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bree_h_reads's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
Graphic: Body horror, Gore, Physical abuse, Emotional abuse, Death of parent, Child abuse, and Ableism
Moderate: Genocide, Animal death, Confinement, and Animal cruelty
Minor: Racism, Religious bigotry, Xenophobia, and Colonisation
mattiedancer's review against another edition
- 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
3.75
- Fans of young adult fantasy novels
- Fans of YA looking for a cute romance
Final Rating: 3.75⭐️/5
Graphic: Confinement, Domestic abuse, Fire/Fire injury, Gore, Kidnapping, Child abuse, Death of parent, Injury/Injury detail, Sexual harassment, Toxic relationship, Violence, War, Body horror, Classism, Murder, Physical abuse, Death, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, and Grief
drtx_bwt's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? N/A
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
5.0
Graphic: Child abuse, Emotional abuse, and Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Fire/Fire injury and Death of parent
Minor: Lesbophobia and Violence
onegalonelife27's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
And onto one of my favorite aspects-the male lead in this book! Han is the BEST! He's awkward, he's tries so hard to impress and help the heroine in combat-he often fails, but tries with all he's got. He's also there for the heroine when she needs emotional support. I'd certainly put him on the himbo scale, because man all the history and innuendos that fly over this guy's head. I've forgotten what a joy it is to have such a dork of hero! We need more dorky, sweet men in fiction and this world!
I do feel like some scenes were rushed, like I knew a scene should happen but I didn't expect it to happen when it did, without much foreshadowing to it was happening now.
Either way, I think this is a strong start to a new fantasy series and I look forward to seeing what happens next in this world!
Graphic: Emotional abuse and Child abuse
Moderate: Gaslighting
Minor: Homophobia, Transphobia, and War
hobbithopeful's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
I love fantasy, especially mythology, so I was so excited to read this, but the execution made me regret reading it.
An overall boring read, it lacked the type of writing that made you want to stay up all night. I don't know exactly what it is about this story or the style that makes it so hard to stay engaged with, but I largely attribute my dislike to the writing. The dialogue was very cheesy at times, and there is a lot of telling rather then showing that occurs in this book. The characters were hard to like, and the disability rep is quite frankly terrible. Suzhan was infantilized numerous times, and it feels like the author has no idea what it is actually like to live as a blind person. She is treated more as an invalid then an actual person. It reads more of an after thought then something that was put genuine time and research into.
The characters just feel so...I can't even put into words what is so wrong with them. They are fleshed out, and have different characteristics, they just feel dull. A book about fantasy and magic should never feel dull.
I did enjoy the world-building and all the magic, that was very fun to read.
It becomes very obvious within the first few chapters what is going to happen. While that is not unusual for books, instead of being excited by the journey from point a to point b, it lacked substance.
There is a lot of queer rep, in that the characters that are queer seem to flirt with everything that moves.
It has taken me an inordinate amount of time to slog through this book. I received it as an ARC through Netgalley, and heavily considered dnf-ing it several times.
I personally would not recommend this, nor I will I be reading the next book in the series. At this time I don't think the authors' writing style is for me either.
This is a winning cover, it is absolutely gorgeous, and a lot of people will definitely buy this for how pretty it looks. The composition and design work seamlessly, and I love the font used.
Thank you netgalley for this ARC
Graphic: Blood and Body horror
Minor: Emotional abuse, Child abuse, and Death of parent
sarahyjackson's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.75
I found myself sort of rushing through the climactic event scenes but I sort of felt that way in Sailor Moon, too. Sometimes it really do be the friends and hero you make and become along the way.
Graphic: Injury/Injury detail, Ableism, Body horror, Child abuse, Death, and Emotional abuse
Minor: Lesbophobia
bookswithmick's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
1.0
This is not age appropriate for any group of people. The characters act like ten year olds and are EXTREMELY juvenile and immature, and yet they're also making sex jokes constantly and talking about porn. It is both very middle grade and very adult and YA readers are not going to jive with it, even though they're technically in the middle. Who wants to read about kids with the maturity of ten year olds making porn jokes? Certainly not me. And "joke" is a strong word. Nothing in this was funny.
