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A review by carlyjoann
The Crown of Gilded Bones by Jennifer L. Armentrout
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
This series has been a big let down so far and this book didn’t help my opinion.
I’ll start with my positive thoughts. I like the main couple together still. I like some of the side characters. Some of the lore is intriguing.
Now for my not so positive thoughts. The lore is confusing and it feels like it changes a lot since the FMC doesn’t know much of it and we learn as she does. The plot is very slow moving. There are so many “reveals” that nothing is surprising and most of them are then “revealed” to be something else entirely pages later. It feels like you can’t trust anything said or done because it could change or be a lie. The characters have the same conversations so many times in this book and they are STILL having the same conversations from Book 1 and 2. Being inside of the FMC head is mind numbing at this point in the series. I want to like her but being in her head is frustrating as a reader.
There is potential for a good story if only the writing was better. It is just so hard to read and enjoy it when the book feels repetitive and slow. All of these books in the series so far could have been hundreds of pages shorter or just combined.
For a large part of the driving force of the second book and this one being finding Ian and Malik it felt extremely disappointing what we actually got.
All of the plot twists and changes to what Poppy is and who her parents were was confusing and unnecessarily repetitive.
The ending was so cheap and parts of it felt obvious as the story progressed that I wasn’t very surprised by the twists or by the cliffhanger.
I’ll start with my positive thoughts. I like the main couple together still. I like some of the side characters. Some of the lore is intriguing.
Now for my not so positive thoughts. The lore is confusing and it feels like it changes a lot since the FMC doesn’t know much of it and we learn as she does. The plot is very slow moving. There are so many “reveals” that nothing is surprising and most of them are then “revealed” to be something else entirely pages later. It feels like you can’t trust anything said or done because it could change or be a lie. The characters have the same conversations so many times in this book and they are STILL having the same conversations from Book 1 and 2. Being inside of the FMC head is mind numbing at this point in the series. I want to like her but being in her head is frustrating as a reader.
There is potential for a good story if only the writing was better. It is just so hard to read and enjoy it when the book feels repetitive and slow. All of these books in the series so far could have been hundreds of pages shorter or just combined.
All of the plot twists and changes to what Poppy is and who her parents were was confusing and unnecessarily repetitive.
The ending was so cheap and parts of it felt obvious as the story progressed that I wasn’t very surprised by the twists or by the cliffhanger.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Sexual content, Blood, and Murder
Moderate: Death of parent
Minor: Child death