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3.6 AVERAGE
3.6 AVERAGE
challenging
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
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
challenging
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
What I liked:
1) Cults! There’s an interesting plot somewhere in this story.
2) That first scene with Dragon
1) Cults! There’s an interesting plot somewhere in this story.
2) That first scene with Dragon
In many ways this book was great! It was a good balance of character, commentary, and events; and I enjoy seeing shifters and vampires and secret societies being used in a way that isn't your bog-standard paranormal modern fantasy. But I had real difficulty getting into it, because there were too many characters and POV switches, and I kept losing track of who was who. Multiple characters are grieving a dead brother, which might have been intended as a kind of narrative resonance, but actually made it difficult for me to keep them straight; and when you combine that with shifting timelines, it got very confusing. Laina is married to Ridley, for example, but a couple of chapters later she's got a girlfriend named Rebecca--so are we in the pre-Ridley past? No, because her brother is dead, and that happened during her marriage to Ridley. Did they break up? What's the deal here? And then three chapters later from Ridley's perspective we learn that they have an open marriage--which is fine, but if we had learned about that earlier, I wouldn't have gotten so confused and distracted during the whole Rebecca-girlfriend bit. The end sequence, when all of the characters and plot elements coincide, would have been much more effective if I had been able to keep them all straight in my head. I'm sure that Turnbull is doing something very cool here, but I can't quite keep up with him well enough to see it.
adventurous
challenging
dark
reflective
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I feel like this book is just a setup for the book or books to follow. There is a lot of World building and many of characters are introduced but there's no real, definitive climax or resolution to the plot. The story bounces from character to character as well as from timeline to timeline - sometimes in first person sometimes in third person - without any clear indication of where the storyline is going. It's intelligent, introspective and very descriptive but I wish more had been put into building the plot or developing the characters rather than the almost detached narration that was given. I do want to read the second book in the story but I really hope that the pace and plot are more developed.
challenging
dark
emotional
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Heavy and feels incomplete
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism
Moderate: Animal death, Bullying, Death, Emotional abuse, Pedophilia, Sexual assault, Violence, Police brutality, Grief, Death of parent, Gaslighting, Dysphoria
This is a really ambitious book with a lot of interesting ideas. I don’t know that it fully comes together for me, but I'm definitely going to read the next one. Best section was the one split between Calvin/Cory and the atomic professor’s life.