Scan barcode
A review by toggle_fow
The Riddle by Alison Croggon
3.0
I FINALLY GOT THROUGH THIS BOOK. *sounds of muffled screaming in the background*
I literally... Like, I enjoy this series as a whole, but this has to be the most difficult book of the four (five) to slog through. I feel like John Henry trying to hammer my way through a mountainside.
It's not even unpleasant as in bad -- it's unpleasant in a "we're stuck in Maerad's head and that is a very unpleasant place to be right now" Catching Fire type way.
She's going through this thing where she's resentful and angry at everyone, her enemies, the Bards, Cadvan, etc., and sinks into this horrible miasma of self-pity and anger and angst that she has to overcome to go on to become the Chosen One that everyone needs her to be. And it's good! Character growth is good! But it's literally the whole book and it's just so unpleasant. And then, after all this unnecessary hostility towards Cadvan, when she's weirdly and inexplicably swooning for the Winter King in some gross and magical way? Frankly... why?
It's a constant process of opening the book, reading a paragraph, screaming UGH. MAERAD. in sheer frustration, and shutting the book again. I'm exhausted. The only thing that could have made this emotionally worthwhile for me would have been if the Cadvan reunion scene had been twenty times as long as it actually was.
I literally... Like, I enjoy this series as a whole, but this has to be the most difficult book of the four (five) to slog through. I feel like John Henry trying to hammer my way through a mountainside.
It's not even unpleasant as in bad -- it's unpleasant in a "we're stuck in Maerad's head and that is a very unpleasant place to be right now" Catching Fire type way.
She's going through this thing where she's resentful and angry at everyone, her enemies, the Bards, Cadvan, etc., and sinks into this horrible miasma of self-pity and anger and angst that she has to overcome to go on to become the Chosen One that everyone needs her to be. And it's good! Character growth is good! But it's literally the whole book and it's just so unpleasant. And then, after all this unnecessary hostility towards Cadvan, when she's weirdly and inexplicably swooning for the Winter King in some gross and magical way? Frankly... why?
It's a constant process of opening the book, reading a paragraph, screaming UGH. MAERAD. in sheer frustration, and shutting the book again. I'm exhausted. The only thing that could have made this emotionally worthwhile for me would have been if the Cadvan reunion scene had been twenty times as long as it actually was.