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A review by bookph1le
Falling Kingdoms by Morgan Rhodes
1.0
Just a general warning: while I will keep major spoilers out of the visible parts of this review, a good portion of the review will be behind spoiler tags because it will contain MAJOR spoilers, so do not look at them unless you've either read the book or don't mind my spoiling the plot (such as it is) for you.
I was so excited to read this book because it was billed as a sort of YA Game of Thrones. As someone who's both read the books and watches the series, I'm here to tell you that this couldn't be further from the truth. This book has none of the subtlety, not even a fraction of the character development, and nothing like the intricacy of the plotting of the Song of Ice and Fire series.
One of the worst aspects of this book is the sophomoric writing compounded by the fact that the editing was abysmal. There were so many awkwardly worded sentences that I started to lose track. For example, this gem:
I couldn't count how many times I needed to go back and reread a sentence or a paragraph because the wording was so poor that it was as if hadn't been written in English. Or how about how repetitious the language is at times? Case in point:
There are also numerous grammatical errors, such as the word "has" where "had" should have been used. If publishing companies want to claim they're giving the reader such a quality experience due to their excellent editing and their discernment of what constitutes a good book, they need to work harder at backing that claim up.
So much of this book is just plain derivative. Yes, it borrows quite heavily from Martin's books, but the system of magic in the book owes a lot to Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra. It does not use the tropes and plot devices anywhere near as well as the aforementioned sources.
The characterization in this book is nearly nonexistent. Each and every character felt like a type, not a person. There are portions of the book where it's obvious the writer is trying to give a character some depth, but never really hits the mark. Instead, many of the characters seem to flip wildly from one personality type to another, particularly Magnus, who irked me to no end.
As for the female characters, they're just plain awful. They're spineless, stupid, too perfect to be real, evil just to be evil, or a combination of all of these. I couldn't stand any of them, but Cleo in particular got on my last nerve. She's senseless and flighty, and I couldn't bring myself to care about anything she went through. Why is it so difficult to find decent female characters in YA lit? It shouldn't be this hard!
Everyone in this book is hot, with the exception of one elderly character. Otherwise, everyone is hot. Not only are they hot, they all spend a lot of time noticing each other's hotness. Sometimes, the reader is also supposed to marvel at how, despite a character's hotness, another character realizes there may be evil lurking within that character. Profound.
The best thing I can say for this book is that the mythology of the Watchers is mildly interesting, and there does seem to be a decent plot idea mired within the awful prose. Had this book been handled more deftly, it could quite possibly have been a good book.
Now, for some spoilerific specifics about things that drove me crazy:
- Sooooo... Aron kills someone, sparking an international incident, and Cleo's daddy thinks it's the *perfect* time to announce her betrothal to him 'cuz he's special 'n' stuff. *goggles*
- Cleo is traipsing around Paelsia in a silk dress and jewels. Are you for reals? And she and Nic didn't make up fake names or come up with a backstory? They didn't think anyone would wonder why they don't have Limeros accents when they claim to be from there? -1000000 to Cleo's and Nic's stealth.
- Um, the chieftain doesn't get that Cleo might be, like, you know, a valuable captive that he can use against the king whose realm he's about to invade. Hahahahahahahahaha. My stomach hurts from laughing.
- Jonas hates Cleo because he blames her for killing his brother, but he still notices that she's a totally hawt babe of epic proportions.
- Seriously? Magnus is, like, apologizing for killing Theon, even though it makes complete and utter sense for there to be a fight to the death between them? Dude.
- Cleo tried to keep her dress clean while she was a captive. Man, that girl is DEEP! In fact, she's almost as deep as that puddle the rain left behind on my sidewalk.
- Oooh, Magnus's sister who isn't his sister doesn't luuuuurve him and now he's EVIL.
- But wait! Magnus saved Amia so he's, like, not completely evil. You guys! He's conflicted! That means you can totally still crush on him because he's not a psychopath like his dad, he's just kinda a psychopath. Big diff, don't you know?
- Lucia, your homicidal spell casting at the end made me roll my eyes so hard they almost fell out. You're so sweet and beautiful and wonderful, yet you don't stop to think about what might happen if you, the most powerful sorceress of legendary legend, wig out?
- The characters in this book pretend to be good, but not ONE of them stops to think about how their horrible or stupid or just plain depraved--or horribly, stupidly depraved--actions will affect others. You all fail, every last one of you.
- All of the rulers are stupid. All of them. There is no way a single one of those dudes would have managed to hold onto a throne for more than a week, not in any fantasy universe one can conjure.
- The endless banter and self-congratulatory speeches at the height of what should be tense confrontations is straight up cartoon-worthy.
- The ending. Oh. My. God. Cleo, you are dumber than a box of rocks--and I'm insulting rocks by saying that. Then again, I did want to applaud Magnus for finally managing to capture you, especially since it's not like you ever seemed all that hard to capture. Your stupidity is a perfect match for his incompetence. What a shame for you that Magnus wasn't as inept on his third go round, since he pretty much let you walk away the previous two times. Practice makes perfect, I guess? Third time's a charm?
I was so excited to read this book because it was billed as a sort of YA Game of Thrones. As someone who's both read the books and watches the series, I'm here to tell you that this couldn't be further from the truth. This book has none of the subtlety, not even a fraction of the character development, and nothing like the intricacy of the plotting of the Song of Ice and Fire series.
