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4.26 AVERAGE
4.26 AVERAGE
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
I loved the first book in this series, but this one was a bit disappointing. I was happy to be back in the world and see the characters interact with one another, but the pacing was So Slow. I feel like this book was way longer than it should have been, especially for what happened in it.
What bugged me most about this book was Arlo and how she couldn't see the danger she was in for the whole book. Maybe it would have been better if we got a bit less information about what was happening as the reader, as we knew so much more than Arlo that it made her look stupid for not putting the pieces together. I think the ending was intriguing and very interesting, but the buildup to it just felt very frustrating.
That said, I do still love the characters and the world, I'll definitely continue with this series when the next book comes out.
What bugged me most about this book was Arlo and how she couldn't see the danger she was in for the whole book. Maybe it would have been better if we got a bit less information about what was happening as the reader, as we knew so much more than Arlo that it made her look stupid for not putting the pieces together. I think the ending was intriguing and very interesting, but the buildup to it just felt very frustrating.
That said, I do still love the characters and the world, I'll definitely continue with this series when the next book comes out.
No! That can't be how this book ends! NO!
I love how much queer representation this series has. I love that it's such a good fantasy series too. I love the characters and I love the world-building. I love the intrigue and the plot twists and I hate the cliffhanger at the end but I love that this is a four book series instead of a standalone.
I love how much queer representation this series has. I love that it's such a good fantasy series too. I love the characters and I love the world-building. I love the intrigue and the plot twists and I hate the cliffhanger at the end but I love that this is a four book series instead of a standalone.
Writing this review on my phone, because my laptop has not been cooperating recently, and also I fully read this book like three months ago, so. This should be fun!
It was, much like the first one, just such a fun time reading this book. I think this series scratches the same itch as like, sparkly rocks and rainbow colors- it’s another shiny thing to put in my magpie nest of a brain. There’s so much going on, always, at all times, and really the only thing I can do is just turn my brain off and go along for the ride and it’s great.
That being said: this book does get pretty dark at parts, and it addresses some pretty serious themes. I was glad there were content/trigger warnings at the beginning, and would recommend taking a look at those if that’s a concern.
This book has a lot of like, political intrigue and machinations and that kind of thing. The first book ends at like, “This Is The Beginning Of Something Big”, whereas this ends with a huge cliffhanger and “The Wheels Are Set In Motion”. So it’s sort of a different feel. A *lot* of this book is also interpersonal relationship drama, which I personally enjoyed immensely.
We get to see Celadon POV in this one- amazing!!! Wonderful!!! 10/10!!! I love him dearly and I’m genuinely so excited that we got to see more of him in this. He’s protective and headstrong and clever and lonely and dammit I just love him so much. I’m pretty sure he’s gonna get paired off with someone at some point in this series, I just have no idea who. Could go a few directions. But that’s just my theory.
Nausicaä and Arlo do a lot of questing around, Arlo learns about her powers from Luck and Nausicaä is forced to confront her trauma regarding her sister. Their arcs both involve a lot of personal struggle and growth and relying on each other to help them through that. There’s also a lot of flirting and generally it’s very cute and sweet.
Our other main romance subplot is…complicated. For a few reasons, mostly boiling down to “these boys are jealous, madly in love, very horny, and incapable of having an actual conversation for some reason”. Basically Celadon and Vehan’s friend/probably-future-husband Theo are both spending the summer with Aurelian and Vehan, which means there are four very pretty and very gay boys all in the same place hanging out together and literally all of them have ulterior motives. Some plot stuff happens, but I mostly just loved the drama. Neither Vehan nor Aurelian can go five minutes without pining over the other one and it’s so funny to me. They’re useless gay dumbasses and I love them so much.
We also get a little bit of Riadne POV in the form of flashbacks of her life. It’s not current POV, but it was I guess useful to get her backstory. I didn’t care about it all that much, and I didn’t really enjoy reading those sections as much, but I get why they were necessary. I also kept getting annoyed at Arlo for continuing to support Riadne despite all evidence to the contrary. I just don’t like Riadne much, although I suppose that is the point.
We love a shiny magpie book. We love political intrigue and relationship drama and wild rollercoasters. We love writing reviews of books we read months ago (hahaha it’s fine it’s fine I’m fine).
