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sleepgoblin's review against another edition
3.0
Lada can be hard to love, but by the end of this one, I was all for Lada. TEAM LADA.
jess_shortman1's review against another edition
dark
tense
slow-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? Yes
2.0
gabbywabby92's review against another edition
4.0
So much better than the first book! Usually, the second book of a series tends to drag on but this was so much better! There was betrayal, love, friendship in new places, war, everything you can think of to make it seem more!
This book for the most part follows the story of Radu and Lada. Mehmed is still a large part of the story but the POVs generally stick with the brother and sister.
“No one will be more brutal than me. No one will be more ruthless. And I will never stop fighting.”
Lada is still as fierce as always but has learned that she cannot rely on anyone to achieve her goals. I believe that her heart is in the first place in wanting to clean up her country, but I have a feeling that the results may not end the way she wants. Lada is ruling with a strong fist for the most part and killing all of your people is only going to get you so far. Lada also seems to be stuck with this idea that she needs Mehmed and Radu, where in the first book she kept saying she didn’t need them. Her failure throughout the book I believe is what causes her to doubt her ability and the men that follow her.
“I wonder if anyone gets through childhood without being broken. I certainly did not.”
Radu is still….well he’s still Radu. He’s in denial of his true feelings, he’s still wrapped around Mehmed like a sick puppy and now he’s in a foreign country as for Mehmed in the heart of the war! Radu is my least favorite character mostly because he is always doubting himself, he never seems to find this inner strength that we all know he has without saying it’s for Mehmed. You should not have to rely on someone else to get where you want to go.
Mehmed I feel has turned into a dictator, turning on everyone, leaving people in the dark. He even goes as far as uses Radu for this advantage even though he knows how much Radu cares for him. He has simply just turned in a brat and I do not believe that he will be happy with just Constantinople. He is even trying to control Lada which we all know won’t end well, talk about trying to use some reverse psychology!
Overall, this book contains more dramatic effect and more ambition that I personally felt was lacking in the first book. There was enough action to help push past all of the unneeded commentary and allowed for us to see all sides without being to over baring
This book for the most part follows the story of Radu and Lada. Mehmed is still a large part of the story but the POVs generally stick with the brother and sister.
“No one will be more brutal than me. No one will be more ruthless. And I will never stop fighting.”
Lada is still as fierce as always but has learned that she cannot rely on anyone to achieve her goals. I believe that her heart is in the first place in wanting to clean up her country, but I have a feeling that the results may not end the way she wants. Lada is ruling with a strong fist for the most part and killing all of your people is only going to get you so far. Lada also seems to be stuck with this idea that she needs Mehmed and Radu, where in the first book she kept saying she didn’t need them. Her failure throughout the book I believe is what causes her to doubt her ability and the men that follow her.
“I wonder if anyone gets through childhood without being broken. I certainly did not.”
Radu is still….well he’s still Radu. He’s in denial of his true feelings, he’s still wrapped around Mehmed like a sick puppy and now he’s in a foreign country as for Mehmed in the heart of the war! Radu is my least favorite character mostly because he is always doubting himself, he never seems to find this inner strength that we all know he has without saying it’s for Mehmed. You should not have to rely on someone else to get where you want to go.
Mehmed I feel has turned into a dictator, turning on everyone, leaving people in the dark. He even goes as far as uses Radu for this advantage even though he knows how much Radu cares for him. He has simply just turned in a brat and I do not believe that he will be happy with just Constantinople. He is even trying to control Lada which we all know won’t end well, talk about trying to use some reverse psychology!
Overall, this book contains more dramatic effect and more ambition that I personally felt was lacking in the first book. There was enough action to help push past all of the unneeded commentary and allowed for us to see all sides without being to over baring
goosemixtapes's review against another edition
4.0
imo the first, like, 350 pages of this were 3-star level, and then the last hundred were 5-star worthy. so. i'm averaging. some thoughts:
>my biggest problem with the first book was that the writing was about as subtle as a hammer. for some reason white saw the need to spell EVERYTHING out for the reader (i get that it's YA, but it's a book that deals with dark enough topics that i wouldn't place it on the younger side of YA) and it was incredibly frustrating. this book had a few moments like that, but on the whole it was much better in that regard.
>it was also far less choppy! honestly, the first half of the first book felt like filler, exposition about the dracul siblings' childhood to flesh out their characters before any plot actually happened. this book had a plot from page one! wahoo. (i love character-driven stories as much as the next guy, but and i darken was, again, mostly just really choppy.)
