A review by jarnbooks
Shiloh by Helena Sorensen

adventurous dark tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

The book started off really strong. It slowly introduces you to the lore of the world and the lore of its characters. Not much plot happens though for the first half but I’m okay with that. Those scenes didn’t need a lot of plot. Then the second half has that same “no plot” idea but the thing is, this part needs plot. The second half kicks off with a weird (and personally out of character) character decision and that’s all the plot we get. The characters do the thing and that’s it. Obviously I’m omitting stuff because spoilers but it ended so abruptly. I was expecting a big battle between our characters and the antagonist (that doesn’t become a problem until 75% through) but no. It just ends with a variation of “These characters are fine.” I know there’s 2 more books that I’m definitely going to read but I was hoping for more in this one. 

It’s good for a first book in a series because of all of the lore introduced but that’s what most of the book is. Personally, I don’t think one of the characters should have shown up so early on in the book (or in this book at all) as any events relevant to her character are very few and have little relevance to the main trio of characters. 

About halfway though, I felt like I was reading the pilot of a tv show. After finishing, I feel like I watched a movie that was the condensed version of a tv show. I felt like a good 200 pages of character development were cut in favor of a shorter book and faster pacing. But those pages would’ve made so much of a difference on certain decisions a certain character makes (that I thought was super random for what was going on with the character at the time). 

I really wanted to give this book more stars but with how abrupt and unsatisfying the ending was, I had to downgrade it. The lore and writing and characters are all super interesting and well written but the ending and certain writing decisions were questionable. I’m definitely going to read the sequels but I hope those have more character building elements and growth, as well as more stakes for the characters. 
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