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recklessric 's review for:
Blood Over Bright Haven
by M.L. Wang
challenging
dark
emotional
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Well written with an interesting and fairly unique magic system that was a bit disappointingly hand-wavy. The story concept and themes are interesting but I think this book felt like it could have used another round of editing or two to really trim it down and make it lean. The pacing was a bit choppy because it felt like there were a few frantic sections that were really exciting to read but they were spaced out with sections that felt like they landed in sort of a middle zone of opening up questions about the world and the magic without coming to any satisfying answers and therefore, for my taste would have been better left out. Aside from those slow sections though this was a really solid book with just a few more little complaints that drift into spoiler territory. One last thought though too - I'm a software engineer and this was pitched to me as a computer science magic system; it might be that but not in a way that felt satisfying so that was a bit disappointing.
SPOILER PORTION BELOW
A couple other small detractors here: the twist of the other realm being the Kwen felt fairly obvious and it took a long time to get to that realization after it became apparent to me as a reader so that definitely impacted how the pacing felt and then it also felt pretty clear that Sciona (spelling? Audiobook listener) was going to turn the blight on the mages also felt fairly obvious so the time to get to that point also felt a bit slow. I also didn't need the bit of romance with Sciona and Thomil. It felt like it really was only there to try to add a bit of an emotional gut punch to the end but it also didn't really take anything away from the story - it just induced a few eye rolls for me.
Overall this book is cool though because it can be read and interpreted through a lot of different lenses and it brings to light a lot of different, and important to discuss themes. Oppression, colonization, caste systems, misogyny, and even land and resource stewardship (what would have happened after all the Kwen were blighted? I would have loved to see this explored a little). Even on more simple, emotional levels there's some interesting exploration of rage, grief, greed, power, and intellectualism and this book does a fairly good job of juggling a lot of themes and topics.
SPOILER PORTION BELOW
A couple other small detractors here: the twist of the other realm being the Kwen felt fairly obvious and it took a long time to get to that realization after it became apparent to me as a reader so that definitely impacted how the pacing felt and then it also felt pretty clear that Sciona (spelling? Audiobook listener) was going to turn the blight on the mages also felt fairly obvious so the time to get to that point also felt a bit slow. I also didn't need the bit of romance with Sciona and Thomil. It felt like it really was only there to try to add a bit of an emotional gut punch to the end but it also didn't really take anything away from the story - it just induced a few eye rolls for me.
Overall this book is cool though because it can be read and interpreted through a lot of different lenses and it brings to light a lot of different, and important to discuss themes. Oppression, colonization, caste systems, misogyny, and even land and resource stewardship (what would have happened after all the Kwen were blighted? I would have loved to see this explored a little). Even on more simple, emotional levels there's some interesting exploration of rage, grief, greed, power, and intellectualism and this book does a fairly good job of juggling a lot of themes and topics.