A review by kkrez
Magic Bites by Ilona Andrews

2.0

I’m very mad at this book.
VERY MAD.

^ So mad that when typing that I spelled both “very” and “mad” incorrectly on the first pass.

Here’s the surprising part: I actually liked this book.
And now for the even more surprising part: I really hated this book.

Here’s how my general feeling on this book breaks down:
Characters: fantastic.
Dialogue: better than superb.
Plot: not bad.
Writing:



Shall I start with the bad and then get to the good? Don’t mind if I do..

I really annoying-white-girl CANNOT with the writing in this book. It felt like I was trying to compete in the 400 meter hurdles while running in quicksand.



So freaking painful.

My first grievance is that I spent MOST of this book really confused. I felt like I completely missed large sections of the book (which may be the case when you see my second grievance). I didn’t understand half of the magic rules and felt like I was dropped in the deep end and left to my own devices.

My second grievance with the writing is that there was at least a 3 paragraph description for everyone’s appearance. I legitimately fell asleep while reading these descriptions and it never ended. We'd meet a character and there'd be a full page of character description and then God forbid they have an outfit change because we won’t be able to forget it. We’ll get another 3 paragraphs on the precise shade of beige a dress is. Oops, spoiler alert!



Not only were the character descriptions out of control, in general, the “action scenes” had so much descriptive language that I was also falling into a deep reading coma during those. Those are supposed to be the most exciting, but the language didn’t adjust for what should have been a fast-paced, high energy scene.

This is why I’m so mad/sad.

The dialogue was amazing, anytime I hit a page of dialogue it was gone too soon. I would slog through the next 15 pages of descriptions and pray some dialogue would save me shortly.



I have lots of conflicting feelings about Kate. Kate is a piece of work, but, because I was just itching for something other than descriptions, I didn’t mind Kate’s pretty much constant bad moods. Post-book and after reflecting, I wondered why people even put up with Kate. She seems like someone who would get annoying really fast. Because I was so pissed off at the writing I didn’t mind her snarky quips because I was feeling quite snarky myself.

I did love how self aware Kate was. She was slightly vain and constantly thought she was too dumb to be doing what she was doing, which...



Now I know I just ripped this book apart for the writing, but I’m a plot geek at heart. And the plot of this book was really not bad. Another reason I’m so mad. It would have been made that much better if the writing had not pissed me off. But I do have to say I’m pretty unimpressed with the ending. Ok, actually...I’m thinking about it now, the ending was absolutely terrible. But all the other plot points were good enough.

I really want to think this series gets better because it has such potential. To be honest, I'm very nervous to continue reading this series. I just don’t have patience for these things anymore. But I know I’m sometimes in the minority for these things. If you’re willing to work for it, you will like this book.