall, the plot felt alright. I appreciated the loose ends that were tied up. I cheered when Ruhngot to finally kill his father , when Lidia got to kill Pollux , and just all characters getting their moment of justice. The Asteri conflict has been resolved, and while there is the oncoming struggle of setting up a new government , it feels like everything is alright. The saying "Through love, all things are possible" is repeated time and time again, and this book really drives that theme home. I will not forget the frustrations I had with the book/series, but in the end I enjoyed my time in the world and am glad to have read it.
On the other hand, I believe this book has the best lore building moments of the series. The information dumps were easy to follow and engaging. With the lore building in the first book, it felt very scattered and needlessly confusing. This books had smooth, consistent lore that felt properly woven between character dialogue.
As far as characters go, Lidia is probably my favorite. I appreciate the depth and growth that she shows with Ruhn. Every development between her and Ruhn kept me on the edge of my seat, desperately rooting for them. I would love to see
Overall, the plot felt alright. I appreciated the loose ends that were tied up. I cheered when Ruhn
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, War, Murder, Torture, Vomit, Excrement, Death, Death of parent, and Violence
Moderate: Child abuse, Trafficking, Child death, Domestic abuse, Confinement, Misogyny, Kidnapping, Cursing, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Sexism, Alcohol, and Body horror
Minor: Sexual assault, Racism, Classism, Pregnancy, and Rape
greylandreviews's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
Waited 2+ years for this book and it was mediocre. The scenes that were good in this were few and far between. SPOILERS AHEAD!!!
Can't believe I am saying this but, Lidia and Nesta saved this book from not getting dnf. Honest to whatever higher power believe in, they carried this story along and my full focus when they were on page. Also the SNIPPET we got of Prythian and the lore we got from had me wanting so much more.
Now for the bad. Bryce. Bryce Quinlan. She is just not interesting to me. Don't even get me started on Ithan and Tharion. WHY DID THEY HAVE SO MANY FUCKING SCENES IN THIS DAMN BOOK! It was like a whole filler arc with these two and I skimmed unless I saw something interesting. All the other "supporting" cast were insignificant until Bryce needed something from them.
Can't believe I am saying this but, Lidia and Nesta saved this book from not getting dnf. Honest to whatever higher power believe in, they carried this story along and my full focus when they were on page. Also the SNIPPET we got of Prythian and the lore we got from had me wanting so much more.
Now for the bad. Bryce. Bryce Quinlan. She is just not interesting to me. Don't even get me started on Ithan and Tharion. WHY DID THEY HAVE SO MANY FUCKING SCENES IN THIS DAMN BOOK! It was like a whole filler arc with these two and I skimmed unless I saw something interesting. All the other "supporting" cast were insignificant until Bryce needed something from them.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Gore, and Murder
Moderate: Misogyny, Gun violence, Sexual content, Blood, and Death
ginnymay's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual content, Violence, Torture, and War
Moderate: Death, Body horror, and Blood
Minor: Sexism, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, War, and Cursing