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A review by capturedinwords
Caraval by Stephanie Garber
2.0
My video review: https://youtu.be/ptlZAw1_NaY
I truly wanted to be swept away by Caraval. I really did.
My overall opinion is that this book had a fantastic idea yet failed to match it with its writing. While I still enjoyed reading it, I also came across many annoyances and an abundance of bad YA tropes.
The metaphors, color description, and comparisons felt like they were trying way too hard to be abstract and poetic, when actually they just don't make any sense. It wasn't like the cute imaginative way Anne of Green Gables would describe things. It's like a bunch of colors and descriptive words were tossed into a bowl and picked out at random. I understand some may think it sounds beautiful and whimsical, and that's fine, but for me it just felt amateur and forced.
“He tasted like midnight and wind, and shades of rich brown and light blue.”
"It came in shades of Hemlock Green- the color of poison and terror." (Please Google Hemlock Green. It does not remind me of poison or terror in anyway, in fact it looks more like a calming color.)
“It smelled like the middle of the night”
“Something acidic and moldy and burnt bubbled up through Scarlett’s throat - the taste of death.”
Another thing, it is incredibly melodramatic. Like middle-school/high-school dramatic. I've never seen the word "No!" be yelled by the main character so many times in a book. This over-dramatic writing comes with the romance as well, with Scarlett getting all excited over the smallest of physical contact (hell, sometimes she would freak out even when there was no physical contact). The romance feels like it leads this book and pushes the magic and plot away. The worst of it is that the romance can pretty much be summed up by the time when Scarlett was under magical influence and blurted out:
“I think he’s the most attractive person I’ve ever seen.” Is that really all you got to say about him? That's the reason you love him?
We are constantly being reminded that Scarlett loves her sister by phrases like: “I just want to find my sister and get home in time for my wedding” or “my greatest desire is to find my sister”. These are repeated SO many times. Yet the problem is that we never even got to see much of a bond between these two sisters. It's important for the reader to feel that bond since the MAIN driving force of the protagonist is to find her sister (even though she is told this is just a game, and she could have simply enjoyed Caraval instead.). Scarlett constantly makes several decisions that contradict this driving motivation to find her sister. Not that I blame her, but since these lines about saving her sister are repeated so often, it seems odd that she makes such contradicting actions.
Scarlett in my opinion was very unlikable. Her character is practically based around worry. Oh and being naive and dramatic. That's basically what she has going for her, and at times it got really annoying. I would have liked to see more character progression. It also seemed rather ridiculous that basically the whole game is set up for her, and her alone, to win. It seems like Caraval is completely personalized towards Scarlett, so really there's no point in all these other strangers playing the game.
I also felt the world building to be rather underwhelming, with much left to be imagined. Actually near the beginning of the book I was very hopeful for some good world building, with mention of the Conquered Isles and I believe even an empire of some sort. But none of that goes anywhere. Caraval itself sounds like a beautiful and weird place. Sort of Alice in Wonderland mixed with Venice. While I liked the rose carousel, Castillo, and general magical essence of the place, I just still had a hard time forming an image of anything due to how the author skips over a lot of things without giving description. Unless they are colors.
Oh and the villains. Scarlett's dad is abusive, and at the beginning that made me feel sympathy. But later on he is brought into the story as pretty much one of the main villains, with no motive to him at all. I mean he killed people at Caraval and was perceived to be incredibly ruthless for no reason whatsoever. His wife left him, yes, but other then that everything seems to be going just peachy for him in his life.
And the ending. I liked the unpredictable tension near the end, but the final conclusion just felt flat. It still makes no sense to me whatsoever. Oh right, un-explainable magic; that solves everything.
I can see the appeal, and like I said, I reaaaally wanted to enjoy it. Sadly it just didn't work for me.
I truly wanted to be swept away by Caraval. I really did.
My overall opinion is that this book had a fantastic idea yet failed to match it with its writing. While I still enjoyed reading it, I also came across many annoyances and an abundance of bad YA tropes.
The metaphors, color description, and comparisons felt like they were trying way too hard to be abstract and poetic, when actually they just don't make any sense. It wasn't like the cute imaginative way Anne of Green Gables would describe things. It's like a bunch of colors and descriptive words were tossed into a bowl and picked out at random. I understand some may think it sounds beautiful and whimsical, and that's fine, but for me it just felt amateur and forced.
“He tasted like midnight and wind, and shades of rich brown and light blue.”
"It came in shades of Hemlock Green- the color of poison and terror." (Please Google Hemlock Green. It does not remind me of poison or terror in anyway, in fact it looks more like a calming color.)
“It smelled like the middle of the night”
“Something acidic and moldy and burnt bubbled up through Scarlett’s throat - the taste of death.”
Another thing, it is incredibly melodramatic. Like middle-school/high-school dramatic. I've never seen the word "No!" be yelled by the main character so many times in a book. This over-dramatic writing comes with the romance as well, with Scarlett getting all excited over the smallest of physical contact (hell, sometimes she would freak out even when there was no physical contact). The romance feels like it leads this book and pushes the magic and plot away. The worst of it is that the romance can pretty much be summed up by the time when Scarlett was under magical influence and blurted out:
“I think he’s the most attractive person I’ve ever seen.” Is that really all you got to say about him? That's the reason you love him?
We are constantly being reminded that Scarlett loves her sister by phrases like: “I just want to find my sister and get home in time for my wedding” or “my greatest desire is to find my sister”. These are repeated SO many times. Yet the problem is that we never even got to see much of a bond between these two sisters. It's important for the reader to feel that bond since the MAIN driving force of the protagonist is to find her sister (even though she is told this is just a game, and she could have simply enjoyed Caraval instead.). Scarlett constantly makes several decisions that contradict this driving motivation to find her sister. Not that I blame her, but since these lines about saving her sister are repeated so often, it seems odd that she makes such contradicting actions.
Scarlett in my opinion was very unlikable. Her character is practically based around worry. Oh and being naive and dramatic. That's basically what she has going for her, and at times it got really annoying. I would have liked to see more character progression. It also seemed rather ridiculous that basically the whole game is set up for her, and her alone, to win. It seems like Caraval is completely personalized towards Scarlett, so really there's no point in all these other strangers playing the game.
I also felt the world building to be rather underwhelming, with much left to be imagined. Actually near the beginning of the book I was very hopeful for some good world building, with mention of the Conquered Isles and I believe even an empire of some sort. But none of that goes anywhere. Caraval itself sounds like a beautiful and weird place. Sort of Alice in Wonderland mixed with Venice. While I liked the rose carousel, Castillo, and general magical essence of the place, I just still had a hard time forming an image of anything due to how the author skips over a lot of things without giving description. Unless they are colors.
Oh and the villains. Scarlett's dad is abusive, and at the beginning that made me feel sympathy. But later on he is brought into the story as pretty much one of the main villains, with no motive to him at all. I mean he killed people at Caraval and was perceived to be incredibly ruthless for no reason whatsoever. His wife left him, yes, but other then that everything seems to be going just peachy for him in his life.
And the ending. I liked the unpredictable tension near the end, but the final conclusion just felt flat. It still makes no sense to me whatsoever. Oh right, un-explainable magic; that solves everything.
I can see the appeal, and like I said, I reaaaally wanted to enjoy it. Sadly it just didn't work for me.