Reviews

I’m finding NKJ’s writing style kind of odd. It feels like she leads you into things/makes allusions and doesn’t explain them. And characters often go zero to 60 with little reason. I prefer really good reasons.

kkisel's review against another edition

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adventurous fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

teokajlibroj's review

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2.0

It's probably unfair to criticise this book for being so similar to the Broken Earth because it came out first, but I read it afterwards, so I'll say it now. It annoyed me that some much of this book was copied into the Broken Earth, the main character is the exact same, she has the same voice, acts the same way, views the world the same, is similarly emotional and damaged (although not exactly the same way). The side characters are also copied across (Sieh-Hoa is so obvious it's painful), which made me feel somewhat cheated, as if I got charged twice for one book.

This is a deeply internal book and everything external might as well be made out of cardboard. The opening made me believe this would be a story with politics and deep world-building, but there is almost none. Political scheming gets dropped quickly and no effort is made to create a political world, instead we are given a small number of one-dimensional villains. The characters are dull and there isn't really anything interesting about the main character. She's supposed to be a tough leader of a country, but for most of the book she is passive and helpless, while everyone comes to her and tells her what to do.

Also the trope of a character from a region considered barbaric who must overcome prejudice in a palace full of decadent nobles is a well-worn cliche, that this book merely repeats without adding anything new. No, the author isn't the first person to ask who really is the savage?

Instead the book goes down a weird route with a Twilight romance between an unremarkable girl and an immortal god who is very emo and probably will kill her.

The writing is good and poetic but at times it was just showing off and needlessly trying to look clever. Why move the plot or have the main character do anything, when she could just abstractly ponder things, be overwhelmed with emotions or just pine after this dark, mysterious bad boy?