A review by aannaascott
Lore by Alexandra Bracken

adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

an overall fun reading experience with a rich world and an exciting plot. i did find the pacing semi inconsistent, which was part of the reason i struggled to really get into the book at first. another thing is certain world building aspects weren't explained until later on, when i feel as though the story would have been more engaging if the stakes were established earlier on, before my interest in their mystery started to wane. i also think that the characters could've been better fleshed out because there are big points of interest for a LOT of these people, especially castor, but the villains in particular fell very flat for me. this person is a villain? what made them a villain? considering that lore mentions multiple times how the end of the archon would "free everyone", it seems kind of hypocritical to fail to recognize that in some of these characters, but oh, it's okay, because they are made cartoonishly evil/sexist/predatory so there's no room for them to have any depth or subtlety, and it disconnected me from the story. even castor and lore themselves often made me feel separate from the book, not only because they were walking archetypes, but because they were boring and inconsistent. certain plot points, characters, and ideas are picked up and dropped at will and it just makes everything feel messy. this book needed to be either split in two and fleshed out or severely pared down. so so so missed potential :/
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