>i hold to my opinion that lada's edginess wearies me sometimes, but i appreciated how much this book fleshed out her character--especially in terms of WHY she wants to rule wallachia so badly. in book one it was all "because it's my homeland and my birthright and it belongs to me and i'm a dragon who kills people rrrrrr" and sure okay girlboss but i think monarchy is inherently bad and birthrights are a bullshit concept, so i want some substance. in this book, we see her actually working for change in a country that has been brutalized by the rich. also, she/her princes are soooooo fucking sexy. also also, her last chapter was a fucking banger.
>radu my best friend. radu my best friend in the entire world. i liked him in book one and i liked him for the first ~350 pages here and then the climax hit and now he's my best friend in the entire world i care him so much. even if i did want to shake him sometimes and tell him is CLEARLY hitting on him. hey man i get it it's the 1400s and internalized homophobia is a bitch
>i'm a sucker for siblings. i am. every time one of them thought "god i wish the other one were here; they would know what to do" it got me
>once again, it would have been SO easy to make this series a not-like-other-girls screed, but though lada is a masculine woman who often scorns feminine things, the narrative does not agree with her! it is made very clear that radu's more feminine style of achieving things through manipulation & navigation of social situations is equally effective if not sometimes more so! and lada's scenes are full of women with all kinds of strengths (conventionally feminine or not), and the whole narrative balances “lada has to fight twice as hard by virtue of being a woman” with “lada being a woman helps her in many ways (understanding the power of mobilizing other women, the scene where her period puts her in a position to see an ambush coming, etc)”
>i like how pacifist this book was. maybe even, dare i say it, a little anti-colonialist. i want it to be. i want book 3 to be even more anti-colonialist. man fuck mehmed why do both of them like him so much
>i will admit. that the first 350 pages. were. fine. they were just fine. all the reviews that said "the first book is fine but the second book is better" were right, but at the same time, i wasn't necessarily excited to pick the book up until the climax (although then i couldn't put it down). that said. i am going to read. the third one. because now i am invested. in these siblings. and anyway i'm already 2/3s of the way there so i might as well
>my biggest problem with the first book was that the writing was about as subtle as a hammer. for some reason white saw the need to spell EVERYTHING out for the reader (i get that it's YA, but it's a book that deals with dark enough topics that i wouldn't place it on the younger side of YA) and it was incredibly frustrating. this book had a few moments like that, but on the whole it was much better in that regard.
>it was also far less choppy! honestly, the first half of the first book felt like filler, exposition about the dracul siblings' childhood to flesh out their characters before any plot actually happened. this book had a plot from page one! wahoo. (i love character-driven stories as much as the next guy, but and i darken was, again, mostly just really choppy.)
>i hold to my opinion that lada's edginess wearies me sometimes, but i appreciated how much this book fleshed out her character--especially in terms of WHY she wants to rule wallachia so badly. in book one it was all "because it's my homeland and my birthright and it belongs to me and i'm a dragon who kills people rrrrrr" and sure okay girlboss but i think monarchy is inherently bad and birthrights are a bullshit concept, so i want some substance. in this book, we see her actually working for change in a country that has been brutalized by the rich. also, she/her princes are soooooo fucking sexy. also also, her last chapter was a fucking banger.
Spoiler
YESSSSSS PRINCE LADA BURN IT ALL THE FUCK DOWN. SCORCH THE METAPHORICAL EARTH AND START OVER!>radu my best friend. radu my best friend in the entire world. i liked him in book one and i liked him for the first ~350 pages here and then the climax hit and now he's my best friend in the entire world i care him so much. even if i did want to shake him sometimes and tell him
Spoiler
cyprian>i'm a sucker for siblings. i am. every time one of them thought "god i wish the other one were here; they would know what to do" it got me
>once again, it would have been SO easy to make this series a not-like-other-girls screed, but though lada is a masculine woman who often scorns feminine things, the narrative does not agree with her! it is made very clear that radu's more feminine style of achieving things through manipulation & navigation of social situations is equally effective if not sometimes more so! and lada's scenes are full of women with all kinds of strengths (conventionally feminine or not), and the whole narrative balances “lada has to fight twice as hard by virtue of being a woman” with “lada being a woman helps her in many ways (understanding the power of mobilizing other women, the scene where her period puts her in a position to see an ambush coming, etc)”
>i like how pacifist this book was. maybe even, dare i say it, a little anti-colonialist. i want it to be. i want book 3 to be even more anti-colonialist. man fuck mehmed why do both of them like him so much
>i will admit. that the first 350 pages. were. fine. they were just fine. all the reviews that said "the first book is fine but the second book is better" were right, but at the same time, i wasn't necessarily excited to pick the book up until the climax (although then i couldn't put it down). that said. i am going to read. the third one. because now i am invested. in these siblings. and anyway i'm already 2/3s of the way there so i might as well
jessicalgeuther's review against another edition
5.0
Really like these books
I am really enjoying this series. The characters are so rich and their paths are at times inspiring, depressing, hopeless, and life changing. It is great how all three were so close and now all three are so far apart. Radu is the most fascinating as he has really changed fundamentally more than the other two. I look forward to more!!
