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4.06 AVERAGE
4.06 AVERAGE
challenging
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
slow-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
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
dark
mysterious
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
What a wild story. It took me a while to get back into it after I put it down but I’m glad I made it to the end. The final 1/3 was exciting. I love mysteries unwind. I did feel like the reveal of the culprit(s) was a little rushed and haphazard but I really enjoyed the story beats. The ending was satisfying for a cliffhanger. I’m looking forward to seeing how they handle the second book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Drug abuse, Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Vomit
Moderate: Drug use
adventurous
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
dark
funny
mysterious
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
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
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
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
If I had to describe the book, I would say it's three things. Aesthetically, it's almost a Call of Cthulhu-esque dark urban supernatural fantasy, filled with cultish secret societies in New England doing dangerous rituals for self-serving purposes, and there are ghosts and blood sacrifices and whispers of Hell. Thematically, it's a story of entitlement and privilege and the disheveled and traumatized young woman who doesn't quite fit into the fancy college halls but is the only person capable of seeing past the wealth and fancy brick and ivy facades to recognize how screwed up things are. And structurally, it is a murder mystery.
Aesthetically, mwuah, 5/5, excellent, gorgeous. I love a good creepy (almost lovecraftian) tale of the occult. The magic was deliciously arcane and mysterious and terrifying, with a dangerous vibe both from how it's performed (entrails and ominous latin chanting, woohoo!) and why it's performed (for petty, selfish reasons of wealth and privilege). I also can tell that Bardugo put a lot of effort to get the wealthy college campus and ornate old buildings sliding into dilapidated seedy New England town right.
Thematically, pretty good, 4/5, thumbs up. The character of Alex was a bit hard to pin down for me at first, since she is evasive and defensive, but I warmed up to her greatly over the course of the story. Her alienation at Yale really spoke to me, because of course somebody with her background wouldn't quite fit in in the comfortable cushy-chair-historical-wood-paneled-smoking-room vibe of an Ivy League. And of course somebody with her background would not be bribed into silence when there is injustice and abuse of power afoot. I think the novel could have benefited from leaning harder on its commentary of privilege but it did well enough pointing out how easy it would be to be a person who can sidle into an Ivy League's admission list and then into its secret societies for the rich and famous, just because of their family connections.
Structurally, meh, 3/5, decent, passable. It's not the best murder mystery that I've read. Such narrative structures live and die on their pacing and how they reveal and don't reveal information, and there were some places where Alex learns new information for her investigation that were clunky to me. The ending did tie all of the plot threads together in a way that makes sense and I definitely respect the neatness of how it all came together. However, it didn't do so in a method that satisfied me. (rly. are we going to close all these threads via a bunch of villain monologing at the 95% mark?) Also at times, the narrative is sometimes too,..coy (is coy the right word?) with Alex's past. I do not tend to care for paragraphs where it's like, "yes yes I'm remembering this important moment from my past but now I'm going to stop RIGHT before the pivotal part that tells you what's going on, cuz too painful (but actually it's cuz we are only 30% through the book and this is more of a 75% mark revelation)". Overall it was a functional murder mystery with a good array of foreshadowing and cast of suspects to make things fun, but it was nothing special.
Averaging out to a 4/5 seems appropriate. I think it could be better, but the good bits are very good, and I'm looking forward to the next one. Let's go to Hell!
(Miscellaneous things worth comment:
- Darlington! Excellent character. I love him. I love his prissy-ass Airs and over-the-top gentlemanly styling, because I love how it hides a person desperate to find purpose and clings to an old, crumbling house because he doesn't know how to exist without it. I love how he wholeheartedly adores the occult because it gives him a sense of wonder and a mystery to unravel. I love how he believes in his work. Characters need convictions to be convincing.
- Content warnings: wow uh, I did NOT know what I was getting into when I read it. I have a strong stomach for trigger-warning content but I can see plenty of people getting turned off. TW for rape, grooming, abuse, murder, live vivisection of people, drug use and addiction, roofie-ing, and also the literal eating of feces woohoo!
- Would have loved to see more of Alex's roommates - there are these tantalizing glimpses of friendship, and I can only advocate for Moar Strong Female Friendships in fiction kthx.
- Love the Ladino used in the novel. I minored in Spanish in college and it was very fun to read this slightly slanted Spanish that used some words that I recognized, but some words that were not spelled the same and some unfamiliar ones. Loved that small detail!
