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3.85 AVERAGE
3.85 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
When I heard the Twisted Sisters were releasing a new Fantasy series, with Fae who had magic gifted from the gods but had since lost it, I was instantly sold.
The prequel was phenomenal, it really pulled me into the world and encouraged me to read the first book straight away.
It is an absolute monster of 861 pages. This didn’t daunt me too much, I’ve devoured the later ZA books in a day which are around this page length.
I didn’t realise it has the basic plot of Aladdin, but with a few twists. This did help me understand each characters roles a little quicker, but my god it was a battle to get through the first quarter of the book and finally meet the genie. The last 200 pages were significantly better, and I personally believe this book has 200-300 pages too many. Lots of background plots, which flesh out the world and the other characters, but they’re not nearly interesting enough to justify the extra length.
Overall, I didn’t hate nor love it. It’s distinctly average.
I’m hoping against hope, that it is similar to ZA, in that the series gets progressively better as the books go on. I am not sat on tender hooks awaiting the second however, and I shall not be rushing to buy it as soon as it’s released (whenever that might be!)
The prequel was phenomenal, it really pulled me into the world and encouraged me to read the first book straight away.
It is an absolute monster of 861 pages. This didn’t daunt me too much, I’ve devoured the later ZA books in a day which are around this page length.
I didn’t realise it has the basic plot of Aladdin, but with a few twists. This did help me understand each characters roles a little quicker, but my god it was a battle to get through the first quarter of the book and finally meet the genie. The last 200 pages were significantly better, and I personally believe this book has 200-300 pages too many. Lots of background plots, which flesh out the world and the other characters, but they’re not nearly interesting enough to justify the extra length.
Overall, I didn’t hate nor love it. It’s distinctly average.
I’m hoping against hope, that it is similar to ZA, in that the series gets progressively better as the books go on. I am not sat on tender hooks awaiting the second however, and I shall not be rushing to buy it as soon as it’s released (whenever that might be!)
adventurous
dark
funny
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
N/A
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Okay, this pains me a little bit, but I did not like this book, that I have to DNF around 40%. First, the constant ramblings of every character's inner monologue made me want to rip my hair out. I think having that much inner thought play out on a page is fine once the characters and plot have been well established, but having it right from the start made the book very boring. And on that note, the plot was so slow I mean, I was 40% through, and nothing happened. Like not one thing of note. Even though the inner thoughts are what consumed basically every page, I don’t feel like we were actually getting to know any of them, and their interactions with each other felt awkward.
This is the first book from these authors that I haven’t liked, and it just seems they are going in a different direction with this series, and it is just not for me.
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
dark
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
mysterious
tense
slow-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
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
dark
funny
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
adventurous
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
mysterious
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I was shocked and appalled to read some of the male characters’ perspectives, particularly their views on women. Our uptight guard character, Cassius, has no substance to him beyond blind loyalty to the empire and an unsubstantiated infatuation with the princess. For readers of the Zodiac Academy series by the same authors, he is essentially a copy of Lance Orion. While that’s annoying from a craft perspective, what I really took issue with was the very subtle acts of violence he commits against women. His lust for the princess is obviously repressed since he can’t act on his feelings, so he describes having to solicit sex workers to carry out his desires. He literally says that his impulses are so intense that he has to pay more and struggle more to find SW who will agree to his demands (presumably he’s either into some weird shit kink-wise or his fantasies are literally violent??). This is such a gross and flippant way of presenting an oppressive system, and brushing it off like it’s evidence of the love interest’s insatiable pull towards the FMC. I get that mention of a brothel is fairly commonplace in fantasy series, but to have the love interest participate in a power dynamic that features women subjugated to a man’s wildest and perhaps dangerous fantasies for their livelihood, and to have that played off as some kind of argument for the MMC’s yearning, is really fucking gross. This is especially heinous considering the FMC he’s paired with is a princess whose life is dominated by a lack of the right to self-determination, whose struggle for freedom is entirely rooted in patriarchal hegemony and systemic misogyny. This is supposed to be some feminist take meanwhile the women who are most at risk in this world are used as victims of a man’s fantasies for one of the most visible women in the empire.
Aside from those issues, this book just took way too long to get going. It’s not until 200 pages in that the main quest begins, and the lead up to that is just the two MMC being gross. The exposition was awful. Usually I can excuse the authors’ bad writing because the plots are so fast paced and ridiculous that it’s entertaining and I’m distracted from the prose itself. That was impossible to do with this book. I’m a firm believer that the word c*ck should not be used in the first 20% of a novel AT LEAST, and this book used it as nauseam within the first couple pages.