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A review by hobbithopeful
Platinum Tinted Darkness by Timothy Wolff
Did not finish book. Stopped at 23%.
I DNF primarily due to lack of strong storytelling, failure of immersion, and poor character strength.
The story reads like the second book in the series, to the point where I had to double check if it was indeed the first book. There's such a big difference to a books starting off with a ton of great action, and one that just throws everything at you immediately and expects you to just understand what's going on and be invested with the characters. I wish the author had taken his time with introducing different topics and events, instead of trying to pile everything on in the first few chapters. It really does feel like a whole book was skipped and this is the sequel.
It was hard to stay immersed in the story, one of the main reasons I chose to DNF is because I just felt so disconnected from the story and the plot. A lot of elements were eerily similar to Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive series, not in the writing style but with similar plot points.
The character names were so bad, half the characters had "fantasy" names and the other half had names like David and Melissa. (I genuinely paused and was like really) It would have flowed better if the naming scheme was more consistent.
Sereena is such a weirdly written character, she is described as being tiny, but has broad shoulders. (All her descriptions were inconsistent) It was kinda odd that Melissa is also mentioned being "adorable".
There isn't diversity in this book, one of my biggest bookish icks is when BIPOC characters are introduced, but nothing about them even reads as BIPOC. If you take away one word saying they have "dark" skin, and nothing else changes about their character or how they read, then more research needs to be done writing diverse characters. (Or getting BIPOC beta readers)
I was so excited to read a adult fantasy book, especially after coming off reading the Expanse Series, and a Strange & Stubbon Endurance. I was very disappointed by the quality of writing, and the pacing.
I would not reccomend this book.
The story reads like the second book in the series, to the point where I had to double check if it was indeed the first book. There's such a big difference to a books starting off with a ton of great action, and one that just throws everything at you immediately and expects you to just understand what's going on and be invested with the characters. I wish the author had taken his time with introducing different topics and events, instead of trying to pile everything on in the first few chapters. It really does feel like a whole book was skipped and this is the sequel.
It was hard to stay immersed in the story, one of the main reasons I chose to DNF is because I just felt so disconnected from the story and the plot. A lot of elements were eerily similar to Brandon Sanderson's Stormlight Archive series, not in the writing style but with similar plot points.
The character names were so bad, half the characters had "fantasy" names and the other half had names like David and Melissa. (I genuinely paused and was like really) It would have flowed better if the naming scheme was more consistent.
Sereena is such a weirdly written character, she is described as being tiny, but has broad shoulders. (All her descriptions were inconsistent) It was kinda odd that Melissa is also mentioned being "adorable".
There isn't diversity in this book, one of my biggest bookish icks is when BIPOC characters are introduced, but nothing about them even reads as BIPOC. If you take away one word saying they have "dark" skin, and nothing else changes about their character or how they read, then more research needs to be done writing diverse characters. (Or getting BIPOC beta readers)
I was so excited to read a adult fantasy book, especially after coming off reading the Expanse Series, and a Strange & Stubbon Endurance. I was very disappointed by the quality of writing, and the pacing.
I would not reccomend this book.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Injury/Injury detail, War, and Violence