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A review by mnboyer
Five Broken Blades by Mai Corland
adventurous
dark
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
1.0
<b>Book of the Month Club: May 2024</b>
I must have started reading a different book than all of the people raving about this one. At about 10% into the audiobook, I started wondering if the author thought I was stupid. There were moments where the narrator said something along the lines of, "I was deep in my cups... which means drunk" (paraphrasing) -- look, I know what "deep in my cups" means and if you think your reader doesn't understand your metaphors, then perhaps you shouldn't be using them. You don't write something like this and then explain it to the reader. I mean, the reader isn't stupid. Again and again little things like this would pop up and it became overwhelming rather quickly!
Multiple POVs can be great or can be a miss for me. These seemed to be a miss for me because even though these were different characters, the way in which they were thinking continued over and over again -- the same thought patterns. This other person I've encountered is hot. I want to sleep with them. Look. I like a romance as much as the next person. But there wasn't enough here to make me think these were just flat character archetypes and not fulfilled, rounded out living people.
Now, very rarely do I DNF a book. But I kept thinking to myself "I get it, stop explaining your own work!" and after several times of thinking this, I gave up on this one. My TBR pile is just too big to sift though this one.
I must have started reading a different book than all of the people raving about this one. At about 10% into the audiobook, I started wondering if the author thought I was stupid. There were moments where the narrator said something along the lines of, "I was deep in my cups... which means drunk" (paraphrasing) -- look, I know what "deep in my cups" means and if you think your reader doesn't understand your metaphors, then perhaps you shouldn't be using them. You don't write something like this and then explain it to the reader. I mean, the reader isn't stupid. Again and again little things like this would pop up and it became overwhelming rather quickly!
Multiple POVs can be great or can be a miss for me. These seemed to be a miss for me because even though these were different characters, the way in which they were thinking continued over and over again -- the same thought patterns. This other person I've encountered is hot. I want to sleep with them. Look. I like a romance as much as the next person. But there wasn't enough here to make me think these were just flat character archetypes and not fulfilled, rounded out living people.
Now, very rarely do I DNF a book. But I kept thinking to myself "I get it, stop explaining your own work!" and after several times of thinking this, I gave up on this one. My TBR pile is just too big to sift though this one.