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sarahmreads's review
adventurous
challenging
funny
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.25
The first thing that sold this book to me was gays in space. Need I say more? However, those high expectations led to a kind of big letdown.
Asa is the heir of her family’s legacy, Almeida Industries, but finds out that the project she’s supposed to inherit has much darker roots. She flees and somehow finds help with a ragtag group of bounty hunters on a neighboring planet, hoping to take her father down.
The world-building of this story I think was pretty well done. It didn’t focus as much on why exactly humans had to move planets, but more on the tech and the structure of society and hierarchy on Cortellion and Requiem. I especially liked Requiem’s matriarchy system. It was unique and not something I’ve really seen before.
Now let’s talk plot and pacing. The pacing was a little weird. There were several points where I thought that it would make for a good closure to the story, but it kept going, so that threw me off. Also the reveal of Asa’s identity happened WAY earlier than I thought it would, and I wasn’t really a huge fan of how it was done. Plot was kind of cliche but I thought it worked.
The execution fell a little flat for me. I only ever really felt attached to Asa and her own ambitions and goals. Riven was too headstrong and willing to die for my tastes. Also she has a terminal illness and I felt it was sloppy in how it’s demonstrated. Basically her illness strengthens under extreme stress, which happens maybe twice in the story? It’s only really used as a plot device and just explains why she is okay with dying so much. But I felt it could have been explored more and given her more depth as a character instead of it being just tacked on to her like a last minute decision. The last chapter was meant to be a cliffhanger, but was more of a “this didn’t really need to be here but here it is anyway,” and I wasn’t a huge fan of the buildup to it either, which I won’t say cause spoilers.
Some characters, like Samir, could have been excluded from the story because they didn’t contribute much if not nothing to the story. On top of that, I was EXTREMELY confused about the love story situation in this book. Asa starts off falling for Ty, even though it’s advertised as a queer story. I think Asa and Riven are both at least bisexual, which is nice. But when that relationship becomes rushed in the last 25% of the story, it doesn’t really help. And the WAY it comes about was horrible in terms of where it happens in the story in relation to other events. Just… why? Yes there was some buildup for Asa and Riven getting together, which is fine, but why then have the whole romance subplot with Asa and Ty? It didn’t really make sense to me. And to be honest, I actually preferred Asa with Ty.
City of Shattered Light is a breakthrough science fiction story with great world-building, but lackluster everything else.
Asa is the heir of her family’s legacy, Almeida Industries, but finds out that the project she’s supposed to inherit has much darker roots. She flees and somehow finds help with a ragtag group of bounty hunters on a neighboring planet, hoping to take her father down.
The world-building of this story I think was pretty well done. It didn’t focus as much on why exactly humans had to move planets, but more on the tech and the structure of society and hierarchy on Cortellion and Requiem. I especially liked Requiem’s matriarchy system. It was unique and not something I’ve really seen before.
Now let’s talk plot and pacing. The pacing was a little weird. There were several points where I thought that it would make for a good closure to the story, but it kept going, so that threw me off. Also the reveal of Asa’s identity happened WAY earlier than I thought it would, and I wasn’t really a huge fan of how it was done. Plot was kind of cliche but I thought it worked.
The execution fell a little flat for me. I only ever really felt attached to Asa and her own ambitions and goals. Riven was too headstrong and willing to die for my tastes. Also she has a terminal illness and I felt it was sloppy in how it’s demonstrated. Basically her illness strengthens under extreme stress, which happens maybe twice in the story? It’s only really used as a plot device and just explains why she is okay with dying so much. But I felt it could have been explored more and given her more depth as a character instead of it being just tacked on to her like a last minute decision. The last chapter was meant to be a cliffhanger, but was more of a “this didn’t really need to be here but here it is anyway,” and I wasn’t a huge fan of the buildup to it either, which I won’t say cause spoilers.
Some characters, like Samir, could have been excluded from the story because they didn’t contribute much if not nothing to the story. On top of that, I was EXTREMELY confused about the love story situation in this book. Asa starts off falling for Ty, even though it’s advertised as a queer story. I think Asa and Riven are both at least bisexual, which is nice. But when that relationship becomes rushed in the last 25% of the story, it doesn’t really help. And the WAY it comes about was horrible in terms of where it happens in the story in relation to other events. Just… why? Yes there was some buildup for Asa and Riven getting together, which is fine, but why then have the whole romance subplot with Asa and Ty? It didn’t really make sense to me. And to be honest, I actually preferred Asa with Ty.
City of Shattered Light is a breakthrough science fiction story with great world-building, but lackluster everything else.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Animal cruelty, Animal death, Emotional abuse, Blood, Terminal illness, Murder, and Gun violence
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