Even if there were some parts I didn’t care about as much I still had an absolute blast reading this, like the first one, I texted my friend constant updates the whole time even though she hasn’t read these books (thanks Lizzie I appreciate it) and I’m excited for book three!
It was, much like the first one, just such a fun time reading this book. I think this series scratches the same itch as like, sparkly rocks and rainbow colors- it’s another shiny thing to put in my magpie nest of a brain. There’s so much going on, always, at all times, and really the only thing I can do is just turn my brain off and go along for the ride and it’s great.
That being said: this book does get pretty dark at parts, and it addresses some pretty serious themes. I was glad there were content/trigger warnings at the beginning, and would recommend taking a look at those if that’s a concern.
This book has a lot of like, political intrigue and machinations and that kind of thing. The first book ends at like, “This Is The Beginning Of Something Big”, whereas this ends with a huge cliffhanger and “The Wheels Are Set In Motion”. So it’s sort of a different feel. A *lot* of this book is also interpersonal relationship drama, which I personally enjoyed immensely.
We get to see Celadon POV in this one- amazing!!! Wonderful!!! 10/10!!! I love him dearly and I’m genuinely so excited that we got to see more of him in this. He’s protective and headstrong and clever and lonely and dammit I just love him so much. I’m pretty sure he’s gonna get paired off with someone at some point in this series, I just have no idea who. Could go a few directions. But that’s just my theory.
Nausicaä and Arlo do a lot of questing around, Arlo learns about her powers from Luck and Nausicaä is forced to confront her trauma regarding her sister. Their arcs both involve a lot of personal struggle and growth and relying on each other to help them through that. There’s also a lot of flirting and generally it’s very cute and sweet.
Our other main romance subplot is…complicated. For a few reasons, mostly boiling down to “these boys are jealous, madly in love, very horny, and incapable of having an actual conversation for some reason”. Basically Celadon and Vehan’s friend/probably-future-husband Theo are both spending the summer with Aurelian and Vehan, which means there are four very pretty and very gay boys all in the same place hanging out together and literally all of them have ulterior motives. Some plot stuff happens, but I mostly just loved the drama. Neither Vehan nor Aurelian can go five minutes without pining over the other one and it’s so funny to me. They’re useless gay dumbasses and I love them so much.
We also get a little bit of Riadne POV in the form of flashbacks of her life. It’s not current POV, but it was I guess useful to get her backstory. I didn’t care about it all that much, and I didn’t really enjoy reading those sections as much, but I get why they were necessary. I also kept getting annoyed at Arlo for continuing to support Riadne despite all evidence to the contrary. I just don’t like Riadne much, although I suppose that is the point.
We love a shiny magpie book. We love political intrigue and relationship drama and wild rollercoasters. We love writing reviews of books we read months ago (hahaha it’s fine it’s fine I’m fine).
Even if there were some parts I didn’t care about as much I still had an absolute blast reading this, like the first one, I texted my friend constant updates the whole time even though she hasn’t read these books (thanks Lizzie I appreciate it) and I’m excited for book three!
adventurous
emotional
funny
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
adventurous
tense
slow-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:
Yes
I finished the book for every other character other than Arlo, which is irritating given the fact that she's basically the main character. I didn't like her in the first book and I didn't like her in this one. I skimmed her chapters because of course hers were the longer ones. I wish she wasnt made to be as naive and clueless. Every now and then I like her but honestly the only reason i'm continueing the series is for every other character. I want to see their stories develop and be happy. Maybe she'll become less annoying in the next books because now she knows not to be so naive and to listen to everyone else when they say that someone is evil...
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
i enjoyed the overall plot and fell in love with the characters i just think it can get a little slow at times with all of the detailed descriptions of places/events.
I have a BIG problem with the cover art. Vehan has been described as having GOLDEN skin in the books. You look at this cover and tell me those boys are anything other than white as a ghost. I may be reading into it a little much, but I looked up a lot of the names while reading to see how to pronounce them. During my research, I found out that Vehan is a traditional Muslim name and is found in many Middle Eastern countries, Egypt, India, Pakistan, and Malaysia. I was hopeful that there was actually diversity in these characters, the diversity so many reviewsof book one were searching for. I thought maybe it was there, the description was just a little lacking.
And then we were given two white fae on the cover.