I am really enjoying this series. The characters are so rich and their paths are at times inspiring, depressing, hopeless, and life changing. It is great how all three were so close and now all three are so far apart. Radu is the most fascinating as he has really changed fundamentally more than the other two. I look forward to more!!
kokobeereading's review against another edition
2.0
DNF at 32% - I pushed for as long as I could, but it felt like I was trudging for dear life. The book moved much slower than the first one in my opinion (and that's saying something). I just couldn't keep forcing myself to go on. I had to switch to something I actually enjoyed and this one was not it.
poplion90's review against another edition
5.0
I LOVED THIS BOOK. It was gorgeous and fast pace and literally everything i wanted it to be. I can not wait to read book 3!
huhwait's review against another edition
4.0
3.5/4 stars.
more fun from this book, it was enjoyable enough to hold my attention for the whole 400 + pages.
Happy to wait for the pb of book 3 though.
more fun from this book, it was enjoyable enough to hold my attention for the whole 400 + pages.
Happy to wait for the pb of book 3 though.
dorisede's review against another edition
5.0
"I will make you proud. No one will be more brutal than me. No one will be more ruthless. And I will never stop fighting".
Everything gets more bloodier in this book. This book is basically about war. Lada's battle to become Prince of Wallachia and Mehmed's siege of constantinople. And then, there's Radu still completely obsessed with Mehmed, constantly going on and on about Mehmed being "his Mehmed" and what not. It was quite annoying. He did everything to please Mehmed because he thought maybe if did more Mehmed would love him instead of Lada. He actually believed Mehmed didn't know how he felt about him but Mehmed, the clever, cunning bastard knew all along but refused to dismiss his delusions. He however used it to his advantage, to get Radu to do everything he wants. And Radu the fool will going about doing everything while chanting " I am always yours Mehmed".
I don't care if it makes me an evil witch but that sex scene between Mehmed and Lada. I wish Radu was within the vicinity, so the poor fool can die of a heart attack.
This book made me understand why Lada and Mehmed are best suited for each other. They are both ambitious, ruthless and determined. They will destroy everything that stands in the way of their ambition. I wished they had stayed together, just so I could see the mayhem they will unleash on each other. One person will probably kill the other person in the night. I also wanted to read from Mehmed's POV, just to know how he thinks of all the evil stuff he does.
I enjoyed this book, except some of Radu's parts. I think Lada loves Radu more than he loves her. She will always pick him over Mehmed while Radu will do the exact opposite. He will probably kill Lada, if his precious Mehmed ordered it.
Thank you Lada for always looking out for yourself and loving yourself first. And, thank you for leaving Mehmed's stupid ass.
For the Popsugar 2021 reading challenge: A book with something broken on the cover.
Everything gets more bloodier in this book. This book is basically about war. Lada's battle to become Prince of Wallachia and Mehmed's siege of constantinople. And then, there's Radu still completely obsessed with Mehmed, constantly going on and on about Mehmed being "his Mehmed" and what not. It was quite annoying. He did everything to please Mehmed because he thought maybe if did more Mehmed would love him instead of Lada. He actually believed Mehmed didn't know how he felt about him but Mehmed, the clever, cunning bastard knew all along but refused to dismiss his delusions. He however used it to his advantage, to get Radu to do everything he wants. And Radu the fool will going about doing everything while chanting " I am always yours Mehmed".
I don't care if it makes me an evil witch but that sex scene between Mehmed and Lada. I wish Radu was within the vicinity, so the poor fool can die of a heart attack.
This book made me understand why Lada and Mehmed are best suited for each other. They are both ambitious, ruthless and determined. They will destroy everything that stands in the way of their ambition. I wished they had stayed together, just so I could see the mayhem they will unleash on each other. One person will probably kill the other person in the night. I also wanted to read from Mehmed's POV, just to know how he thinks of all the evil stuff he does.
I enjoyed this book, except some of Radu's parts. I think Lada loves Radu more than he loves her. She will always pick him over Mehmed while Radu will do the exact opposite. He will probably kill Lada, if his precious Mehmed ordered it.
Thank you Lada for always looking out for yourself and loving yourself first. And, thank you for leaving Mehmed's stupid ass.
For the Popsugar 2021 reading challenge: A book with something broken on the cover.
lestka12's review against another edition
4.0
I was very pleased with this continuation of Lada and Radu’s story. This book is filled with all of the action and conflict that Kiersten White gave to us in And I Darken and so much more! I can’t wait to see how their story continues in Bright We Burn this July!