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3.07 AVERAGE
3.07 AVERAGE
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
dark
emotional
fast-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
So, this was one of the occasions where the show/movie was better than the book (for me)....
Little disclaimer first: I read the book after I watched the movie. I think I was analysing a lot while reading this book and maybe it took away some of the enjoyment, I have a hard time to say to be honest.
The best way to express how I felt reading this is that I felt like this story was being described and not told? It lacked a lot of feeling for me while the potential was certainly there. Maybe it was the writing style, I’m not sure; but I know that if I hadn’t watched the show and been interested in digging into the book—I might not have finished this story.
One thing that I think wasn’t my cup of tea was the POV style. It was all over the place. It changed randomly and I never felt like we were truly inside someone’s head and feelings.
I think the story lacked in making me connect with the characters, while I absolutely adored them in the show. (I could write a whole separate novel long review on the show/book differences and how I feel about them, so I’ll spare you that.)
I don’t think it was a bad book, I simply think it might not be my favourite writing style. It felt like a rich story told with no emotion. It’s a 2,5 star for me, 3 on here for the potential and lore in the book.
As for the art: it felt like a totally separate thing? It didn’t feel like the characters or the story to me.
~~~
Audiobook review: By chapter 39 I started the audiobook because I had a hard time getting through reading this book. It definitely helped me along. But although I loved Katherine’s acting in the show, I thought her narration of the audiobook was a bit lacking. Her conversation intonations were kinda weak (don’t know if it’s my lack of experience with audiobooks, but that’s how I felt!). I also had the audiobook on 1.5x speed and I am a non native english speaker (to paint you a picture, my last audiobook was on 0.5x).
Little disclaimer first: I read the book after I watched the movie. I think I was analysing a lot while reading this book and maybe it took away some of the enjoyment, I have a hard time to say to be honest.
The best way to express how I felt reading this is that I felt like this story was being described and not told? It lacked a lot of feeling for me while the potential was certainly there. Maybe it was the writing style, I’m not sure; but I know that if I hadn’t watched the show and been interested in digging into the book—I might not have finished this story.
One thing that I think wasn’t my cup of tea was the POV style. It was all over the place. It changed randomly and I never felt like we were truly inside someone’s head and feelings.
I think the story lacked in making me connect with the characters, while I absolutely adored them in the show. (I could write a whole separate novel long review on the show/book differences and how I feel about them, so I’ll spare you that.)
I don’t think it was a bad book, I simply think it might not be my favourite writing style. It felt like a rich story told with no emotion. It’s a 2,5 star for me, 3 on here for the potential and lore in the book.
As for the art: it felt like a totally separate thing? It didn’t feel like the characters or the story to me.
~~~
Audiobook review: By chapter 39 I started the audiobook because I had a hard time getting through reading this book. It definitely helped me along. But although I loved Katherine’s acting in the show, I thought her narration of the audiobook was a bit lacking. Her conversation intonations were kinda weak (don’t know if it’s my lack of experience with audiobooks, but that’s how I felt!). I also had the audiobook on 1.5x speed and I am a non native english speaker (to paint you a picture, my last audiobook was on 0.5x).
adventurous
dark
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
So I have mixed feelings about this book.
Before she was The Lady of the Lake, she was Nimue, a Fey druidess girl with a hunger for revenge and a sword of power to help her satiate it. She teams up with the ever famous Arthur, The Green Knight, and a woman named Morgan to bring peace back to the Fey lands and populations and to stop the church from killing literally everyone. Other famous characters come in to play as well, whether they are on her side or not. The church and the king are two opposed forces in this novel, however they both have the common goal of killing Nimue, which is an interesting enough dynamic.
I would firstly like to discuss the characters. Usually, the strong female lead with revenge on her mind is an appealing main character to me. Not this time, though. Nimue is a woman who claims to be bold, strong and independent, while she is actually just a girl who throws herself into bad situations to prove a point. In addition to that, her character did a complete 180 halfway through the book and went from "I care about me and me only," to "I will LITERALLY kill myself to save any one of you," and I think that whole transition was done poorly. This is not to say, however, that she doesn't have some good moments. She does, I'm just not interested enough to sift through all the bad ones and offer them up.
