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3.95 AVERAGE
3.95 AVERAGE
3.5 rounded up. Still a lot of gore for me. But, she is a great storyteller.
Damn, that sucked… I was pretty meh about the first book, but there were some elements I quite enjoyed. I liked the fact that she was a storyteller whose lies turned out to be truths. I liked Gild’s mischievous nature. I liked the twist at the end. The overarching plot was a bit tedious, but these points were interesting enough to have me wanting to read this finale. Oof. What a disappointment. Serilda is one of the stupidest, laziest, most useless heroines I have ever read. She’s constantly begging and pleading with the evil psychopath of a demon king, when she’s not bitching and whining at him, instead of, I dunno, DOING SOMETHING?! She goes around playing hide and seek with the dead children and doing god knows what for literal months and then is upset and shocked that nothing’s happened?! Good lord, the number of times I rolled my eyes at her behavior… Just astounding that she even managed to live and have a happy ending. She should’ve fallen into the pit with the rest of them. Ugh. I should’ve just dnf’d, but I had already invested so much time into it, I felt like it would be a shame… I gave it an extra 0.5 star because… good concept, I guess. But oof, that just truly sucked.
Waited too long to write my review, so now, sadly, I can't remember enough to write a full "Prudie" review. But I did enjoy this one, very much! A great conclusion to this creative, entertaining duology. As in the first book, I loved the writing, and the characters and world continue to blossom in this story, expounding on things from the first book in a satisfying way. Compulsively readable fantasy story for sure.
Brief Prudie ratings, based on what I can recall (if you are not a reader with conservative, Christian-based values, this part of the review will not be helpful to you)--
Language: I remember there being several profanities, though "small" ones, I believe?
Steaminess: Kissing, hand-holding, hugging. I don't remember anything steamy in this one, except some references to sex that were mostly off-hand and not detailed.
Positive themes: Definitely rings of pro-life and how a baby should be valued from conception. Pro-parenthood, pro-complementarianism in the main love story.
Political correctness: Talk of women, young and old, having pre-martial sex (said kind of in passing). As I was afraid there would be, the same-sex romance between side characters in the first book is brought to the culmination of getting "married" and having a wedding. It's not a major thread in the story, but you get enough of it to see it as pointed, front-facing tokenization and/or the intent of indoctrinating young readers so as to normalize that lifestyle. There is more face-time with the non-binary gods in this book, which are genderless "theys". And there's a very...unnatural, uncomfortable thread in the story regarding the MC's mother (spoiler: It was really, really weird, and would certainly be an important conversation point with your teenage readers if you're a parent.)
Violence: There is quite a lot of violence and/or scary images in this book (series). There wasn't anything that stood out to me as being over-the-top grotesque, but younger or more sensitive readers may struggle with some of the visuals presented in this creepy, dark environment that is rife with ghosts, gods, monsters, and dangerous magical creatures.
Brief Prudie ratings, based on what I can recall (if you are not a reader with conservative, Christian-based values, this part of the review will not be helpful to you)--
Language: I remember there being several profanities, though "small" ones, I believe?
Steaminess: Kissing, hand-holding, hugging. I don't remember anything steamy in this one, except some references to sex that were mostly off-hand and not detailed.
Positive themes: Definitely rings of pro-life and how a baby should be valued from conception. Pro-parenthood, pro-complementarianism in the main love story.
Political correctness: Talk of women, young and old, having pre-martial sex (said kind of in passing). As I was afraid there would be, the same-sex romance between side characters in the first book is brought to the culmination of getting "married" and having a wedding. It's not a major thread in the story, but you get enough of it to see it as pointed, front-facing tokenization and/or the intent of indoctrinating young readers so as to normalize that lifestyle. There is more face-time with the non-binary gods in this book, which are genderless "theys". And there's a very...unnatural, uncomfortable thread in the story regarding the MC's mother (spoiler:
Spoiler
her long-lost mother is really one of the non-binary gods, who took the form of a woman and fell in love with the MC's human father and birthed the MC while in the form of a human woman, so this god calls herself the MC's mother, and the MC thinks of this god as her mother.Violence: There is quite a lot of violence and/or scary images in this book (series). There wasn't anything that stood out to me as being over-the-top grotesque, but younger or more sensitive readers may struggle with some of the visuals presented in this creepy, dark environment that is rife with ghosts, gods, monsters, and dangerous magical creatures.
adventurous
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
A solid ending, but the first 50% was just so slow it was semi-painful. Seriously. Serilda annoyed me, and a lot of her actions were frustrating. A lot of trouble could have been avoided if only she wasn’t hardheaded and didn’t care about the village children’s ghosts quite so much. That particular plot point felt a bit weak for me.
The first half was so tedious that the second did not quite make up for it. I did manage to plod through it, though!
And don’t get me started on the pregnancy trope.
The first half was so tedious that the second did not quite make up for it. I did manage to plod through it, though!
And don’t get me started on the pregnancy trope.
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
challenging
I enjoyed this continuation of the story. Like the first book, this was a little gruesome and tragic for me but I was riveted the whole time so that says a lot. There were a few times where I was pretty surprised (in a good way) and I love to be surprised. It’s a very creative re-telling with a satisfying ending.
3.5 stars rounded down for a very rushed ending.
I thought this has a lot going for it as the story went along. Nice pacing, new developments, etc. However, once we got to the end it all seemed very confusing, especially in regards to the wishes granted and what was considered ample consideration. I had a hard time following what was currently happening and what was going to happen in the future.
I also despised the whole, "I'll bet you're wondering what happened to the characters..." ending story. Kind of bummer that the last 50-odd pages turned this from a solid 4 stars down. It was better than the first overall, but left me with an eye roll.
I thought this has a lot going for it as the story went along. Nice pacing, new developments, etc. However, once we got to the end it all seemed very confusing, especially in regards to the wishes granted and what was considered ample consideration. I had a hard time following what was currently happening and what was going to happen in the future.
I also despised the whole, "I'll bet you're wondering what happened to the characters..." ending story. Kind of bummer that the last 50-odd pages turned this from a solid 4 stars down. It was better than the first overall, but left me with an eye roll.
adventurous
dark
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:
Complicated