I did actually take a star off of my review for this. Seeing how many reviews complain about the lack of representation in these books, this feels like a very conscious and arrogant decision. This could have been fixed before the book was published. There isn’t an excuse here. Again, Vehan is a name associated with countries in the Middle East and South East Asia? Why am I looking at a white fae on the cover?
Anyway. I didn't learn my lesson after book one.
I was *hopeful* that Vehan and Aurelian being on the cover meant there would be more focus on them during this book. Like heavy focus on them. I know better than this.
With that said: Aurelian is the best part of this story. I love him with every fiber of my being. I will personally end someone if any harm comes to him. I cannot express how much I adore this broody fae. I don't even have constructive reasoning. I just love him, that's all.
We got more Celadon in this book, which I adore. I am glad to see him grow into a main character role, although it doesn't help with the one problem that carries over from A Dark and Hollow Star: too many perspectives. Add him in, we're still at 5. But don't worry, we also get the Queen's perspective this go around, so six!!! At least going into book two, you can expect it, so it isn't as jarring to be bounced back and forth like a ping-pong ball. He has a *big reveal* in this book, and honestly? I will give kudos where kudos are due. I picked it up at the first hint of the Queen's office not being double-locked (the vaguest of spoilers if I ever gave one), but the actual reveal was still so good.
This book has made me like Arlo and Nausicaa both less. I found myself growing more and more irritated with both of them as the book went on. My problems with Nausicaa continue on from book one, I still think her character, a centuries-old immortal woman, is written to be far more childish than the teenagers she is surrounded by. Arlo is too blinded by the fact she's learning alchemy and is being treated like a member of the fae community to realize that she's looking danger straight in the face for the entire book.
Vehan is here. He's having a lot of issues in this book. Issues with his magic. Issues with the array on his chest. Issues with his memory. His mother is evil. He's in love with his best friend but he is kind of almost engaged to another guy but not really. The poor boy is going through it and he thinks he's losing his mind. He's still a cinnamon roll. A moody cinnamon roll this go around, but a cinnamon roll none the less.
I still stand firmly by my stance that Aurelian and Celadon are the bread and butter of these books for me. Their suspicions of the Seelie Queen of Summer is my favorite part of this book and I wish we got more of their detective work. Their chemistry together is so much fun and I wanted more of their friendship to be built. Hell, there was such a cool opportunity for things to change and take an unexpected turn here too and get off the pipeline of Vehan and Aurelian needing to get together by the end of the book. Like many other things, I feel like the idea is there, the execution is at like a 70%. It's like we got a taste of something good but for every paragraph of good, we get two off filler.
Much like book one, Arlo's magic 'lucky' D20 has taken away the risk of most fights. And even then, as she learns more about what she can do with the D20 and what it means to be a vessel for the patron 'Luck' she gets the warning to be very specific with her wording when using the D20. So it's a very obvious forewarning that it will come back to bite her in the ass eventually. And it does. In the biggest way.
I have a lot of thoughts about the plot, but I don't want to throw a ton of spoilers into this review. Overall, it feels half baked. I know I keep saying it, but the ideas are there, they just need to be fleshed out better than they are. The ending is a perfect example of this. It gets sloppy and rushed. I had to reread the last few chapters a couple of times to make sense of what was going on because I just couldn't make heads or tails of if the first time through. It wasn't some big climactic fight like I think it was intended to be. It was just a lot of loose ends... trying to tie themselves up. And creating a very large fire.
I will be reading book three.
I will continue to foolishly hope that the fact Celadon is on the cover means I will get more of him in the book. Will I complain about that cover too? Stay tuned!
And then we were given two white fae on the cover.
I did actually take a star off of my review for this. Seeing how many reviews complain about the lack of representation in these books, this feels like a very conscious and arrogant decision. This could have been fixed before the book was published. There isn’t an excuse here. Again, Vehan is a name associated with countries in the Middle East and South East Asia? Why am I looking at a white fae on the cover?
Anyway. I didn't learn my lesson after book one.
I was *hopeful* that Vehan and Aurelian being on the cover meant there would be more focus on them during this book. Like heavy focus on them. I know better than this.
With that said: Aurelian is the best part of this story. I love him with every fiber of my being. I will personally end someone if any harm comes to him. I cannot express how much I adore this broody fae. I don't even have constructive reasoning. I just love him, that's all.
