A review by restlessreason17
The Kingdom of Sweets by Erika Johansen

dark mysterious reflective
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.25

This was a very...strange book? I'm not so sure how to rate it. I feel a little lied to, also. This wasn't really fantasy? Honestly read a bit more like a paranormal horror. 

The Good
  • The writing style! I enjoyed it. Natasha likes to think all lot and I liked to hear her think. 
  • Expanded a lot on the original story. If I remember correctly, there isn't much of a plot after the defeat of the rat king in the ballet. I loved that this world was so much more fleshed out, and even Dosselmeyer got a backstory (though I still had some questions)
  • Kept me guessing. Despite how strange this book felt sometimes, I always wanted to know what happened next. 
  • Characters! I enjoyed the characters, which I know is kinda controversial. I think it was the last 3rd that made my opinion solidify, but I appreciated how flawed they were and that the text called them out for it. Like, Natasha gives very strong "not like other girls", but imo the book doesn't praise that. 
  • Rasputin showed up and for some reason that was just very funny to me

The Bad
  • Conrad. For all the talk about Conrad, I don't think we had many interactions with him. Like, there was a lot of telling about what the marriage was, but he never got to talk more than one or two sentences? In general, though, there was a lot of summarization. 
  • Incest??? There was literally just an incest line thrown out there and never heard expanded on and I just sat there like 🧍‍♀️ 
  • Confused. I dunno, basically I just got confused sometimes. As an example, we weren't told that this story takes place in Russia until the epilogue (sure, we had names to go off of, and very random history tidbits, but I thought we were in Germany for the longest time because that's where the OG story took place). Another example: Dosselmeyer was a sorcerer, and a king was mentioned, so I thought for a little that we were in a fantasy kingdom, but we weren't? 
  • Fritz and the Pit. Ok so, Natasha has divination, so she just knows things sometimes (I'm ASSUMING that's how she knows Orlov was the Fairy's son), but then what was the Pit if Fritz could see it?? And why did the Fairy mess with him at all?? Was he being messed with at all?
  • Sl*tshaming?? There was a lot of mentions of people sleeping around n stuff, and the MC kinda hated her sister for it, while she was regularly meeting Conrad. It was strange. 
  • The Ending? Yeah this also confused me. Also,
    is it just me, or did it never really feel like Natasha forgave Clara for the past?

Also there was this habit the author got into where usually each page would only have like 2-4 paragraphs, and I'd have to go back and analyze them to see whether or not it passes, but when you write, you should use Tip Top. Every time there's a new Time, person, Topic, or place, you're supposed to make a new paragraph. Sometimes it felt like we started with one idea and ended with another.
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