- I know that for structural reasons, you can't just blurt out all of a character's dramatic backstory, so there was a good narrative reason to keep coy about Alex's past. Usually the coyness is fine and I get on with it, but I got irritated at it because there are all these chapters being coy, then the dark flashbacks tell you what's going on, but Alex doesn't necessarily process it, deal with it, or discuss it, because nobody else in the story KNOWS about her past! So now we're going to spend a lot of the novel dancing around topics that are clearly painful to the main character, then reveal it, then not get emotional catharsis from it? Maybe in a later book...)
Aesthetically, mwuah, 5/5, excellent, gorgeous. I love a good creepy (almost lovecraftian) tale of the occult. The magic was deliciously arcane and mysterious and terrifying, with a dangerous vibe both from how it's performed (entrails and ominous latin chanting, woohoo!) and why it's performed (for petty, selfish reasons of wealth and privilege). I also can tell that Bardugo put a lot of effort to get the wealthy college campus and ornate old buildings sliding into dilapidated seedy New England town right.
Thematically, pretty good, 4/5, thumbs up. The character of Alex was a bit hard to pin down for me at first, since she is evasive and defensive, but I warmed up to her greatly over the course of the story. Her alienation at Yale really spoke to me, because of course somebody with her background wouldn't quite fit in in the comfortable cushy-chair-historical-wood-paneled-smoking-room vibe of an Ivy League. And of course somebody with her background would not be bribed into silence when there is injustice and abuse of power afoot. I think the novel could have benefited from leaning harder on its commentary of privilege but it did well enough pointing out how easy it would be to be a person who can sidle into an Ivy League's admission list and then into its secret societies for the rich and famous, just because of their family connections.
Structurally, meh, 3/5, decent, passable. It's not the best murder mystery that I've read. Such narrative structures live and die on their pacing and how they reveal and don't reveal information, and there were some places where Alex learns new information for her investigation that were clunky to me. The ending did tie all of the plot threads together in a way that makes sense and I definitely respect the neatness of how it all came together. However, it didn't do so in a method that satisfied me. (rly. are we going to close all these threads via a bunch of villain monologing at the 95% mark?) Also at times, the narrative is sometimes too,..coy (is coy the right word?) with Alex's past. I do not tend to care for paragraphs where it's like, "yes yes I'm remembering this important moment from my past but now I'm going to stop RIGHT before the pivotal part that tells you what's going on, cuz too painful (but actually it's cuz we are only 30% through the book and this is more of a 75% mark revelation)". Overall it was a functional murder mystery with a good array of foreshadowing and cast of suspects to make things fun, but it was nothing special.
Averaging out to a 4/5 seems appropriate. I think it could be better, but the good bits are very good, and I'm looking forward to the next one. Let's go to Hell!
(Miscellaneous things worth comment:
- Darlington! Excellent character. I love him. I love his prissy-ass Airs and over-the-top gentlemanly styling, because I love how it hides a person desperate to find purpose and clings to an old, crumbling house because he doesn't know how to exist without it. I love how he wholeheartedly adores the occult because it gives him a sense of wonder and a mystery to unravel. I love how he believes in his work. Characters need convictions to be convincing.
- Content warnings: wow uh, I did NOT know what I was getting into when I read it. I have a strong stomach for trigger-warning content but I can see plenty of people getting turned off. TW for rape, grooming, abuse, murder, live vivisection of people, drug use and addiction, roofie-ing, and also the literal eating of feces woohoo!
- Would have loved to see more of Alex's roommates - there are these tantalizing glimpses of friendship, and I can only advocate for Moar Strong Female Friendships in fiction kthx.
- Love the Ladino used in the novel. I minored in Spanish in college and it was very fun to read this slightly slanted Spanish that used some words that I recognized, but some words that were not spelled the same and some unfamiliar ones. Loved that small detail!
- I know that for structural reasons, you can't just blurt out all of a character's dramatic backstory, so there was a good narrative reason to keep coy about Alex's past. Usually the coyness is fine and I get on with it, but I got irritated at it because there are all these chapters being coy, then the dark flashbacks tell you what's going on, but Alex doesn't necessarily process it, deal with it, or discuss it, because nobody else in the story KNOWS about her past! So now we're going to spend a lot of the novel dancing around topics that are clearly painful to the main character, then reveal it, then not get emotional catharsis from it? Maybe in a later book...)
So sad to state that I dnf this book at page 227 (50%). Like I could not care less about this plot or characters :(
I’ve also had this book on my shelf for years and this is so disappointing that I could not finish it
I’ve also had this book on my shelf for years and this is so disappointing that I could not finish it