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A review by katsbooks
Shadow and Bone by Leigh Bardugo
adventurous
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
“And there's nothing wrong with being a lizard either. Unless you were born to be a hawk.”
“Like calls to like.”
I had a lot of fun with this book. I legitimately read the whole thing in one day. The adventure was a lot of fun and I enjoyed the world-building. I would give adult readers the caveat that this is very much a young adult novel. I've seen quite a lot of reviews that dragged the book because the characters acted like young adults. For example, I've seen a few reviews that really disliked Alina because she really embodied the Not-Like-Other-Girls trope. Which is completely fair, because she definitely does, but the story is also told in the first person so, as someone who works with young adults, Alina feeling out of place and like she doesn't belong 100 percent rings true to me. This book also features the Chosen One trope which I enjoy a lot. One of my only actual critiques is that I wish we would have been able to get to know Mal a little bitter. As a reader, I cared about him because Alina did but it would've been to care for him as a character in his own right. I'm definitely going to pick up the next two volumes.
“Like calls to like.”
I had a lot of fun with this book. I legitimately read the whole thing in one day. The adventure was a lot of fun and I enjoyed the world-building. I would give adult readers the caveat that this is very much a young adult novel. I've seen quite a lot of reviews that dragged the book because the characters acted like young adults. For example, I've seen a few reviews that really disliked Alina because she really embodied the Not-Like-Other-Girls trope. Which is completely fair, because she definitely does, but the story is also told in the first person so, as someone who works with young adults, Alina feeling out of place and like she doesn't belong 100 percent rings true to me. This book also features the Chosen One trope which I enjoy a lot. One of my only actual critiques is that I wish we would have been able to get to know Mal a little bitter. As a reader, I cared about him because Alina did but it would've been to care for him as a character in his own right. I'm definitely going to pick up the next two volumes.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Gaslighting, Genocide, Grief, Kidnapping, War, and Xenophobia