Reviews tagging 'Blood'

The Battle Drum by Saara El-Arifi

27 reviews

kendal_reads's review

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adventurous emotional medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

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lisacanteven's review

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adventurous challenging emotional informative 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

5.0

I'm a pretty visual person, so seeing stories play out in my head as I read isn't a new thing. However, this book was probably the clearest I could ever see a story in my mind. I still gave the first book, The Final Strife, 5 stars but somehow the sequel was leagues above even that book. You learn so much about the politics of this world in the first book, but the second is such an exciting and thrilling adventure. If it wasn't for my Lexapro I would have bawled in several places in this story. Alas, my Lexapro has a lockdown on my tears. 

The last line of the book?!? I read an ebook from the library, so my last line was italic. However, my partner read a Kindle version and the final line was in quotes. I checked a US hardback and it's in quotes too. This makes a huge difference in the ending, so I need to know why my copy was wrong!!
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malinhalia's review against another edition

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adventurous fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No

0.5

I will admit I wasn't going into this book unbiased as I disliked book 1. So why read the second one? I really wanted to review it, and I was intrigued about where the plot was going after the reveal at the end of the first book. I also hoped that maybe the writing would be better than the first, but boy, was I wrong.

The characters are extremely one-dimensional and most are straight up unlikeable (unable to conjure the slightest bit of empathy, emotion, critical thinking, or even a consistent plan of action). The writing style itself is very heavy-handed and every plot point is carefully and patronisingly explained to you in detail (you really don't need conclusion-drawing skills to read this book). In addition to this, the author in multiple instances unnecessarily spoils the plot in advance by having chapter openers (for example, notes to or from certain characters). This works well in some books but not in this one. They detract from rather than add to the story, as they make - in some places - several chapters unnecessary as the plot point is glaringly clear from just this short text.  The writing is choppy and doesn't feel suitable for a book marketed to an adult audience.

Whilst I found the background of
the Zaalam, the Kabut religion and how it came to spread to the Warden's empire
, I thought this was the only redeeming thing of the book. The magic system, which is a very interesting concept in itself, is very underused throughout the book. The plot is shallow and so much of the book feels superfluous - I think it would have worked better as a shorter, more carefully edited book. 
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evekenzinator's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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rachaeltobindodd's review against another edition

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adventurous fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

This world is so rich! The story telling is beautiful. It by no means suffered from book 2 syndrome. In fact since I was already invested after book 1 I loved this book even more. I love the expansion of the word and mythology and the twists at the end. I can’t wait for book 3!
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caseythereader's review

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious 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? Yes

4.25

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samusc's review

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious tense 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

5.0

I was incredibly excited for this book as The Final Strife was my favorite read of 2022, and this absolutely delivered!
Saara El-Arifi took a bunch of risks with this title, and executed them flawlessly:

  • Anoor and Sylah are apart for the entire book, and yet their love for one another still drives their decisions. 
     
  •  
    Sylah is knocked out from a severe injury for a decent amount of the book, providing opportunity for strong character moments from Jond and the mysterious old man Niha. 
     
  •  
    Anoor 's paranoia increases as she accuses nearly everyone in her inner circle of murder, which has heavy consequences. By the end of the book, she's made some truly awful decisions. While emotionally hard to read about, it makes sense given everything she's been through. She's a young traumatized women who's entire worldview has been rocked; she's ripe for manipulation.
  • Locations and cultures of people new to our main characters were revealed masterfully. By the end of the first book in the series, Sylah didn't have much to go off of beyond a map showing land beyond the sea and Loot's yellow blood. In comparison, by the end of this title, both the reader and characters of a much larger understanding of the world. This includes one of my favorite aspects of worldbuilding, also seen in the Roots of Chaos series, when groups of people have different explanations for similar religious phenomena, largely due to migration.
  • A big theme in The Battle Drum is sacrifice. Unfortunately, we lost many characters on this journey in brutally detailed ways. However, these heartbreaking moments are presented alongside hopeful ones, as is necessary in any fantasy (in my opinion). It's a joy to read about Hassa and Kwame's growing relationship, as well as Jond's adoption of a sand kitten. 

This installment in the Ending Fire Trilogy is a perfect example of what a second book in a fantasy trilogy can be, akin to The Oleander Sword by Tasha Suri.
Once I got to the last third of this book last night, I had to finish it, there was just so much happening! It then took me over an hour to fall asleep because my mind was buzzing with everything these characters had gone through and predictions for the third book. 
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barda's review

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adventurous challenging dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

I'm very frustrated by having to rate this book so low, but I definitely didn't enjoy it as much as the first book.

The first book had some flaws, but I still broadly enjoyed the characters, the setting, and the worldbuilding. While this second book fixed my biggest pet peeve of rapidly switching POV's (this one had the more standard format of a chapter only having one character's POV), it felt like this one was actually more confusing than the first one, and that the author lost plot momentum from the first book.

The characters just weren't as likeable in this book. I still really enjoyed Hassa and she's easily a stand-out character, but Jond was just boring and Sylah was not in the book enough for me to judge her characterisation. Anoor, however, I was the most disappointed in. Like Sylah, it feels like she barely has any screen-time in this book, but most egregiously she seems to regress in all of her character development that she gained in the first book. I hate to criticise characters who make seemingly stupid mistakes, as oftentimes they'll be realistic mistakes that you might expect one to make, but Anoor keeps making mistakes over and over and doesn't seem to learn from the negative impacts of these. She's incompetent and seemingly regains her naivety that she grew out of in the first book. This makes the twist
of her being the Child of Fire also come out of left-field, as she goes from being exceedingly naive and sad to suddenly angry and wanting revenge over the space of a chapter
.

The plot certainly had some interesting bits, particularly with the Academy and how the cultures of the mainland work. I did also broadly enjoy the plot reveals towards the end of the book; however, they were all suddenly shoved into the end of the book leaving little room for the characters to breathe, and many of the plot twists could have been revealed and solved earlier if characters simply communicated with each other (
for instance, with Jond not telling Sylah that the other disciples were Sandstorm - what was his reasoning for not telling this to Sylah in the first place? It's not really explained in the text
). 

Broadly, this book's usually interesting plot was dragged down by its characters and overall characterisation. I still might pick up the next one when it comes out as I think the mysteries that have been set up are worth reading, but I do hope that the author can figure out where they want their characters to go. 
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purplesoccer126's review

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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cozyscones's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional 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? It's complicated

4.5

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