jesikasbookshelf 's review for:

The Song Rising by Samantha Shannon

3.5

adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: Yes

Loveable characters: Yes

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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I can't wait to advertise the Mime
Order to the n-northerners. "Join
Paige Mahoney for unexpected
rambles through snow and shit," Maria bit out through chattering teeth.

Summed up perfectly by Maria - this book is Paige making roughly 31 ridiculous decisions in a row. Some of them work out to be genius and some of them are.....really incredibly idiotic. It's a coin toss every time she makes a call. Her poor inner circle must have whiplash constantly. 

We see more of Scion England (including the former Scotland) in this book - the slow unfurling of the whole world that has been built in these books is brilliantly done. This is the first book where I've wished we had perspectives other than Paige's though - hearing from voiyants of the Manchester and Edinburgh communities would have really added to this book.

There are parts of this book that were incredibly well done and then parts that just felt overly unrealistic to me even when based in this world. Largely because I never doubted that Paige would somehow survive - and again, other perspectives here may have suggested she wasn't indispensable. She's traumatised, yes, but she also makes decisions as though she isn't at the head of an entire community that could also help so that everyone is protected better and it began to drive me slightly insane.