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lawbooks600's review
adventurous
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
Score: Four out of ten.
What a disappointing reading experience.
Yvain, an illustrated retelling of an Arthurian myth by M.T. Anderson, with by Andrea Offermann, could've been much better. I wanted to read it after seeing another person I knew read it, so I picked it up from a library shelf. I glanced at the intriguing blurb, but the low ratings warned me to avoid it, and when I closed the final page, I was underwhelmed.
It starts with Yvain, a knight, wanting glory for himself, so he sets out to fight and eventually defeat a lord, leaving behind his partner, Laudine, and her servant, Lunette. Gawain, however, wants Yvain to go on an adventure across the land, and so he goes off to fight dragons, mythical beasts and who knows what else. Other than that though, there isn't any other plot to Yvain, but there are a lot of problems I want to discuss about Yvain, I'm unsure where to start, but I'll try.
First, the characters. Yvain the knight and other side characters like Laudine and Lunette lack depth or character development, making it difficult to connect or relate with them, but adding more depth and expanding the arcs would've been an improvement. The pacing is enough to keep Yvain going, with a length of slightly over 100 pages, but I would've liked to see more of the worldbuilding, which felt underexplored, but adding more pages dedicated to answering questions I had would make Yvain better. Now that I think of it, I don't think there were enough pages to tell the story. At least the art is engaging, especially during the few battle scenes I got to see, with Yvain easily slaying any beast in his path, and the pictures can sometimes speak for themselves, except for some parts with fog covering the pictures. How am I supposed to read the text through that? The conclusion is heartwarming as Yvain returns to his land after so long, but M.T. Anderson's debut in the illustrated novel genre (as he wrote prose until this came out) didn't resonate, so perhaps his traditional creations could be more enjoyable.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Animal death, Blood, Murder, Violence, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail
Full trigger warnings: Animal death, murder, blood, grief and loss depiction, physical assault and injury, sword violencedogearedqueer's review
adventurous
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence
Moderate: Animal death, Blood, and Animal cruelty
Minor: War, Suicidal thoughts, Slavery, and Murder
vigil's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
i’d say it has less to do with love and more manipulation, but it’s always a good time to read arthuriana. that being said, i feel like this mislabeled as YA mostly because i have no idea who this book is meant for.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Blood, Classism, Confinement, Death, Grief, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Suicidal thoughts, and Violence
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