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3.92 AVERAGE
3.92 AVERAGE
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
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:
Yes
Look, it‘s not that bad, but I am so bored reading it. It feels way too YA for my taste, I just don‘t want to read about teenagers any more. I‘m disappointed I keep running into YA novels marketed as adult.
adventurous
dark
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
mysterious
fast-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
adventurous
dark
medium-paced
This was pretty good, but I would like more than that for a book this long. Great premise and decent worldbuilding.
❤
❤❤
Ashes of the Sun has a very promising premise. The world especially, was definitely intriguing. However the execution of this very promising plot was below par. To be honest, I did not think this was the work of a seasoned author.
So the book opens up with Gyre and his sister Maya taking care of the family's farm animals. Fast forward to a random official showing up, Va something something Thousandcuts, Maya is taken against her parents will? maybe not against her parents will? We're never really told. Either way, she's taken, there's much crying, Gyre tries to "rescue" her and gets one of his eyes fucked up for his troubles.
12 years later, Gyre is older and swearing something that seems like revenge, smells like revenge and talks like revenge but he says it's liberation. Maya is firmly entrenched in the ideals of the Twilight Order and every time she opens her mouth basically sounds like the goody two shoes you'd hate in secondary school.
The nail in the coffin for this book for me is that you could more often than not, predict what was going to happen and quite frankly these characters were dumb as rocks.
Umm spoilers I guess *shrug*
Maya gets miraculous powers at the end of the book because sure that makes sense. Gyre's brain never picks up on the fact that Kit was one step from betraying him even though it was obvious to anyone with half a brain. But I guess when you're thinking with your penis you can't really think with your real brain.
Wexler dedicates for some weird reason too much time in my opinion to the sex life of Gyre and Maya. Oh, look Maya masturbates, oh look Gyre can't say no to Kit trying to drag his penis out every time she's horny (which is a lot of times by the way). How does this help the book? I'm guessing the point was to show them as regular people, readers could somehow relate to but to be honest, more time should have been spent giving them a brain and making them think smartly....
❤❤❤
All in all, amazing world, great potential but
execution falls flat...
"I am seizing you on the authority of the Twilight Order...You stand accused of practicing dhaka. You will have an opportunity to present evidence in your defense"
❤❤
Ashes of the Sun has a very promising premise. The world especially, was definitely intriguing. However the execution of this very promising plot was below par. To be honest, I did not think this was the work of a seasoned author.
So the book opens up with Gyre and his sister Maya taking care of the family's farm animals. Fast forward to a random official showing up, Va something something Thousandcuts, Maya is taken against her parents will? maybe not against her parents will? We're never really told. Either way, she's taken, there's much crying, Gyre tries to "rescue" her and gets one of his eyes fucked up for his troubles.
12 years later, Gyre is older and swearing something that seems like revenge, smells like revenge and talks like revenge but he says it's liberation. Maya is firmly entrenched in the ideals of the Twilight Order and every time she opens her mouth basically sounds like the goody two shoes you'd hate in secondary school.
The nail in the coffin for this book for me is that you could more often than not, predict what was going to happen and quite frankly these characters were dumb as rocks.
Umm spoilers I guess *shrug*
Maya gets miraculous powers at the end of the book because sure that makes sense. Gyre's brain never picks up on the fact that Kit was one step from betraying him even though it was obvious to anyone with half a brain. But I guess when you're thinking with your penis you can't really think with your real brain.
Wexler dedicates for some weird reason too much time in my opinion to the sex life of Gyre and Maya. Oh, look Maya masturbates, oh look Gyre can't say no to Kit trying to drag his penis out every time she's horny (which is a lot of times by the way). How does this help the book? I'm guessing the point was to show them as regular people, readers could somehow relate to but to be honest, more time should have been spent giving them a brain and making them think smartly....
❤❤❤
All in all, amazing world, great potential but
execution falls flat...
adventurous
dark
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
A fun Star Wars-esque story, but unfortunately I found it really hard to care about the characters.
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
This was a very good book, all things considered. It's a fun type of world, mostly fantasy but a mildly sci-fi-ish twist. Strong worldbuilding overall, though it's not quite as solidly-rooted as something in the Daniel Abraham, Miles Cameron or M.L. Wang space. This is very much a popcorn read - magic swords & bio-punk magic robots, vague powerful Orders, mysterious ancestors & rebel scum. It's not a super thinky book, but it's pretty well-written and entertaining.
The plot moves pretty well, and I had a lot of fun reading this. The action scenes, of which there are a decent number, blend the fun magic system & entertaining worldbuilding to end up with a pretty solid read. I did also like that there's some pretty decent representation & diversity in the cast.
That being said, there are a couple of things that knock it down a little. First, the plot - while not awful - does have a bit of a flat feeling to it. There's some exciting parts, but the climax isn't particularly amazing & it feels a little like some of the conflict ends a bit neatly and the remaining plot sort of tapers off. Second, one of the storylines feels much more engaging than the other, with a lot more rise and fall, and frankly it made me wonder what things would have been like if the book had just followed one throughout. The expected major clash between the two didn't really materialise, and that felt like a bit of a wasted opportunity.
Overall, a pretty strong popcorn page-turner, with some genuinely cool aspects (the magic swords and action therewith are SO much fun) but the weaker plot and characters are more of an issue in a book than a film somehow, and while I enjoyed reading this a lot, the sequel isn't a guaranteed buy.
The plot moves pretty well, and I had a lot of fun reading this. The action scenes, of which there are a decent number, blend the fun magic system & entertaining worldbuilding to end up with a pretty solid read. I did also like that there's some pretty decent representation & diversity in the cast.
That being said, there are a couple of things that knock it down a little. First, the plot - while not awful - does have a bit of a flat feeling to it. There's some exciting parts, but the climax isn't particularly amazing & it feels a little like some of the conflict ends a bit neatly and the remaining plot sort of tapers off. Second, one of the storylines feels much more engaging than the other, with a lot more rise and fall, and frankly it made me wonder what things would have been like if the book had just followed one throughout. The expected major clash between the two didn't really materialise, and that felt like a bit of a wasted opportunity.
Overall, a pretty strong popcorn page-turner, with some genuinely cool aspects (the magic swords and action therewith are SO much fun) but the weaker plot and characters are more of an issue in a book than a film somehow, and while I enjoyed reading this a lot, the sequel isn't a guaranteed buy.
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
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:
Yes