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A review by luxthepenguin
Graceling by Kristin Cashore
3.0
Not sure if I can call this book anything other than meh.
Literally every problem tied up nicely, and that made me feel like the problems didn’t have weight. Katsa's relationship with her uncle? Resolved in the epilogue. The main "antagonist" of the story? Quickly killed by Katsa. The only slight letdown was Po's blindness, but even then, his grace made up for it. And his struggles with controlling his grace were also completely resolved by the end.
The antagonist of the book (whose name I can’t even recall) has so little development. I mean, really, what do we know about his upbringing, motivations, etc?
The characters in general just didn't have a whole lot of depth:
Katsa - strong girl who has a grace for survival. Admittedly has some of the better character development out of there characters bc of her uncle and her anger management
Po - legit had zero weaknesses. Extremely one dimensional. He was patient, trusting, loving, kind, rational, clever, strong, everything you could ever want in a man, etc. The only slight misdemeanor was his one lie to Katsa, but that's easily justified. He seemed so good that it was hard to believe that he didn't want to somehow manipulate Katsa. After I got over that theory, he literally became perfect brick wall love interest dude.
The world building was meh like most other aspects of the book. What about the other Gracelings that had mundane gifts? Why were they treated differently depending on the country? Did the other kings care at all about this whole plot? What role does the king actually play in the world? Because there was no mention of any politics or things of that nature. What responsibilities did Katsa's uncles have, beyond his one character trait of forcing his subjects to be afraid of him and parading his niece around like a dog?
This book was on my tbr list for a while, and it disappointed. Not bad, but it could’ve given so much more.
Literally every problem tied up nicely, and that made me feel like the problems didn’t have weight. Katsa's relationship with her uncle? Resolved in the epilogue. The main "antagonist" of the story? Quickly killed by Katsa. The only slight letdown was Po's blindness, but even then, his grace made up for it. And his struggles with controlling his grace were also completely resolved by the end.
The antagonist of the book (whose name I can’t even recall) has so little development. I mean, really, what do we know about his upbringing, motivations, etc?
The characters in general just didn't have a whole lot of depth:
Katsa - strong girl who has a grace for survival. Admittedly has some of the better character development out of there characters bc of her uncle and her anger management
Po - legit had zero weaknesses. Extremely one dimensional. He was patient, trusting, loving, kind, rational, clever, strong, everything you could ever want in a man, etc. The only slight misdemeanor was his one lie to Katsa, but that's easily justified. He seemed so good that it was hard to believe that he didn't want to somehow manipulate Katsa. After I got over that theory, he literally became perfect brick wall love interest dude.
The world building was meh like most other aspects of the book. What about the other Gracelings that had mundane gifts? Why were they treated differently depending on the country? Did the other kings care at all about this whole plot? What role does the king actually play in the world? Because there was no mention of any politics or things of that nature. What responsibilities did Katsa's uncles have, beyond his one character trait of forcing his subjects to be afraid of him and parading his niece around like a dog?
This book was on my tbr list for a while, and it disappointed. Not bad, but it could’ve given so much more.