One of the worst aspects of this book is the sophomoric writing compounded by the fact that the editing was abysmal. There were so many awkwardly worded sentences that I started to lose track. For example, this gem:
Spoiler
"There's a message waiting for you from your father delivered earlier by a falcon." Whaaaaa? His father was delivered by a falcon, or the message was?I couldn't count how many times I needed to go back and reread a sentence or a paragraph because the wording was so poor that it was as if hadn't been written in English. Or how about how repetitious the language is at times? Case in point:
Spoiler
His near hysteria couldn't breach the walls of Cleo's sadness, which had rendered her oddly serene. "They won't breach the walls."There are also numerous grammatical errors, such as the word "has" where "had" should have been used. If publishing companies want to claim they're giving the reader such a quality experience due to their excellent editing and their discernment of what constitutes a good book, they need to work harder at backing that claim up.
So much of this book is just plain derivative. Yes, it borrows quite heavily from Martin's books, but the system of magic in the book owes a lot to Avatar: The Last Airbender and The Legend of Korra. It does not use the tropes and plot devices anywhere near as well as the aforementioned sources.
The characterization in this book is nearly nonexistent. Each and every character felt like a type, not a person. There are portions of the book where it's obvious the writer is trying to give a character some depth, but never really hits the mark. Instead, many of the characters seem to flip wildly from one personality type to another, particularly Magnus, who irked me to no end.
As for the female characters, they're just plain awful. They're spineless, stupid, too perfect to be real, evil just to be evil, or a combination of all of these. I couldn't stand any of them, but Cleo in particular got on my last nerve. She's senseless and flighty, and I couldn't bring myself to care about anything she went through. Why is it so difficult to find decent female characters in YA lit? It shouldn't be this hard!
Everyone in this book is hot, with the exception of one elderly character. Otherwise, everyone is hot. Not only are they hot, they all spend a lot of time noticing each other's hotness. Sometimes, the reader is also supposed to marvel at how, despite a character's hotness, another character realizes there may be evil lurking within that character. Profound.
The best thing I can say for this book is that the mythology of the Watchers is mildly interesting, and there does seem to be a decent plot idea mired within the awful prose. Had this book been handled more deftly, it could quite possibly have been a good book.
Now, for some spoilerific specifics about things that drove me crazy:
Spoiler
- The insta-love is so egregious in this book. I'm supposed to care about this Theon and Cleo thing because why? If you want tragic backstory, leave it in the backstory. Don't try to work it into the plot but then do such a shoddy job that it's obvious it's there just to tug at the reader's heartstrings and to give Cleo further excuses to wangst.- Sooooo... Aron kills someone, sparking an international incident, and Cleo's daddy thinks it's the *perfect* time to announce her betrothal to him 'cuz he's special 'n' stuff. *goggles*
- Cleo is traipsing around Paelsia in a silk dress and jewels. Are you for reals? And she and Nic didn't make up fake names or come up with a backstory? They didn't think anyone would wonder why they don't have Limeros accents when they claim to be from there? -1000000 to Cleo's and Nic's stealth.
- Um, the chieftain doesn't get that Cleo might be, like, you know, a valuable captive that he can use against the king whose realm he's about to invade. Hahahahahahahahaha. My stomach hurts from laughing.
- Jonas hates Cleo because he blames her for killing his brother, but he still notices that she's a totally hawt babe of epic proportions.
- Seriously? Magnus is, like, apologizing for killing Theon, even though it makes complete and utter sense for there to be a fight to the death between them? Dude.
- Cleo tried to keep her dress clean while she was a captive. Man, that girl is DEEP! In fact, she's almost as deep as that puddle the rain left behind on my sidewalk.
- Oooh, Magnus's sister who isn't his sister doesn't luuuuurve him and now he's EVIL.
- But wait! Magnus saved Amia so he's, like, not completely evil. You guys! He's conflicted! That means you can totally still crush on him because he's not a psychopath like his dad, he's just kinda a psychopath. Big diff, don't you know?
- Lucia, your homicidal spell casting at the end made me roll my eyes so hard they almost fell out. You're so sweet and beautiful and wonderful, yet you don't stop to think about what might happen if you, the most powerful sorceress of legendary legend, wig out?
- The characters in this book pretend to be good, but not ONE of them stops to think about how their horrible or stupid or just plain depraved--or horribly, stupidly depraved--actions will affect others. You all fail, every last one of you.
- All of the rulers are stupid. All of them. There is no way a single one of those dudes would have managed to hold onto a throne for more than a week, not in any fantasy universe one can conjure.
- The endless banter and self-congratulatory speeches at the height of what should be tense confrontations is straight up cartoon-worthy.
- The ending. Oh. My. God. Cleo, you are dumber than a box of rocks--and I'm insulting rocks by saying that. Then again, I did want to applaud Magnus for finally managing to capture you, especially since it's not like you ever seemed all that hard to capture. Your stupidity is a perfect match for his incompetence. What a shame for you that Magnus wasn't as inept on his third go round, since he pretty much let you walk away the previous two times. Practice makes perfect, I guess? Third time's a charm?