The plot wasn't the worst, but it also was not original. It didn't even start until like 30% in, and by then I was so irritated it was hard to get into it. The world could have been good, but it wasn't explored much because we just had to constantly hear about Zhara having the "good-looking giggles" every. single. time. she saw someone she found attractive. A lot that happened was repetitive and I've absolutely read in plenty of other books, the characters were obnoxious, the hints at the plot twists were blatantly obvious, and it was all just very poorly executed. Could've been decent even though it was unoriginal, but the writing was so bland and repetitive that i just ended up hating every moment.
Also why is BTS randomly in this?? There's a boy band that shows up super far into the story and is very obviously BTS and it just doesn't fit at all with anything that has happened. It felt kinda weird and off.
The last thing, and one that I really struggled with: for a book that's supposed to have good representation, it does NOT. Yes, there are LGBTQ+ characters and nonbinary pronouns and that was all good. We love a queernorm world. However, there is a disabled character that was represented in a way that made me really uncomfortable. I do not have this disability so my opinion may be skewed, but she was made out to be completely useless by most of the characters for the ENTIRE book, solely because of her disability. She is defined by that alone. I couldn't tell you anything else about her besides her disability, and that's just depressing to write in this review. Don't distill someone's entire essence down to a disability!
Furthermore, the MMC is constantly put down and made fun of for being stupid and vapid. Constantly. I can't even count the number of times they told him, to his face and behind his back, that he was thick (dumb) and too obsessed with working out/his appearance and that some people liked to be around him because he was too stupid to notice anything or be a problem. WTF??? Mocking intelligence is not cute and it's not funny and is NOT something we should be encouraging in a joking manner in a YA book (he's also made fun of for not understanding porn; no idea why that was in there at all and it made me feel super weird and icky).
Obviously I am heated. This book was bad on so many levels and I honestly cannot think of anybody to recommend it to, since the characters act like actual children while also making very inappropriate "jokes" for children. And with the way some characters are treated, i just....cannot recommend this.
The good? The cover is colorful. I liked that. And i liked the concept. The execution was just not there.
Thank you NetGalley and Macmillan Audio for the ALC. I feel bad I disliked it as much as I did but such is life sometimes.
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Ableism, and Child abuse
Moderate: Body shaming
chronicacademia's review against another edition
Graphic: Ableism
Moderate: Death, Death of parent, Domestic abuse, Transphobia, Violence, Child abuse, Blood, Chronic illness, Emotional abuse, Gore, and Medical content
writteninmagic's review against another edition
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
3.0
I thought the premise and the world were interesting. The writing was simple and easy to follow along with for the most part; there were instances, such as mentioning locations in the world and not really having something like a map to indicate where they were in relation to one another, that made it confusing to keep up with when I was reading the story. Unfortunately, the writing style was written as telling everything as it is, which took out any tension the action scenes/battles would've had.
There's a diverse cast of characters, but I felt like none of them really stood out as characters except Xu. All of them basically remained the same throughout the book. However, this is the first book in a series, so there's room for character growth and I'm curious to read more about the magical world and the adventures they'll go on.
Something that frustrated me while I was reading was when something major happened, but then none of the characters mention it until a few chapters later. And then when it gets outright explained several chapters later, Zhara is somehow still surprised even though it should've been really obvious.
The writing got really repetitive with all the instances of Han being like "But how?" and then immediately going "Oh" afterward.
I'm not a fan of instant romantic attraction between characters. Han is instantly drawn toward Zhara and there's also an instant attraction between the two side characters.
Despite the criticisms I've written, I'm curious to read about the story's world (more about the history, the magic, and the elemental Guardians' powers).
Moderate: Emotional abuse and Physical abuse
Minor: Death of parent
kay_rose's review against another edition
- 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
4.0
Graphic: Child abuse, Confinement, Emotional abuse, and Violence
Moderate: Death of parent, Grief, and Murder