Reviews with content warning for Violence - Realm Breaker

Overall good book, there was just long periods of (what felt like) nothing, in-between short periods of something. Several parts felt like they were there to just show how awesome one character or another was.

However, the world building was deeply thought-out, and Aveyard never got lore dumpy. I just wish the pace of the book had been faster, 560 pages felt needless for book 1.

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stephbakerbooks's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

This is a high fantasy book, the first in a series, with a lot of world building, the beginnings of a found family, and some intriguing villains and other morally gray characters.

I don't think I would call this book either character-driven or plot-driven. It's more world-building-driven. The plot moves slowly until the climax at the end, and the book takes a while to get into just because you're trying to understand the world. There's also a lot of characters and multiple POVs, so there's nothing consistent to ground you in the story at first. That being said, if you can push through, I think it's worth it. It definitely just feels like the opening chapter of a saga and will leave you wanting more—I'm excited for where the future books will take the story!

As for the characters, like I said there are a lot of them, and I think the development and backstory suffered a bit in favor of the world building. I'm hopeful that certain characters will be explored more later, but I wanted more from them in this book. I did like all the characters, but I still felt like I didn't know or care about some of them by the end (mainly Valtik, Sigil, and Charlie). I love a found family story, but I guess I just wanted certain aspects that came at the end of the book to come sooner. I did like how it's unclear from the beginning who all is "good" and who is "bad." There was one twist I felt coming, but I still really enjoyed it.

Anyways, I have a feeling this series could get better with each book. So I'm invested in reading the sequel, but I know I'm going to forget a lot that happened in this book before whenever the second book comes out.

Also, Lord of the Rings inspired this one, and it's definitely reaching for that level of epic-ness!

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buywood's review against another edition

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adventurous fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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sallenreads's review against another edition

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adventurous dark fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

This might be my new fantasy series obsession. It had the epic scale of Lord of the Rings, but with diversity and less time spent describing a single tree. The world building in this book was masterful, with an array of countries that felt fully-realized, with distinct histories and cultures. There was also a large cast of interesting characters, each of whom had something to add to the quest instead of only being there to get to some special number. It was also refreshing to read a book that, while it had romance present, the romance didn't completely take over the whole storyline. I absolutely can't wait for the rest of the books in this series.

Thank you to HarperCollins for the ARC.

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