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pantailamon 's review for:
A Crown for Cold Silver
by Alex Marshall
I have mixed feelings about this book. On the one hand, it took me FOREVER to slog through, and towards the end, I found myself skimming parts of chapters before I caught myself and went back to read things thoroughly. At some points, the plot moved so slowly I was just impatient to keep flipping pages so the book would be over more quickly. It's a hefty book, too, over 600 pages.
On the other hand, I loved the world building Marshall's done here -- it's intricate, detailed (at times too detailed, perhaps), and interesting. I've read some comments complaining about how the cultures in this book map too neatly onto existing cultures in our world, but I didn't mind it. Seeing Korean-like names in a fantasy novel is a complete novelty to me, and I loved it, honestly. Marshall's world is rich, complex, and always feels realistic. Even if some of the many paragraphs of exposition and descriptions could have been cut without losing very much, I still enjoyed the feeling of stepping into a world that felt diverse, interesting, and real.
Speaking of diversity, making a majority of the characters non-heterosexual and everyone act completely blasé about it? Pretty awesome. I read another comment complaining about how it's just not realistic to have this many bisexual/gay/etc. characters and how it's just as bad as making everyone heterosexual, but really? There are enough books out there with zero LGBT representation. One book with an abundance of LGBT characters isn't something to complain about. Is it realistic? Maybe in this society it is! It's a freaking fantasy novel. Get outta here with your complaints about it being "too diverse."
Even with the diversity, the imaginative world building, and the smooth prose, I still didn't really love this book, though I wanted to. I found all the characters interesting and three-dimensional, but for some reason, I wasn't terribly invested in any of them. The plot was detailed and intriguing, but by the time the book was over, I had little urge to immediately find the next one. Maybe it was because it was, on the whole, too dense. Maybe it just didn't have a spark that really gripped me and moved me. Whatever the case, when I finally finished, I was glad I had read it but also relieved it was over.
On the other hand, I loved the world building Marshall's done here -- it's intricate, detailed (at times too detailed, perhaps), and interesting. I've read some comments complaining about how the cultures in this book map too neatly onto existing cultures in our world, but I didn't mind it. Seeing Korean-like names in a fantasy novel is a complete novelty to me, and I loved it, honestly. Marshall's world is rich, complex, and always feels realistic. Even if some of the many paragraphs of exposition and descriptions could have been cut without losing very much, I still enjoyed the feeling of stepping into a world that felt diverse, interesting, and real.
Speaking of diversity, making a majority of the characters non-heterosexual and everyone act completely blasé about it? Pretty awesome. I read another comment complaining about how it's just not realistic to have this many bisexual/gay/etc. characters and how it's just as bad as making everyone heterosexual, but really? There are enough books out there with zero LGBT representation. One book with an abundance of LGBT characters isn't something to complain about. Is it realistic? Maybe in this society it is! It's a freaking fantasy novel. Get outta here with your complaints about it being "too diverse."
Even with the diversity, the imaginative world building, and the smooth prose, I still didn't really love this book, though I wanted to. I found all the characters interesting and three-dimensional, but for some reason, I wasn't terribly invested in any of them. The plot was detailed and intriguing, but by the time the book was over, I had little urge to immediately find the next one. Maybe it was because it was, on the whole, too dense. Maybe it just didn't have a spark that really gripped me and moved me. Whatever the case, when I finally finished, I was glad I had read it but also relieved it was over.