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3.95 AVERAGE
3.95 AVERAGE
By all means, this should be a perfect book for me. Folk-inspired fae lands with a bloody mystery and queer main characters? It feels like this was written specifically for me. The premise had also sounded fun and original - having to solve something that requires reading without the knowledge how to do so, needless to say I decided to give The Prince of Sorrows a read.
Some people use the phrase that something is "written like a fanfic" to say that it is written badly, but I think this would be a disservice to all the well written fanfiction I read over the years and that have stuck with me. My high expectations for this book were sadly not met and I only finished the story out of frustration, hoping that surely the next chapter will be better, surely there's a method to this madness!
We follow Saffron, who is our human main character, as he tries to solve the mystery of his friend Arrow's murder. However, Saffron gets distracted by the Big Horns of Prince Cylvan and instead we witness their romance bloom and the mystery gets forgotten about until the last few chapters.
The LI starts as a horrible person, abusing their power over Saffron (I found the party scene with the fruit eating particularly vile). It felt absolutely unrealistic to me for Cylvan to turn into this suffering fragile prince who kisses the ground our human MC walks on not even halfway through the book. Their romance did not win me over.
The side characters are only mentioned in name and in relation to the MC, other than that they felt paper thin and not fleshed out. Only Lettuce, Saffron's friend is privy to a romance of her own, but even this is mentioned in a couple of sentences, for we are told about this rather than shown.
I liked the idea of the human settlement and its more rustic feel, as well as the naming customs for the Beanthinges, as each is called after a spice, textile, vegetable and so on. Kellen Graves certainly knows how to paint a picture for the audience. The reader is taken to multiple locations that have been carefully thought about. The author also knows how to design a visually striking characters - you can tell that Saffron and Cylvan were crafted with love.
Perhaps the story would have benefitted from being only a romance, as this was clearly Graves' favourite part. The murders and the wolf in the woods have fallen short in comparison, so much so it was actually sad to see. Either cut it out, or let the story marinate a bit longer.
Despite all of the above, I plan on continuing the series, as I am hoping that the author's craft will hone with next volumes of Rowan Blood tetralogy. After all, I was positively giddy when discovering the book for the first time and was looking forward to the read.
Some people use the phrase that something is "written like a fanfic" to say that it is written badly, but I think this would be a disservice to all the well written fanfiction I read over the years and that have stuck with me. My high expectations for this book were sadly not met and I only finished the story out of frustration, hoping that surely the next chapter will be better, surely there's a method to this madness!
We follow Saffron, who is our human main character, as he tries to solve the mystery of his friend Arrow's murder. However, Saffron gets distracted by the Big Horns of Prince Cylvan and instead we witness their romance bloom and the mystery gets forgotten about until the last few chapters.
The LI starts as a horrible person, abusing their power over Saffron (I found the party scene with the fruit eating particularly vile). It felt absolutely unrealistic to me for Cylvan to turn into this suffering fragile prince who kisses the ground our human MC walks on not even halfway through the book. Their romance did not win me over.
The side characters are only mentioned in name and in relation to the MC, other than that they felt paper thin and not fleshed out. Only Lettuce, Saffron's friend is privy to a romance of her own, but even this is mentioned in a couple of sentences, for we are told about this rather than shown.
I liked the idea of the human settlement and its more rustic feel, as well as the naming customs for the Beanthinges, as each is called after a spice, textile, vegetable and so on. Kellen Graves certainly knows how to paint a picture for the audience. The reader is taken to multiple locations that have been carefully thought about. The author also knows how to design a visually striking characters - you can tell that Saffron and Cylvan were crafted with love.
Perhaps the story would have benefitted from being only a romance, as this was clearly Graves' favourite part. The murders and the wolf in the woods have fallen short in comparison, so much so it was actually sad to see. Either cut it out, or let the story marinate a bit longer.
Despite all of the above, I plan on continuing the series, as I am hoping that the author's craft will hone with next volumes of Rowan Blood tetralogy. After all, I was positively giddy when discovering the book for the first time and was looking forward to the read.
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
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
Is this really pitched as an adult book? It's just a bunch of whiny, asshole teenagers who treat people like shit. I'm not terribly surprised I didn't like this because most books with fae in them just aren't appealing to read. The horrible, cruel fae just isn't something I find fun to read about, especially when they are meant to be romances.
The main character is mostly insufferable which makes it pretty hard to give a shit about what he's dealing with.
The main character is mostly insufferable which makes it pretty hard to give a shit about what he's dealing with.
Went down to a 4 because it was a very slow start for me. I had trouble. But once it started rolling, it kept going.
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
sad
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
medium-paced
While reading, I was already wondering how many stars I would give this book. Two or three or something with a comma five? In the end I give it two, because even a somewhat nice writing style can't save everything.
Yeah, the writing was mostly nice, but sometimes there was too much description of clothing and surroundings. Not that such things aren't good and great and also somehow important, but at these points it was long-winded and unnecessary. (But still well written)
Especially the "dream sequences" were stunning and made my heart beat faster - so well written! Also that they didn't shy away from addressing all those serious issues found in the content warnings, which I loved. (And that they are properly addressed!).
