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I desperately wanted to like this. The cover and the concept are exactly what I'm about, but it was just so so long and had no clear direction. I put a lot of effort into reading the first 100 pages but got lost in the middle and skimmed a lot until I got to the end.
There was just so much happening all the time while nothing really happened at the same time. On a micro scale, the reading was incredible. I liked how this book talked about feelings and about the way that things feel, but the more I scaled out and thought about what was happening in terms of any sort of plot the less I liked it. And normally I go in for books with winding plot or no plot at all. I wanted to like Ariah but I didn't really, and I only really liked Sorcha. I couldn't stand Dirva. I did really like all the bits about Dirva and Sorcha's family and their dynamics. The bit in the middle where all three of Ariah, Sorcha, and Shayat come together was very good and well done but it couldn't hold it together for me. A lot of kind of random bad stuff happens to Ariah and he's just magically pulled out of it and is fine again, only to do the same thing over and over. It didn't feel to me like he learned from anything he did.
I also desperately wanted to like the lore and world building, but a lot of it was never explained and I wasn't able to intuit exactly what certain aspects of the magic and the world were like or what they meant. I like a little bit of hand holding around my world building but this book didn't really have any explanations at all. I wanted to like it so badly. I gave it a good ole try and eventually just skimmed the rest of it. It wasn't for me but I did definitely like certain bits.
There was just so much happening all the time while nothing really happened at the same time. On a micro scale, the reading was incredible. I liked how this book talked about feelings and about the way that things feel, but the more I scaled out and thought about what was happening in terms of any sort of plot the less I liked it. And normally I go in for books with winding plot or no plot at all. I wanted to like Ariah but I didn't really, and I only really liked Sorcha. I couldn't stand Dirva. I did really like all the bits about Dirva and Sorcha's family and their dynamics. The bit in the middle where all three of Ariah, Sorcha, and Shayat come together was very good and well done but it couldn't hold it together for me. A lot of kind of random bad stuff happens to Ariah and he's just magically pulled out of it and is fine again, only to do the same thing over and over. It didn't feel to me like he learned from anything he did.
I also desperately wanted to like the lore and world building, but a lot of it was never explained and I wasn't able to intuit exactly what certain aspects of the magic and the world were like or what they meant. I like a little bit of hand holding around my world building but this book didn't really have any explanations at all. I wanted to like it so badly. I gave it a good ole try and eventually just skimmed the rest of it. It wasn't for me but I did definitely like certain bits.