Reviews

The Whispering Dark by Kelly Andrew

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alyona_7's review

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world building is non-existent

pages_and_papercrafts's review

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3.0

Hmm…Overall a bit confusing of a plot line and didn’t quite hold my interest in the middle of the book. The action really reminded me of a few scenes from a well known series released in the late 90’s, early 2000’s. The world building was a bit off and not quite up to the level I needed to help me understand this particular world. Granted, fantasy books are ones I don’t read often so it might just be my lack of experience in understanding fantasy genre. Told in third person point of view, Delaney and Colton meet again in college and experience parallel worlds as they try to discover what happened to their murdered classmate. I thought the disability representation (the main female character was deaf) was front and center a few times but then forgotten at other times. I did appreciate the author’s note-she revealed how the characters and plot line came to be. The cover is stunning!

annamickreads's review

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5.0

Get you a man who crawls out of hell for you!!!!!

As someone who was really dissatisfied with "Ninth House," I thought "The Whispering Dark" was a really neat concept and fed my appetite for dark academia blended with contemporary fantasy. There was so much to love about this book in terms of positive representation and intriguing plot that I was immediately hooked.

Kelly Andrew is a writer who, to me, manages to blend prose with plot, a tricky balance to strike especially when you're telling a story that requires some explaining (i.e. the idea that there's a college focusing solely on metaphysical studies and everyone there has a supernatural ~ability~). Delaney Meyers-Petrov is written very dreamily and I will admit I was immediately jealous of her purple hair. I love the idea that everyone has a different ability and they were all, frankly, a little bit terrifying. The tone of this book definitely reminded me a lot of "The Raven Boys" in that, everything feels like its being written in a dream, sort of soft edges and lots of questions, but then you get to some of the body horror-straight up horror parts and you're like oh wow!! It's a nightmare, not a dream!!

Not to discount what other reviewers have been saying about repetition/repeated phrases, I hear you, but as a debut I honestly didn't mind the repetition that much - not everyone's first novel starts off as evolved as say, their third or fourth (have y'all read Shadow and Bone recently?!) and I think this was a really strong start to what will undoubtedly be a career of writing gorgeous, creative and spooky books.

folklau's review against another edition

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medium-paced

2.75

I really wanted to like this more, the premise had so much potential.

The writing, while at times lyrically beautiful, felt disjointed and after a while got really repetitive. There were a couple of phrases and metaphors that felt excessively overused (take a shot every time Lane refers to herself as glass, or each time her full name is written on a page, and you’d probably have a much better time reading this.)

There was a distinct lack of world building, and the magic system wasn’t really explained at all. The plot felt directionless and muddied.
At first I thought maybe the author was keeping things intentionally vague and there’d be reveals along the way so I kept reading in hope of some kind of pay off. But all the “reveals” ended up being things it felt like I’d already been told. It all just felt a little pointless, the end result fell flat and was underwhelming.

There were things that us as the reader knew but the MC was kept in the dark about, which felt unnecessary and made Delaney’s eventual discoveries feel less impactful. I feel like the story would have flowed and developed better if there’d been more honesty and communication between Delaney and Colton.

Delaney felt like the personification of a paddling pool. It’s as if the author decided she’d just give her MC a gothic wardrobe and a dip dye in lieu of an actual personality.
Colton felt like a washed out amalgamation of the dozen already existing emotionally unavailable love interests who have tragic backstories and knife-sharp smiles.
The side characters had no depth, either. It’s like there were just there so the MC and LI could speak to people other than each other when the plot required it.

I did really like the representation of disability in here, it honestly seemed like the most thought out part of the book. The way Delaney’s deafness was actually built in as a plot device was really cool to read. This bumped my rating up slightly.

Overall, I absolutely loved the idea of this. It sounded like such an interesting story to read. Unfortunately the execution was lacking, and I mostly just ended up feeling confused and disappointed.