I think the story itself is very exciting. I also really like the Fae world in general, it's all full of mischief and those little subtleties that are beautiful on the outside and rotten on the inside. I LOVE it when this is also picked up so well and faes are not portrayed as the ultimate awesome and beautiful things. The author did a really good job with this.
The aspects of magic were also wonderfully addressed and crafted.
What I didn't like so much, however, were the main characters - I can't say too much about the others, as they really only played minor roles.
Saffron unfortunately got on my nerves quite a bit from the beginning, but at least his character was consistent in that. I don't know if it's his upbringing or the world ... but he acted like a teenager in the height of puberty in many aspects. Like he was at the mercy of his hormones. He has to giggle or laugh about everything, has these adolescent daydreams of "I love this star and we're getting together and this and that and he's so perfect" (you know who I mean if you've read the book). He's so endlessly naive somehow ...
And then Cylvan, who at first is so arrogant and just typical Fey and Prince and then ... suddenly so in love and nice and great and hach. WHAT?! (that shouldn't be a spoiler, it's romance between them)
And this change of feeling comes so suddenly and where is the chemistry and where is it really built up and why is it all so overdone and so cheesy in my eyes that I want to break? Hurr ...
Somehow a character of Cylvan is built up and then disappears completely - as if a twin brother had stepped in.
Still, the end of book one was exciting and I'll keep reading because the story itself is really nice and shows once again that you don't necessarily have to save the world to create a nice fantasy setting! <3
Ugh, is this my genre? No.
Do I actually know that and still try to read it again and again? Yes.
Does it always backfire at least halfway? Yes.
Yeah, the writing was mostly nice, but sometimes there was too much description of clothing and surroundings. Not that such things aren't good and great and also somehow important, but at these points it was long-winded and unnecessary. (But still well written)
Especially the "dream sequences" were stunning and made my heart beat faster - so well written! Also that they didn't shy away from addressing all those serious issues found in the content warnings, which I loved. (And that they are properly addressed!).
I think the story itself is very exciting. I also really like the Fae world in general, it's all full of mischief and those little subtleties that are beautiful on the outside and rotten on the inside. I LOVE it when this is also picked up so well and faes are not portrayed as the ultimate awesome and beautiful things. The author did a really good job with this.
The aspects of magic were also wonderfully addressed and crafted.
What I didn't like so much, however, were the main characters - I can't say too much about the others, as they really only played minor roles.
Saffron unfortunately got on my nerves quite a bit from the beginning, but at least his character was consistent in that. I don't know if it's his upbringing or the world ... but he acted like a teenager in the height of puberty in many aspects. Like he was at the mercy of his hormones. He has to giggle or laugh about everything, has these adolescent daydreams of "I love this star and we're getting together and this and that and he's so perfect" (you know who I mean if you've read the book). He's so endlessly naive somehow ...
And then Cylvan, who at first is so arrogant and just typical Fey and Prince and then ... suddenly so in love and nice and great and hach. WHAT?! (that shouldn't be a spoiler, it's romance between them)
And this change of feeling comes so suddenly and where is the chemistry and where is it really built up and why is it all so overdone and so cheesy in my eyes that I want to break? Hurr ...
Somehow a character of Cylvan is built up and then disappears completely - as if a twin brother had stepped in.
Still, the end of book one was exciting and I'll keep reading because the story itself is really nice and shows once again that you don't necessarily have to save the world to create a nice fantasy setting! <3
Ugh, is this my genre? No.
Do I actually know that and still try to read it again and again? Yes.
Does it always backfire at least halfway? Yes.
So first of all, what you need to know before reading this is that it has a cliffhanger. A terrible cliffhanger! And also, this is more fantasy than romance. It’s very magical, with fey of all types. High fey and pixies and pucas and selkies. In that way it has similar vibes to The Folk of the Air. And also the way the humans are treated terribly and the way that Prince Cylvan acts in the beginning. He was very much a Cruel Prince. The book is entirely from the POV of Saffron, a human changeling servant. It was slow burn. And there was one intimate scene near the end. It was not fade to black but it was sort of artistically described in a way that was vague but you could still tell what was going on.
And that was an issue I had with most of the book. The writing style was too symbolic. I’m not sure what to call it but for example, there was a scene where Saffron touched Cylvan’s face and he thought to himself he had to be careful to not cut himself on the sharp edges. And I was so confused about what was happening. Why would Cylvan’s face cut Saffron? Until I realized that it was supposed to be a metaphor about Cylvan’s sharp personality. I didn’t like the extra effort it took to follow the story because of this. But for some ppl I’m sure it would be fine. Since I’m autistic, I might just be taking it too literally. I don’t think I will be continuing the series.
And that was an issue I had with most of the book. The writing style was too symbolic. I’m not sure what to call it but for example, there was a scene where Saffron touched Cylvan’s face and he thought to himself he had to be careful to not cut himself on the sharp edges. And I was so confused about what was happening. Why would Cylvan’s face cut Saffron? Until I realized that it was supposed to be a metaphor about Cylvan’s sharp personality. I didn’t like the extra effort it took to follow the story because of this. But for some ppl I’m sure it would be fine. Since I’m autistic, I might just be taking it too literally. I don’t think I will be continuing the series.
Wow literally everyone in this book so punchable. Like, I visualized my fist impaling a perfect fae face at least once every page turn.
Loved it tho
Loved it tho