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A review by capturedinwords
The Way of Shadows by Brent Weeks
4.0
Is this a good book? Yes. Is this a good series? HELL YES. I really wish more people would give this book a chance... I guess I would say this book has a slow beginning, I mean personally I loved it all, the beginning really gave you a feel for The Warrens and how corrupt and unfair the world is, but I can see how some would be turned off by the slower pace. But trust me, the book makes up for it. When you get farther along, all of a sudden it's like "Okay lets become super badass now", and a whole bunch of awesome happens. I must say, the awesome get's even more awesome in the second and third books though. I will not be talking about the story in this review as that is what the synopsis is for, and I don't want to spoil anything. I will tell you, although i'm sure you guessed, this is very much a rogue book. If you love assassins you should end up liking this book.
Although I love this book there is still some noticeable flaws. One of the main flaws being the female leads. Well to be honest there isn't really any female leads. There's Doll Girl who is hardly a lead in this book, and there's Momma K who is sort of interesting but she pisses me off most of the time. This changes in the sequel, and we gain a female lead who is actually one of my favorites (hint: She has red fiery hair, a sad back story, she's emotionally screwed up, but she's a complete badass and could no doubt beat the crap outta me/kill me). Although I love Azoth/Kylar and can relate to him on many ways, I found that a couple times he would say something out of place or inappropriate and nobody would notice it. These are basically my only problems with the book. Other than these, I loved it.
The character development throughout these books are amazing in my opinion. At times I didn't even know if I loved or hated certain characters until you hear their back story and discover why they act the way they do. The world building wasn't too great in this first book, but it really gave you the feel for Cenaria (The main city that this takes place in). I thought the writing style was great, besides some of the slow parts. The combat scenes were fantastic. Later in the book, the power granted by the ka'kari feels very powerful and as Kylar's abilities grow throughout the series his powers become immense. I've never really read a book were the character was so powerful yet still had his weaknesses and wasn't too OP. This book really gets the feel for assassins right (well actually they're called 'wetboys', but whatever).
"The Way of Shadows", although not an entirely original sounding name, it holds meaning to it when connected with the other books in The Night Angel Trilogy. The names of the books symbolize a young wetboy (assassin) fight with inner demons and how at first he welcomed the shadows, but eventually wanted to escape them, until the final book when he finally comes beyond them.
I completely recommend this book, but if you read this book you really have to read the other two. In my opinion the other two are just SO much better, but you still can't skip the first as there are important things to learn in it. I also have to say that this book isn't for everyone. It's gritty, it's violent, it has sexual themes, and it is overall just a pretty dark book. If you don't mind any of these things however, then you are in for an amazing badass book.
Although I love this book there is still some noticeable flaws. One of the main flaws being the female leads. Well to be honest there isn't really any female leads. There's Doll Girl who is hardly a lead in this book, and there's Momma K who is sort of interesting but she pisses me off most of the time. This changes in the sequel, and we gain a female lead who is actually one of my favorites (hint: She has red fiery hair, a sad back story, she's emotionally screwed up, but she's a complete badass and could no doubt beat the crap outta me/kill me). Although I love Azoth/Kylar and can relate to him on many ways, I found that a couple times he would say something out of place or inappropriate and nobody would notice it. These are basically my only problems with the book. Other than these, I loved it.
The character development throughout these books are amazing in my opinion. At times I didn't even know if I loved or hated certain characters until you hear their back story and discover why they act the way they do. The world building wasn't too great in this first book, but it really gave you the feel for Cenaria (The main city that this takes place in). I thought the writing style was great, besides some of the slow parts. The combat scenes were fantastic. Later in the book, the power granted by the ka'kari feels very powerful and as Kylar's abilities grow throughout the series his powers become immense. I've never really read a book were the character was so powerful yet still had his weaknesses and wasn't too OP. This book really gets the feel for assassins right (well actually they're called 'wetboys', but whatever).
"The Way of Shadows", although not an entirely original sounding name, it holds meaning to it when connected with the other books in The Night Angel Trilogy. The names of the books symbolize a young wetboy (assassin) fight with inner demons and how at first he welcomed the shadows, but eventually wanted to escape them, until the final book when he finally comes beyond them.
I completely recommend this book, but if you read this book you really have to read the other two. In my opinion the other two are just SO much better, but you still can't skip the first as there are important things to learn in it. I also have to say that this book isn't for everyone. It's gritty, it's violent, it has sexual themes, and it is overall just a pretty dark book. If you don't mind any of these things however, then you are in for an amazing badass book.