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A review by bookish_otaku
Dragon Spear by Jessica Day George
1.0
1/5
It pains me to have to write this review because the first two books were so solid, but this book really wasn't necessary, in a lot of ways.
Sure we still hadn't seen Luka and Creel get married, but apart from this (which could have easily been fixed with a quick epilogue) the only thing this third installation brings is world building for the sake of worldbuilding. There is no purpose to it other than providing an opportunity for Creel, who for some reason always tries to blend in, to majorly mess up. And she does. Big time.
There is a section where Creel encounters a new country of people who are coded as black. They are given a foreign, tribal feel. They have tattoos, piercings that make Feravalans cringe, and have never seen blue eyes before. While it's never explicitly stated that they are black, the fact that Creel can easily see their white tattoos implies as much. Then there is also a comment Creel makes when arguing that she should go first into a dark tunnel, as she's been "dyed dark" and enemies presumably will have a hard time seeing her.
She then makes it worse and worries that her complexion will remain dark even during her wedding and says she will look like a "burnt figure." I'm sorry but how did this pass the editor? Jessica Day George, you were doing so well, why did you have to make Creel do black face? This is so clearly and indisputably black face, I don't know how you missed it. If not black face, then brown face.
Because of these harmful elements that are not acknowledged in the book as being harmful, and are also included in a Middle Grade book, I can't really give this book any higher than a 1 star. If this had not been included, I'd probably just give it a 2 because, like I mentioned before, it just really didn't feel necessary. Why focus so hard on worldbuilding in the last book of a series? It makes no sense to me.
It pains me to have to write this review because the first two books were so solid, but this book really wasn't necessary, in a lot of ways.
Sure we still hadn't seen Luka and Creel get married, but apart from this (which could have easily been fixed with a quick epilogue) the only thing this third installation brings is world building for the sake of worldbuilding. There is no purpose to it other than providing an opportunity for Creel, who for some reason always tries to blend in, to majorly mess up. And she does. Big time.
There is a section where Creel encounters a new country of people who are coded as black. They are given a foreign, tribal feel. They have tattoos, piercings that make Feravalans cringe, and have never seen blue eyes before. While it's never explicitly stated that they are black, the fact that Creel can easily see their white tattoos implies as much. Then there is also a comment Creel makes when arguing that she should go first into a dark tunnel, as she's been "dyed dark" and enemies presumably will have a hard time seeing her.
She then makes it worse and worries that her complexion will remain dark even during her wedding and says she will look like a "burnt figure." I'm sorry but how did this pass the editor? Jessica Day George, you were doing so well, why did you have to make Creel do black face? This is so clearly and indisputably black face, I don't know how you missed it. If not black face, then brown face.
Because of these harmful elements that are not acknowledged in the book as being harmful, and are also included in a Middle Grade book, I can't really give this book any higher than a 1 star. If this had not been included, I'd probably just give it a 2 because, like I mentioned before, it just really didn't feel necessary. Why focus so hard on worldbuilding in the last book of a series? It makes no sense to me.