Merlin played a major role in this book, and this time around, he's lost his magic, and is a drunk. This may sound like a kind of cool concept. It's really not. He's sloppy, unpredictable in a bad way, constantly shifting in his personality and in his motives, holier-than-thou guy and just an all and all irritating narrator that I had the misfortune of reading from.
I had no problems with Arthur other than the insta-love. The Green Knight was hardly there for me to form an opinion of. The villains made good, anger-inducing villains.
So who DO you like? Well, I liked reading from The Weeping Monk's POV, otherwise known as who? Lancelot! I deeply wish that we'd had more of him and his internal conflict with the church. He's an agent of the church, was raised by a high ranking official named Father Carden that he regards highly and loves deeply, he's been raised to believe all Fey are children of the Devil, and yet he himself is a Fey. He constantly has some internal battle between his heritage and his home, and the only thing making him even considering leaning toward the side of the Fey is the fact that the church willingly and knowingly kills children. I absolutely adored his character and the spin that he brought to the story.
I hold some hatred for King Uther mostly because he is one of the villains, but I loved reading from Merlin's POV when King Uther was there, and then I loved reading King Uther's POV and his mom's POV later in the book. The politics that swirled around those chapters were addicting and horrifying, and the dynamic between him and his mother set me on the edge of my seat and had my nerves going absolutely freaking bonkers wondering what would happen next and why it would happen. He was a great villain and I wish that there were more chapters with him.
As for all the other characters, I either don't have any opinions one way or another about them, or they weren't large enough in the story for me to review.
Now onto the magic system. I don't know if the author was relying on the reader's prior knowledge of the Arthurian legend or something, but it really didn't seem like it. Point is, this magic system kinda sucked. It showed a lot of promise, especially in the beginning when we kept on hearing about the affects of that magic or how people who have a deeper connection to that are hated, but then, that was all we were ever told. Whenever Nimue used magic at all, the only thing said was something like, "and as Nimue drew on her vast stores of magic, rats ran up the Father's leg." Excuse me, what?! This is a HIGH FANTASY novel, and there is no description or explanation to the way the magic works other than that? I'm sorry, but I really cannot accept this as explanation when the book has been marketed as high fantasy. Magic system is horrible and that's all there is to it.
About the story itself. It was pretty exciting to read about, but there were a whole ton of moments that felt weird to read. Nimue hates her mom and her village, and it seems they hate her, too. In fact, any day now she is planning to escape. However, after Nimue's mother and village are killed, Nimue changes plans and teams up with Arthur and co. to topple the church and restore power to Feykind. Also, she's SUPPOSED to give this really powerful magic sword to Merlin, but she doesn't really want to do that so she won't. But then she almost does, but then she realizes that she doesn't want to, but then she does, but then she keeps it cuz its fueling her rage for humankind. Oh and also she's in love with Arthur, but then The Green Knight is in love with her, but then Arthur leaves and she hates him, but then armies attack and Arthur's back, but then the knight is gone, but then they have to fight the armies. My point is, the story line itself was sloppy and confusing, but it was fast-paced enough and adrenaline inducing enough for me to rate this book three stars instead of one.
So read this book or don't. It's easy enough to get through, though it will give you one major headache if you choose to read it. If you don't, you're not really missing anything. The book will probably be a lot better after being translated to the Netflix adaptation. Thanks for reading my review!
Before she was The Lady of the Lake, she was Nimue, a Fey druidess girl with a hunger for revenge and a sword of power to help her satiate it. She teams up with the ever famous Arthur, The Green Knight, and a woman named Morgan to bring peace back to the Fey lands and populations and to stop the church from killing literally everyone. Other famous characters come in to play as well, whether they are on her side or not. The church and the king are two opposed forces in this novel, however they both have the common goal of killing Nimue, which is an interesting enough dynamic.
I would firstly like to discuss the characters. Usually, the strong female lead with revenge on her mind is an appealing main character to me. Not this time, though. Nimue is a woman who claims to be bold, strong and independent, while she is actually just a girl who throws herself into bad situations to prove a point. In addition to that, her character did a complete 180 halfway through the book and went from "I care about me and me only," to "I will LITERALLY kill myself to save any one of you," and I think that whole transition was done poorly. This is not to say, however, that she doesn't have some good moments. She does, I'm just not interested enough to sift through all the bad ones and offer them up.
