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A review by lanidon
The Wren in the Holly Library by K.A. Linde
3.0
This is fun, I never thought about dropping it, but it's sloppy... The world building, the characters, the plot, the romance, sloppy sloppy sloppy. So much of it crumbles if you think a second too hard about it. I never felt immersed in the world because it didn't feel atmospheric or real.
A lot of the book is very gritty but it's not grounded enough to land. We're at the tail end of a world war, but I didn't feel the impact of that. We're just told again and again that people are starving, they can't afford healthcare, they have to carefully plan a route through rubble, technology has all but collapsed. It never feels significant to the story because it is never shown as having impact, it's all told to us in past tense, meanwhile in the present everything is solved with money or magic. I think the book wouldn't been the same if it were a classic urban fantasy without this war.
Also how in the world did everyone agree to call sentient non humans "monsters" as the one and only description of the group. Monsters is on the official treaty document. Monsters is what they call themselves. Monsters is the political and cultural default term. How would that ever happen. It kept tripping me up. It sounds like a slur, this world has all the same folktale and cultural connotations of the word monster, yet that is somehow wholly accepted as an okay things to call them
Anyway, it's a fine book, fast easy read. I might read the sequel if it finds it's way back to me, but I won't seek it out
A lot of the book is very gritty but it's not grounded enough to land. We're at the tail end of a world war, but I didn't feel the impact of that. We're just told again and again that people are starving, they can't afford healthcare, they have to carefully plan a route through rubble, technology has all but collapsed. It never feels significant to the story because it is never shown as having impact, it's all told to us in past tense, meanwhile in the present everything is solved with money or magic. I think the book wouldn't been the same if it were a classic urban fantasy without this war.
Also how in the world did everyone agree to call sentient non humans "monsters" as the one and only description of the group. Monsters is on the official treaty document. Monsters is what they call themselves. Monsters is the political and cultural default term. How would that ever happen. It kept tripping me up. It sounds like a slur, this world has all the same folktale and cultural connotations of the word monster, yet that is somehow wholly accepted as an okay things to call them
Anyway, it's a fine book, fast easy read. I might read the sequel if it finds it's way back to me, but I won't seek it out