A review by bezarue
The First Binding by R.R. Virdi

adventurous challenging slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

The first 300 pages of this book took me over three months to read. This was the slowest start to a book I have ever attempted, and if it wasn't part of a readathon I would have DNF'd. It did pick up a lot after that, and managed to be a fairly engaging story, but that first 300 pages killed me dead. And I didn't even feel like the beginning did a good job of setting up the world either- like I felt all the world building came mostly afterwards to be honest. It needed a glossary because there were 950 characters and two timelines which I don't really think was employed to best effect, and I quite often lost a grasp on who was who. It also just had so much misogyny baked in, but in a way where it clearly thought it had created a fairly equal fantasy society? Like I don't think was intentional. And why did every single female that Ari met apart from Aram be so desperately in love with him? I didn't believe the relationship in the present between him and Eloine, plus all the other reviews say it's plagiarism so like yeah no thank you