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A review by incipientdreamer
The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo
2.5
*sigh* Leigh Bardugo is yet again trying to feed us the Darkling agenda. In this case, we have Vanilla Darkling aka his main sin is being an edgy typical YA love interest. Which you might say is better than how problematic the Darkling was but I dissent.
I heard the phrase "Bardugo signs a 6 figure deal to write whatever the fuck she wants" and "standalone historical fantasy set during the Spanish Inquisition" and I came running. I should have tempered my expectations after the fiasco that was Hell Bent. Bardugo seems to want to write this style of romantasy that appeals to the current market and is good for her, go make bread. But I'm afraid this isn't for me.
Discussing my issues with the new style of Bardugo's work with a friend and I believe the issue is in how she tries to give these dues ex machine endings that end up being sickly perfect. These endings just do not work with the edgy and dark vibe she is going for in her stories. It ends up being unsatisfying and like too sweet cakes, mostly frosting and no flavor. Apart from my issues with the ending to this (which just FYI was just another rehashing of the S&B ending), I had issues with the simplicity of the plot and the characters. It only got good around the 80% mark and then fell back into the same maddeningly frustrating blandness. I have read a hundred other stories like this one before. There is nothing that I can do to separate it from the hundreds of mediocre YA fantasy books that come out every year. I kept waiting for that "oof" moment where I would be blown away by Bardugo's plotting (and I know she can be great at that, she wrote the Six of Crows books and Ninth House (no we are not mentioning Hell Bent in this house)) but it never happened and I just continued to be disappointed more and more with every chapter.
The characters are bland and I am already forgetting them. The romance was cliched and made me roll my eyes. The writing was okay but not her best, I had a hard time focusing and didn't have much motivation to continue it. It tries so hard to be a political fantasy as well and fails epically at it. We are info dumped about random important dudes and then they make sneaky moves that aren't very sneaky and are totally extremely obvious. The one chapter that made me sit up (chapter 43 I believe) was amazingly written and I could feel the breaths of Bardugo's genius in it (view spoiler) and I felt myself thinking that yes, this is what I want more of. Sadly, that was the only chapter that actually made an impact on me and is the cause of 2 stars, not 1.
So will I be reading Bardugo's future books? Honestly, I can't say. I might pick them up if the hype is infectious but will have a lot less patience in the future. In all fairness if this wasn't a Bardugo novel I probably would have DNF-ed this less than halfway through.
I heard the phrase "Bardugo signs a 6 figure deal to write whatever the fuck she wants" and "standalone historical fantasy set during the Spanish Inquisition" and I came running. I should have tempered my expectations after the fiasco that was Hell Bent. Bardugo seems to want to write this style of romantasy that appeals to the current market and is good for her, go make bread. But I'm afraid this isn't for me.
Discussing my issues with the new style of Bardugo's work with a friend and I believe the issue is in how she tries to give these dues ex machine endings that end up being sickly perfect. These endings just do not work with the edgy and dark vibe she is going for in her stories. It ends up being unsatisfying and like too sweet cakes, mostly frosting and no flavor. Apart from my issues with the ending to this (which just FYI was just another rehashing of the S&B ending), I had issues with the simplicity of the plot and the characters. It only got good around the 80% mark and then fell back into the same maddeningly frustrating blandness. I have read a hundred other stories like this one before. There is nothing that I can do to separate it from the hundreds of mediocre YA fantasy books that come out every year. I kept waiting for that "oof" moment where I would be blown away by Bardugo's plotting (and I know she can be great at that, she wrote the Six of Crows books and Ninth House (no we are not mentioning Hell Bent in this house)) but it never happened and I just continued to be disappointed more and more with every chapter.
The characters are bland and I am already forgetting them. The romance was cliched and made me roll my eyes. The writing was okay but not her best, I had a hard time focusing and didn't have much motivation to continue it. It tries so hard to be a political fantasy as well and fails epically at it. We are info dumped about random important dudes and then they make sneaky moves that aren't very sneaky and are totally extremely obvious. The one chapter that made me sit up (chapter 43 I believe) was amazingly written and I could feel the breaths of Bardugo's genius in it (view spoiler) and I felt myself thinking that yes, this is what I want more of. Sadly, that was the only chapter that actually made an impact on me and is the cause of 2 stars, not 1.
So will I be reading Bardugo's future books? Honestly, I can't say. I might pick them up if the hype is infectious but will have a lot less patience in the future. In all fairness if this wasn't a Bardugo novel I probably would have DNF-ed this less than halfway through.