A review by gladiolus17
A Day of Fallen Night by Samantha Shannon

adventurous emotional mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

Ahhhhh!!!! I cannot possibly put together all my thoughts in coherent sentences, so I will just ramble in bullet points.

Loved loved loved this book. Just as much as I did Priory.

  • Soooo steeped in POV. The metaphors and descriptions are all filtered through the character’s lens. Even if you didn’t have a character name in the text, you would still know whose POV it would be.
  • Amazing, poetic language. I learned so many cool words from this book.
  • The way bodies were described were so gentle and beautiful. Aging is not a terrible thing, and is described so tenderly.
  • The poetry!!!! I loved that nod to Japanese waka and tanka poems.
  • The food!!! So specific and delicious.
  • The family dynamics!!!! Complex and nuanced.
  • Bardholt!!! I loved him as a father, just as much as Glorian does. 

The pacing picks up after the midpoint. The first half is all world building and reaction, while the latter half is the characters taking what they learned and fighting the bad guys.

As much as I loved this book to death, I do think the side characters were its weakness. Many of the side characters were very developed, not to discount that, but some named characters didn’t have a huge impact on the plot, so when they died, it felt hard to sympathize with them.

That being said, this book is a treasure and is still wonderful despite the weaknesses.
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