Reviews - The Songbird and the Heart of Stone

5.4k reviews for:

The Songbird and the Heart of Stone

Carissa Broadbent

4.11 AVERAGE

klafollett's review against another edition

4.0

A little slow starting for me and just keeps getting more and more crazy. But I’m still chugging along with this series.

kategudge95's review against another edition

4.0

challenging dark mysterious 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

katdevinee_'s review against another edition

4.0

Another phenomenal Crowns of Nyaxia book! I loved Mische as a side character in the first two but she really became one of my favorite heroines through reading. Will be eagerly awaiting the next part!

hanfan1's review against another edition

5.0

adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious sad 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

elenavillan's review against another edition

3.0

adventurous emotional medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: Plot

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I loved Mische and Asar both as a couple and as individual characters. I was already fond of Mische in the first duology, but she becomes much more fleshed out and interesting in this volume. Her and Asar's backstories were handled very well, and their romance was very sweet as well. I appreciate that it developed quite slowly and it wasn't exclusively based on physical attraction; I got the sense that they really got to know each other as people, which is what I generally look for when reading a romance novel.

The main problem, however, is that this is written as a plot-driven book, but the plot itself isn't very strong. It was a tad too repetitive and I was never fully invested in what was going to happen next. I just kept turning the pages because (1) the writing style is very readable, and (2) I did care about the main couple (not the side characters, mind you. They were extremely bland and I expect to forget their names in a matter of days). The pacing was weird, with a lot of things happening all at once in a couple of pages and then absolutely nothing for a few chapters.

But perhaps my biggest gripe was actually... the setting. More specifically, the fact that I couldn't picture it in my head at all. The descriptions were so vague and abstract that they did very little to help me understand what was going on, or what a place was supposed to look like. I guess this isn't that big of a deal when you're reading a contemporary story—where you can just fill in the details with the things you see in your everyday life—but I tend to expect more intricate worldbuilding from an epic fantasy novel set in the underworld. Even if the descriptions weren't a highlight from the first duology either, they were effective enough that I still managed to form a general mental picture of the action.

Overall, I think this might be the weakest book in the Crowns of Nyaxia series so far. I certainly hope the second one is better, because Mische and Asar deserve it!