A review by luckykosmos
The Blood Trials by N.E. Davenport

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

3.5

For how highly it's rated, I had a hard time with this one. I loved the blending of science fiction and fantasy, I loved the plot beats, I think this had all the elements of a good story - but I think someone needed to take away Davenport's thesaurus. I have this joke with myself about the word 'truly', and how some authors will sub it in for 'really' and change nothing else about their cadence, and I had that same feeling for a lot of the dialogue. Characters would sound very casual one line, and quite stilted and formal the next. I loved how headstrong Kenna was, watching her think through problems, but I didn't enjoy her talking to people.

There were also some mild pacing issues - thrown into the murder mystery too quickly, a romance that felt rushed, her friendship with Enoch mentioned in passing once and then becoming a major plot point. I think these elements could have been spread out better, but my main issue was the dialogue.

(To be clear - I liked this book! Which is why the dialogue frustrated me so much, because I feel like I would have loved it! It has a lot to say about the toxicity of nationalism that I really am excited to see in book 2. )
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