Take a photo of a barcode or cover
readwithanna 's review for:
From Blood and Ash
by Jennifer L. Armentrout
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
No
My overall feelings are positive. It was easy to get swept up in the world and the characters.
The first 200 pages ish were a bit slow. The e-book I read (on my phone, because I don't have an e-reader) was just over 1000 pages, so the beginning was a bit too slow. The book is very wordy and it didn't need to be. Maybe 100 pages could have been trimmed to condense the story a little.
There's also a lot of repetition, and it's the wrong kind of repetition for me. For example, there are a lot of emphasis on the craven and how that all works. We get it by the second time but over and over again we're given these details that we know by now.
I also wasn't sure if this was supposed to be a little bit satire. There's very little depth to the world building. It doesn't take me out of the story, but it did sometimes jar me in how simplistic it all is. From the names to the general layout of the world. I don't know if I like it because it allowed me to care more about the characters and their drama, or if I disliked it because I like me some world building in my fantasy.
Then the twist. Or twists, I should say.
They were very predictable.
Not enough for me to be taken out of the world, but enough for me to feel like it/they should have been revealed earlier.
I'm going to go into spoilers below, so if you stop reading here I would say that I recommend this if you want a light world-building high fantasy with heavy romance. It was a fun time all around.
That Hawke was "bad" was very predictable. I don't begrudge Poppy for not seeing that, though, because I probably wouldn't have either. But it was grating how long it took her to realise he was the dark one. Like, it was very obvious to me from the beginning and even after he'd betrayed her she just took so long to connect the dots. That took me out of the story a bit.
The first 200 pages ish were a bit slow. The e-book I read (on my phone, because I don't have an e-reader) was just over 1000 pages, so the beginning was a bit too slow. The book is very wordy and it didn't need to be. Maybe 100 pages could have been trimmed to condense the story a little.
There's also a lot of repetition, and it's the wrong kind of repetition for me. For example, there are a lot of emphasis on the craven and how that all works. We get it by the second time but over and over again we're given these details that we know by now.
I also wasn't sure if this was supposed to be a little bit satire. There's very little depth to the world building. It doesn't take me out of the story, but it did sometimes jar me in how simplistic it all is. From the names to the general layout of the world. I don't know if I like it because it allowed me to care more about the characters and their drama, or if I disliked it because I like me some world building in my fantasy.
Then the twist. Or twists, I should say.
They were very predictable.
Not enough for me to be taken out of the world, but enough for me to feel like it/they should have been revealed earlier.
I'm going to go into spoilers below, so if you stop reading here I would say that I recommend this if you want a light world-building high fantasy with heavy romance. It was a fun time all around.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Blood
Moderate: Physical abuse
Minor: Death of parent