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A review by ohthesefaces
Throne of the Crescent Moon by Saladin Ahmed
adventurous
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.75
I really wanted to love this book, and yet I kept feeling as if this book was an acquaintance I only really wanted to see in a professional setting and never outside of that.
Some things that I enjoyed:
- The setting. As many other reviews have stated, the joy of finding a fantasy book not written in a Medieval English setting was so refreshing, that I immediately picked the book up to try it.
- The diverse range of characters. I liked the premise of a group comprised of a middle aged ghul hunter, a young holy dervish, and a fierce she-lion on a quest for revenge. Add in two additional middle aged characters, complete with body aches and complaints, and I was pretty excited to see how their dynamics would play out.
Things I didn’t enjoy:
- The city. I kept waiting to fall in love with Dhamsawaat the way Adoulla loved it and it never happened. It seemed like the worst place in the world to live with no charm.
- The writing style. I believe the author was trying to tell a concise, meaningful story but he did more “telling” me what to take away or what was going on than “showing” me, or letting me come to my own conclusions.
- The villain. I walked away from the book only knowing the villain’s name and that they’re stereotypically very, very bad. That’s it. Nothing else.
- The “romance.” Can we even call it a romance? The people outside of the romance talked more about the romance than the two people in it… There was no “romance.”
- Raseed. I think the book was too short to allow for true character development, but dang I did not like his character. He felt like a walking trope with a name.
- Lack of consequences. I kept waiting for this very powerful magic to have any true adverse effect on the characters casting it, you know, like it was alluded to the whole book, but there felt like there was very little consequence. Easy win for the good guys is not very entertaining.
- Predictability. For how short the story is, I didn’t expect it to have crazy twists and turns, but the whole time I was reading, I kept wishing there would be. Anything to subvert expectation and give more depth to these characters (main and secondary) than was there.
Overall, I had higher expectations than the book was able to deliver on. But, aside from one instance in the book that stated that because a character that got punched in the face was a woman, her body wasn’t crated by God to receive such pain, the book wasn’t (that) offensive. I finished it, it was okay.
Some things that I enjoyed:
- The setting. As many other reviews have stated, the joy of finding a fantasy book not written in a Medieval English setting was so refreshing, that I immediately picked the book up to try it.
- The diverse range of characters. I liked the premise of a group comprised of a middle aged ghul hunter, a young holy dervish, and a fierce she-lion on a quest for revenge. Add in two additional middle aged characters, complete with body aches and complaints, and I was pretty excited to see how their dynamics would play out.
Things I didn’t enjoy:
- The city. I kept waiting to fall in love with Dhamsawaat the way Adoulla loved it and it never happened. It seemed like the worst place in the world to live with no charm.
- The writing style. I believe the author was trying to tell a concise, meaningful story but he did more “telling” me what to take away or what was going on than “showing” me, or letting me come to my own conclusions.
- The villain. I walked away from the book only knowing the villain’s name and that they’re stereotypically very, very bad. That’s it. Nothing else.
- The “romance.” Can we even call it a romance? The people outside of the romance talked more about the romance than the two people in it… There was no “romance.”
- Raseed. I think the book was too short to allow for true character development, but dang I did not like his character. He felt like a walking trope with a name.
- Lack of consequences. I kept waiting for this very powerful magic to have any true adverse effect on the characters casting it, you know, like it was alluded to the whole book, but there felt like there was very little consequence. Easy win for the good guys is not very entertaining.
- Predictability. For how short the story is, I didn’t expect it to have crazy twists and turns, but the whole time I was reading, I kept wishing there would be. Anything to subvert expectation and give more depth to these characters (main and secondary) than was there.
Overall, I had higher expectations than the book was able to deliver on. But, aside from one instance in the book that stated that because a character that got punched in the face was a woman, her body wasn’t crated by God to receive such pain, the book wasn’t (that) offensive. I finished it, it was okay.