Scan barcode
A review by bellatora
Brightly Woven by Alexandra Bracken
2.0
When I saw the author's picture, I knew I was in trouble. She just looks really young and while that doesn't necessarily mean anything, in my experience it's usually a bad sign.
So I was pleasantly surprised when I started the book. No purple prose, lots of potential. Country on the brink of war. Mysterious, young wizard shows up and whisks away a young, seemingly normal girl to be his assistant and help save her village. Best of all, the names are normal. I basically breathed fantasy when I was younger and I began to get really tired of all the Ae'threl'rens or whatever out there. But here you've got Wayland North (the wizard) and Sydelle Mirabel (the girl). There's a Henry and an Oliver and an Owain. Thank you, Bracken. You used interesting names without making them brain-breakingly strange.
I was enjoying the story until I got to the part where North runs off to fight a dragon. Aren't they on a limited schedule here? You know, country to save from a devastating war? Sydelle's village in a state of occupation? But, nope, off goes North to slay a dragon in an afternoon. And from then on the sense of urgency in the novel kind of died and it all became a confusing, jumbled mess. I honestly didn't know what was going on half the time. North kept running off and characters kept popping in and out and people's motivations became murky. I found myself not caring anymore, which is not a good sign.
I had been liking the North/Sydelle potential but then I stopped caring, especially since the romance plotline just jumped to They like each other. No, I'm not going to develop this anymore. Just go with it, okay? And then childhood friend Henry popped up randomly to create a love triangle. I honestly thought Henry was Sydelle's brother (her much younger brother) until she started talking about him as if he had romantic potential. It was like Bracken felt there should be an obligatory love triangle, no matter how lame, so she just threw it in there.
Plus, Sydelle was a weaver. A weaver who had an (almost magically!) portable, unbreakable travel loom. Who had massive magic weaving skillz. And magic keeps getting described as having "threads." This obvious plotpoint is never fully explored. I kept expecting Sydelle to weave her magic. This doesn't happen (or maybe it does and I spaced out, which is very possible).
I think Bracken could be a writer worth reading in the future. The beginning showed real potential. But this was a story that definitely should've been shelved and returned to later to fix and make the plot more coherent and the characters more fully fleshed out.
So I was pleasantly surprised when I started the book. No purple prose, lots of potential. Country on the brink of war. Mysterious, young wizard shows up and whisks away a young, seemingly normal girl to be his assistant and help save her village. Best of all, the names are normal. I basically breathed fantasy when I was younger and I began to get really tired of all the Ae'threl'rens or whatever out there. But here you've got Wayland North (the wizard) and Sydelle Mirabel (the girl). There's a Henry and an Oliver and an Owain. Thank you, Bracken. You used interesting names without making them brain-breakingly strange.
I was enjoying the story until I got to the part where North runs off to fight a dragon. Aren't they on a limited schedule here? You know, country to save from a devastating war? Sydelle's village in a state of occupation? But, nope, off goes North to slay a dragon in an afternoon. And from then on the sense of urgency in the novel kind of died and it all became a confusing, jumbled mess. I honestly didn't know what was going on half the time. North kept running off and characters kept popping in and out and people's motivations became murky. I found myself not caring anymore, which is not a good sign.
I had been liking the North/Sydelle potential but then I stopped caring, especially since the romance plotline just jumped to They like each other. No, I'm not going to develop this anymore. Just go with it, okay? And then childhood friend Henry popped up randomly to create a love triangle. I honestly thought Henry was Sydelle's brother (her much younger brother) until she started talking about him as if he had romantic potential. It was like Bracken felt there should be an obligatory love triangle, no matter how lame, so she just threw it in there.
Plus, Sydelle was a weaver. A weaver who had an (almost magically!) portable, unbreakable travel loom. Who had massive magic weaving skillz. And magic keeps getting described as having "threads." This obvious plotpoint is never fully explored. I kept expecting Sydelle to weave her magic. This doesn't happen (or maybe it does and I spaced out, which is very possible).
I think Bracken could be a writer worth reading in the future. The beginning showed real potential. But this was a story that definitely should've been shelved and returned to later to fix and make the plot more coherent and the characters more fully fleshed out.