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labyrith_of_a_thousand_mirrors's review
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
reflective
medium-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
2.75
This could have been great. The story is great. And I love the ressources at the end. The authors seem really nice.
But the execution was just... meh. It read like a first draft a lot of the times.
The prose was very purple. One of the most purple I've ever come across. I'm not a native speaker but my language level is close. I think and dream in English more often than not. But I had to look up a lot of stuff. And sometimes the translation didn't make any sense. Like the authors had a not so secret love affair with a thesaurus and just picked words that sound pretty without understanding them. There were also a lot of abbreviations. Ones I don't think even natives mostly understand. Especially gaming ones. Yes, using those is deep POV, but narrative should never come at the cost of understandability.
Also, this book has "telling" syndrome, which is what mostly made it feel like a first draft. I can not recall a single pivotal moment where an emotion felt by the narrating character was shown instead of told. But there were a few instances where the narrating character described somone elses emotion. So the authors do have the ability to show. It's like they either ignored this very important rule completely, like, by choice, so they could write pretty descriptions of emotions or they just didn't know about it. Which I struggle to believe, because considering the ressources they put in the back, they do seem to own a device capable of running Google and Youtube.
What this telling did is that I never felt like I was being transported into the characters skin, even though the stuff that was happening was lovely and more or less realistic, psychologically speaking.
Therefore I didn't relate to them at all. Or very rarely. Now that I think about it the stream of thoughts moments where their thoughts were just on the page or when Sam was ranting to her mother, were quite relatable and immersive. But all the other moments, I didn't relate. Even though I'm riddled with trauma and anxiety too.
So... yeah...
Idea: great, first draft: okay, line editing: non-existent.
Didn't they have an editor?
I think I'll leave it at that.
But the execution was just... meh. It read like a first draft a lot of the times.
The prose was very purple. One of the most purple I've ever come across. I'm not a native speaker but my language level is close. I think and dream in English more often than not. But I had to look up a lot of stuff. And sometimes the translation didn't make any sense. Like the authors had a not so secret love affair with a thesaurus and just picked words that sound pretty without understanding them. There were also a lot of abbreviations. Ones I don't think even natives mostly understand. Especially gaming ones. Yes, using those is deep POV, but narrative should never come at the cost of understandability.
Also, this book has "telling" syndrome, which is what mostly made it feel like a first draft. I can not recall a single pivotal moment where an emotion felt by the narrating character was shown instead of told. But there were a few instances where the narrating character described somone elses emotion. So the authors do have the ability to show. It's like they either ignored this very important rule completely, like, by choice, so they could write pretty descriptions of emotions or they just didn't know about it. Which I struggle to believe, because considering the ressources they put in the back, they do seem to own a device capable of running Google and Youtube.
What this telling did is that I never felt like I was being transported into the characters skin, even though the stuff that was happening was lovely and more or less realistic, psychologically speaking.
Therefore I didn't relate to them at all. Or very rarely. Now that I think about it the stream of thoughts moments where their thoughts were just on the page or when Sam was ranting to her mother, were quite relatable and immersive. But all the other moments, I didn't relate. Even though I'm riddled with trauma and anxiety too.
So... yeah...
Idea: great, first draft: okay, line editing: non-existent.
Didn't they have an editor?
I think I'll leave it at that.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness
Moderate: Alcohol, Cancer, Cursing, Grief, Ableism, Chronic illness, and Miscarriage
Minor: Ableism
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