We got more Celadon in this book, which I adore. I am glad to see him grow into a main character role, although it doesn't help with the one problem that carries over from A Dark and Hollow Star: too many perspectives. Add him in, we're still at 5. But don't worry, we also get the Queen's perspective this go around, so six!!! At least going into book two, you can expect it, so it isn't as jarring to be bounced back and forth like a ping-pong ball. He has a *big reveal* in this book, and honestly? I will give kudos where kudos are due. I picked it up at the first hint of the Queen's office not being double-locked (the vaguest of spoilers if I ever gave one), but the actual reveal was still so good.
This book has made me like Arlo and Nausicaa both less. I found myself growing more and more irritated with both of them as the book went on. My problems with Nausicaa continue on from book one, I still think her character, a centuries-old immortal woman, is written to be far more childish than the teenagers she is surrounded by. Arlo is too blinded by the fact she's learning alchemy and is being treated like a member of the fae community to realize that she's looking danger straight in the face for the entire book.
Spoiler
(The fact she doesn't listen to Celadon when he tries to talk her out of going to Nevada for the summer infuriates me. Celadon is the ONE person in this entire book who has this girl's interests in mind and cares for Arlo at all times but she doesn't want to listen to him. Granted, Arlo is more than likely under Queen Riadne's spell the entire time so it makes sense as to why this all unfolds the way it does but I still hate it.)Vehan is here. He's having a lot of issues in this book. Issues with his magic. Issues with the array on his chest. Issues with his memory. His mother is evil. He's in love with his best friend but he is kind of almost engaged to another guy but not really. The poor boy is going through it and he thinks he's losing his mind. He's still a cinnamon roll. A moody cinnamon roll this go around, but a cinnamon roll none the less.
I still stand firmly by my stance that Aurelian and Celadon are the bread and butter of these books for me. Their suspicions of the Seelie Queen of Summer is my favorite part of this book and I wish we got more of their detective work. Their chemistry together is so much fun and I wanted more of their friendship to be built. Hell, there was such a cool opportunity for things to change and take an unexpected turn here too and get off the pipeline of Vehan and Aurelian needing to get together by the end of the book. Like many other things, I feel like the idea is there, the execution is at like a 70%. It's like we got a taste of something good but for every paragraph of good, we get two off filler.
Much like book one, Arlo's magic 'lucky' D20 has taken away the risk of most fights. And even then, as she learns more about what she can do with the D20 and what it means to be a vessel for the patron 'Luck' she gets the warning to be very specific with her wording when using the D20. So it's a very obvious forewarning that it will come back to bite her in the ass eventually. And it does. In the biggest way.
I have a lot of thoughts about the plot, but I don't want to throw a ton of spoilers into this review. Overall, it feels half baked. I know I keep saying it, but the ideas are there, they just need to be fleshed out better than they are. The ending is a perfect example of this. It gets sloppy and rushed. I had to reread the last few chapters a couple of times to make sense of what was going on because I just couldn't make heads or tails of if the first time through. It wasn't some big climactic fight like I think it was intended to be. It was just a lot of loose ends... trying to tie themselves up. And creating a very large fire.
I will be reading book three.
I will continue to foolishly hope that the fact Celadon is on the cover means I will get more of him in the book. Will I complain about that cover too? Stay tuned!
First of all, I love this book so much and I'm so glad I got it in advance so it could immediately go to the top of my TBR list.
This book picks up essentially where the last left off, Arlo explaining what happened to the court and then she (along with Celadon) are invited to the Summer Seelie Court for the summer so that Arlo can train her alchemy. Honestly, there are multiple plots in this book but it's done so well and so smoothly, that I didn't even realise it until I was writing this. First, you have Arlo and her studies, both in alchemy and with Luck as a Hollow Star. Also with Arlo you have your "will-they-won't-they" romance with her and Nos as she continues to fall in love (and realise she is falling in love). Next, with Celadon and Aurelian, you have their heavy suspicion of the Seelie Queen of Summer and dedication to reveal her plans (also with the help of another character but that's totally spoilers) and this plot line is VERY political/court drama and I must say, I absolutely loved it and it was very well done. Then you have Vehan's struggle with his magic and emotions that May Or May Not be his and, to top it all off, his and Aurelian's own "will-they-won't-they" oblivious love story. 100% this sequel was everything I hoped for, and more, and I need the third one NOW!
