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chaosandbooks 's review for:
Girl, Serpent, Thorn
by Melissa Bashardoust
I really wanted to love this book because it's so unique; however it fell a bit flat for me.
The story is centered around Persian mythology, rich in characters and lore. I wish that Persian mythology was published more often because it's such a nice refreshing read compared to the endless amounts of Greek mythology that we have right now. I could easily read an entire book dedicated to the world of the div in this book because it's so fascinating and complex. I actually do wish it was more fleshed out here and it's one of the few times I wouldn't mind a massive info dump of world-building.
I loved the reference to the classic fairy take and putting a new spin on what we typically see in needing to save the princess. Instead, we have our heroine Saroya who struggles with being cursed by a div (Persian demon) to have a poisonous touch. As the opportunity arises to rid herself of the curse that has held her back, she begins to learn that everything is not what it seems. Without spoiling what happens, I'm just going to lay out the problems I had with some of the characters and the book itself.
Azad was just straight up annoying. So much happens with his character, but regardless I hated him from the second he showed up. He's written like an archetype and I maybe enjoyed two seconds of backstory towards the end. It actually made me mad that he was such an important character because I wanted to kick him off the page every second he was on it.
Parvaneh was so underdeveloped I wanted to cry. Considering she plays another vital role, she literally just existed to support Soraya who was otherwise useless. The whole book would have served better being completely from Parvaneh's point of view and I probably would have enjoyed it more. She's such an interesting and badass character that I needed more.
Soraya and her family are just the worst. I really did feel for Soraya, who it kept in the dark almost the entire story. But she also spent most of her time flip-flopping between absolute woe-is-me syndrome and suddenly thinking she'll do whatever she wants before regretting it two seconds later. I think her character arc was actually well thought out, it just needed to be executed better.
The writing felt very middle grade. So the entire plot in this book has the oh-so-perfect instantaneous solutions that you see in middle grade. It actually makes sense now why the book was so short for such a complex mythology. You know that's fine. I enjoy middle grade fantasy a lot. The problem was that this was marketed as YA and the overall themes of the book are really violent and for a YA audience. So I spent most of the book immensely frustrated by this constant contrast.
So yeah. You know I enjoyed this one. It was good, just not up to the high expectations I had. I just have a lot of mixed feelings on it and think it has a lot of issues regarding what it wants to be. I'm glad I read it though because the mythology was really nice to delve into.
The story is centered around Persian mythology, rich in characters and lore. I wish that Persian mythology was published more often because it's such a nice refreshing read compared to the endless amounts of Greek mythology that we have right now. I could easily read an entire book dedicated to the world of the div in this book because it's so fascinating and complex. I actually do wish it was more fleshed out here and it's one of the few times I wouldn't mind a massive info dump of world-building.
I loved the reference to the classic fairy take and putting a new spin on what we typically see in needing to save the princess. Instead, we have our heroine Saroya who struggles with being cursed by a div (Persian demon) to have a poisonous touch. As the opportunity arises to rid herself of the curse that has held her back, she begins to learn that everything is not what it seems. Without spoiling what happens, I'm just going to lay out the problems I had with some of the characters and the book itself.
Azad was just straight up annoying. So much happens with his character, but regardless I hated him from the second he showed up. He's written like an archetype and I maybe enjoyed two seconds of backstory towards the end. It actually made me mad that he was such an important character because I wanted to kick him off the page every second he was on it.
Parvaneh was so underdeveloped I wanted to cry. Considering she plays another vital role, she literally just existed to support Soraya who was otherwise useless. The whole book would have served better being completely from Parvaneh's point of view and I probably would have enjoyed it more. She's such an interesting and badass character that I needed more.
Soraya and her family are just the worst. I really did feel for Soraya, who it kept in the dark almost the entire story. But she also spent most of her time flip-flopping between absolute woe-is-me syndrome and suddenly thinking she'll do whatever she wants before regretting it two seconds later. I think her character arc was actually well thought out, it just needed to be executed better.
The writing felt very middle grade. So the entire plot in this book has the oh-so-perfect instantaneous solutions that you see in middle grade. It actually makes sense now why the book was so short for such a complex mythology. You know that's fine. I enjoy middle grade fantasy a lot. The problem was that this was marketed as YA and the overall themes of the book are really violent and for a YA audience. So I spent most of the book immensely frustrated by this constant contrast.
So yeah. You know I enjoyed this one. It was good, just not up to the high expectations I had. I just have a lot of mixed feelings on it and think it has a lot of issues regarding what it wants to be. I'm glad I read it though because the mythology was really nice to delve into.