A review by aardwyrm
The Bone Shard Emperor by Andrea Stewart

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Everything I loved about the first book is here, and when the narrative flow gets going, it's every bit as good. There are a few quibbles on the storytelling level. The whole thrust and theme is bound up in protecting your people, but whole swaths of innocents get cut down in nameless silence all the time with little reaction. (Hard to avoid on an epic scale, but egregious.) It makes the often petty behavior of even the most interesting characters and ruthless antagonists feel a little like super powered teenagers playing action figures with people. But the world is still fascinating, and that really is terribly common in the genre.

I had trouble pinning down why I liked the book less than the first one. There's a forced, chemistry-free romance that doesn't suit either character. There's some real book-two-of-a-trilogy bloat, and a lot of the 500+ pages feel like wheel spinning. There's less about the more interesting POV characters from the first book and the secondary weirdos who have a lot of potential.

I finally realized that this just comes down to having way too much Jovis. He's always been the most boring man in the world, to be tolerated only because Mephi is there, and everything he does is dumb and wrong. Cut him and the pacing and plotting and trope use would tidy right up. 
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