Potential cons:
- Length. When I first put this book on my kobo and saw it was like 550~ pages I was immediately overwhelmed. I tend to not like super long books, because they can drag on and tend to be really slow to get going but this WAS NOT LIKE THAT AT ALL. It was written so smoothly, and so well frankly that everything flowed and seemed to follow a logical and exciting timeline that kept me super engaged.
What I liked:
- Queerness. This book reminds me of the Oprah meme "you get a car! And you get a car!" Except instead of cars, we're getting queer characters. Literally everyone and their mom are queer and it's AMAZING. I love the way that in this universe, queerness just is and it's SO refreshing and comforting to read. Sometimes, we don't need stories about how terrible or difficult it is to be queer and this is one of those stories.
- The TTRPG-ness. Of course I'm a DnD nerd, I'm gay what do you expect. The way this is done feels very natural, and just another part of the magic in the world (instead of feeling awkward or forced). The author explains it so well and spread out that we believe this is Arlo learning and exploring what it means to be a Hollow Star and that the TTRPG-ness of it is just happenstance - like the magic came first.
- Worldbuilding. Can I just compliment how GOOD Ashley Shuttleworth is at worldbuilding because good goly are they ever. This is the second book, so we're expected to know a lot more about the world and we do. However, we still get to learn new aspects and traditions of the world as the characters, particularly Arlo, are exposed to new information and events. Everything is woven in so seamlessly though, there's not just a big block of information shoved in there, obviously for the reader's benefit. Instead, things are exposed layer by layer, as they come up and ugh, it's just so good to read.
This book picks up essentially where the last left off, Arlo explaining what happened to the court and then she (along with Celadon) are invited to the Summer Seelie Court for the summer so that Arlo can train her alchemy. Honestly, there are multiple plots in this book but it's done so well and so smoothly, that I didn't even realise it until I was writing this. First, you have Arlo and her studies, both in alchemy and with Luck as a Hollow Star. Also with Arlo you have your "will-they-won't-they" romance with her and Nos as she continues to fall in love (and realise she is falling in love). Next, with Celadon and Aurelian, you have their heavy suspicion of the Seelie Queen of Summer and dedication to reveal her plans (also with the help of another character but that's totally spoilers) and this plot line is VERY political/court drama and I must say, I absolutely loved it and it was very well done. Then you have Vehan's struggle with his magic and emotions that May Or May Not be his and, to top it all off, his and Aurelian's own "will-they-won't-they" oblivious love story. 100% this sequel was everything I hoped for, and more, and I need the third one NOW!
Potential cons:
- Length. When I first put this book on my kobo and saw it was like 550~ pages I was immediately overwhelmed. I tend to not like super long books, because they can drag on and tend to be really slow to get going but this WAS NOT LIKE THAT AT ALL. It was written so smoothly, and so well frankly that everything flowed and seemed to follow a logical and exciting timeline that kept me super engaged.
What I liked:
- Queerness. This book reminds me of the Oprah meme "you get a car! And you get a car!" Except instead of cars, we're getting queer characters. Literally everyone and their mom are queer and it's AMAZING. I love the way that in this universe, queerness just is and it's SO refreshing and comforting to read. Sometimes, we don't need stories about how terrible or difficult it is to be queer and this is one of those stories.
- The TTRPG-ness. Of course I'm a DnD nerd, I'm gay what do you expect. The way this is done feels very natural, and just another part of the magic in the world (instead of feeling awkward or forced). The author explains it so well and spread out that we believe this is Arlo learning and exploring what it means to be a Hollow Star and that the TTRPG-ness of it is just happenstance - like the magic came first.
- Worldbuilding. Can I just compliment how GOOD Ashley Shuttleworth is at worldbuilding because good goly are they ever. This is the second book, so we're expected to know a lot more about the world and we do. However, we still get to learn new aspects and traditions of the world as the characters, particularly Arlo, are exposed to new information and events. Everything is woven in so seamlessly though, there's not just a big block of information shoved in there, obviously for the reader's benefit. Instead, things are exposed layer by layer, as they come up and ugh, it's just so good to read.
adventurous
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:
Complicated