Merlin played a major role in this book, and this time around, he's lost his magic, and is a drunk. This may sound like a kind of cool concept. It's really not. He's sloppy, unpredictable in a bad way, constantly shifting in his personality and in his motives, holier-than-thou guy and just an all and all irritating narrator that I had the misfortune of reading from.
I had no problems with Arthur other than the insta-love. The Green Knight was hardly there for me to form an opinion of. The villains made good, anger-inducing villains.
So who DO you like? Well, I liked reading from The Weeping Monk's POV, otherwise known as who? Lancelot! I deeply wish that we'd had more of him and his internal conflict with the church. He's an agent of the church, was raised by a high ranking official named Father Carden that he regards highly and loves deeply, he's been raised to believe all Fey are children of the Devil, and yet he himself is a Fey. He constantly has some internal battle between his heritage and his home, and the only thing making him even considering leaning toward the side of the Fey is the fact that the church willingly and knowingly kills children. I absolutely adored his character and the spin that he brought to the story.
I hold some hatred for King Uther mostly because he is one of the villains, but I loved reading from Merlin's POV when King Uther was there, and then I loved reading King Uther's POV and his mom's POV later in the book. The politics that swirled around those chapters were addicting and horrifying, and the dynamic between him and his mother set me on the edge of my seat and had my nerves going absolutely freaking bonkers wondering what would happen next and why it would happen. He was a great villain and I wish that there were more chapters with him.
As for all the other characters, I either don't have any opinions one way or another about them, or they weren't large enough in the story for me to review.
Now onto the magic system. I don't know if the author was relying on the reader's prior knowledge of the Arthurian legend or something, but it really didn't seem like it. Point is, this magic system kinda sucked. It showed a lot of promise, especially in the beginning when we kept on hearing about the affects of that magic or how people who have a deeper connection to that are hated, but then, that was all we were ever told. Whenever Nimue used magic at all, the only thing said was something like, "and as Nimue drew on her vast stores of magic, rats ran up the Father's leg." Excuse me, what?! This is a HIGH FANTASY novel, and there is no description or explanation to the way the magic works other than that? I'm sorry, but I really cannot accept this as explanation when the book has been marketed as high fantasy. Magic system is horrible and that's all there is to it.
About the story itself. It was pretty exciting to read about, but there were a whole ton of moments that felt weird to read. Nimue hates her mom and her village, and it seems they hate her, too. In fact, any day now she is planning to escape. However, after Nimue's mother and village are killed, Nimue changes plans and teams up with Arthur and co. to topple the church and restore power to Feykind. Also, she's SUPPOSED to give this really powerful magic sword to Merlin, but she doesn't really want to do that so she won't. But then she almost does, but then she realizes that she doesn't want to, but then she does, but then she keeps it cuz its fueling her rage for humankind. Oh and also she's in love with Arthur, but then The Green Knight is in love with her, but then Arthur leaves and she hates him, but then armies attack and Arthur's back, but then the knight is gone, but then they have to fight the armies. My point is, the story line itself was sloppy and confusing, but it was fast-paced enough and adrenaline inducing enough for me to rate this book three stars instead of one.
So read this book or don't. It's easy enough to get through, though it will give you one major headache if you choose to read it. If you don't, you're not really missing anything. The book will probably be a lot better after being translated to the Netflix adaptation. Thanks for reading my review!
It was readable, but it left much to be desired. The plot was interesting, but the development didn't really go anywhere. That would be fine if the characters were strong enough to hold the expectations the book gave me. They were not. Unfortunately, the most interesting characters (the grey monk, Iris) were tertiary at best, so they didn't have as much content. However, I will say that it seems as if they were being set up to be more important in the future. Really hoping that's true, because I have no desire to read more about Nimue, Arthur, or Merlin.
Really good! Imagery could have been better but my copy included illustrations. I wish I read the book before watching the Netflix series adaptation. Would definitely recommend!
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
There wasn’t really any connections to what the author was “retelling” and personally I just found it boring.
unfortunately, I watched the show on Netflix first. wish I hadn't but my husband wouldn't wait for me to read it. glad I finally did. The book was def. better than the show. i would like to see another book for this I'm interested in seeing the story play on. i know it goes into the whole King Auther thing but i want to see more in this style and how their story becomes what it does.