Take a photo of a barcode or cover
eveofletters 's review for:
When the Moon Hatched
by Sarah A. Parker
adventurous
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I can’t lie, this book was a slog to get through. I read the first 150 pages and had to put it down for a good long while. The language felt unnecessarily flowery just for the sake of being “poetic” and the hefty glossary at the beginning is a bit of turn-off for me as a reader.
Because I’m incapable of DNFing, I did pick it back up and I’ll admit things got almost immediately more interesting (or maybe I was just in a more amenable mindset). I got used to the over-abundant adjectives and modifiers and the actual reading experience started to flow a bit better once I had more context for the magic system. I enjoyed the middle of the book the most, specifically the dynamics between Raeve and Kaan. Other readers have commented on Raeve being annoying or emotionally immature, but I chuckled often at her internal dialogue. She makes questionable decisions, sure, but she’s actually relatively self-aware about it. Kaan I imagined as feminist Khal Drogo but with his own dragon and a gigantic bleeding heart.
- SPOILERS FROM HERE -
Maybe it was because I was still struggling to grasp wtf was going on, but the character death at the outset of the of the book did not have much of an impact. We get really only one scene with said character, and instead a whole lot of Raeve just talking about how important they are to her.
Since their death becomes
Raeve’s main driving force throughout the book, I felt the lack of connection cheapened the whole quest for vengeance trope. When everything comes full circle at the end, I was still left feeling like this character death was a pretty shallow plot tactic devised to justify having a rage-filled assassin FMC. Raeve’s revenge-parade is also obviously a mechanism for introducing “The Other” which I HOPE will be important in later books, but maybe this could have been revealed a different way? Given the little hints sprinkled throughout, my money is on “The Other” actually being the spirit (or consciousness? soul?) of Slátra.
- END SPOILERS -
Overall takeaways—Did I enjoy the book? Ultimately, yes. Did I think it could have been about 300 pages shorter? Yeah. Will I keep reading the series? Also, probably yes.
Because I’m incapable of DNFing, I did pick it back up and I’ll admit things got almost immediately more interesting (or maybe I was just in a more amenable mindset). I got used to the over-abundant adjectives and modifiers and the actual reading experience started to flow a bit better once I had more context for the magic system. I enjoyed the middle of the book the most, specifically the dynamics between Raeve and Kaan. Other readers have commented on Raeve being annoying or emotionally immature, but I chuckled often at her internal dialogue. She makes questionable decisions, sure, but she’s actually relatively self-aware about it. Kaan I imagined as feminist Khal Drogo but with his own dragon and a gigantic bleeding heart.
- SPOILERS FROM HERE -
Maybe it was because I was still struggling to grasp wtf was going on, but the character death at the outset of the of the book did not have much of an impact. We get really only one scene with said character, and instead a whole lot of Raeve just talking about how important they are to her.
Since their death becomes
Raeve’s main driving force throughout the book, I felt the lack of connection cheapened the whole quest for vengeance trope. When everything comes full circle at the end, I was still left feeling like this character death was a pretty shallow plot tactic devised to justify having a rage-filled assassin FMC. Raeve’s revenge-parade is also obviously a mechanism for introducing “The Other” which I HOPE will be important in later books, but maybe this could have been revealed a different way? Given the little hints sprinkled throughout, my money is on “The Other” actually being the spirit (or consciousness? soul?) of Slátra.
- END SPOILERS -
Overall takeaways—Did I enjoy the book? Ultimately, yes. Did I think it could have been about 300 pages shorter? Yeah. Will I keep reading the series? Also, probably yes.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Sexual content, Torture, Violence, Blood, Murder, Fire/Fire injury, Injury/Injury detail
Moderate: Death, Physical abuse, Grief