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stormlightreader's Reviews (936)
This is my second Tim Lebbon book and I have The same complaint as I did with the other book (Eden): the plot is great but isn't a detailed as I'd like for a post-apocalyptic story. The entire story is wrapped up in under 400 pages.
The plot (like Eden) is exactly the sort of plot that grabs me but I didn't really care about any of the characters. Maybe just Glenn and he's not even a main character. The stakes didn't feel high at all and the threat didn't hit that hard.
The plot (like Eden) is exactly the sort of plot that grabs me but I didn't really care about any of the characters. Maybe just Glenn and he's not even a main character. The stakes didn't feel high at all and the threat didn't hit that hard.
Ninth House got me liking the Dark Academia Genre, The Secret History confirmed that I like the genre and If We Were Villains has topped both of them.
“you can justify anything if you do it poetically enough.”
The Secret History was a solid read but I liked this more. The pacing was much better and the plot was more intriguing. I did find myself skimming over some of the Shakespeare dialogue, but it didn’t overwhelm the book.
I enjoyed reading from Oliver's POV but I would’ve liked to get more backstory on Richard (and why he was the way he was) and Filippa in particular but more backstory on all of the characters would've been great.
Although the book was the perfect length, I would've continued reading this book if it were twice as long. Once I got into the flow, I couldn’t wait to pick it back up.
The best part of this review is that I DNFed If We Were Villains years ago.
“you can justify anything if you do it poetically enough.”
The Secret History was a solid read but I liked this more. The pacing was much better and the plot was more intriguing. I did find myself skimming over some of the Shakespeare dialogue, but it didn’t overwhelm the book.
I enjoyed reading from Oliver's POV but I would’ve liked to get more backstory on Richard (and why he was the way he was) and Filippa in particular but more backstory on all of the characters would've been great.
Although the book was the perfect length, I would've continued reading this book if it were twice as long. Once I got into the flow, I couldn’t wait to pick it back up.
The best part of this review is that I DNFed If We Were Villains years ago.
It's finally here! This book was on my 23 in 23 TBR, so as soon as I got approved for it on NetGally, I dropped everything else I was currently reading and picked this up.
The Silent Wife was going to be a very hard Will Trent book to top and I knew that going into this new book. And while this book didn't quite top TSW, it definitely had some standout moments and gave me an epic Sara Linton scene. Slaughter does such a great job of developing the stories and backstories of our main characters and that's no different here. While I feel Will definitely takes a backseat in this one, we get some more little details about his past but most of the development seems to be in Faith's life and Sara's backstory that is very much at the forefront.
The book got off to a great start with Sara on the phone with her sister while supervising her junior colleague and then being presented with an intense emergency case. From there we are introduced to some of the worst characters and even though some of them were downright reprehensible they made for good reading. My absolute favourite moment came at the end and oh my god, that might be my favourite ever Sara Linton moment. I've followed her story for so many books, across Grant County and this series, and this moment left me gobsmacked! I loved it! Can't wait for the next Will Trent book.
Thanks to NetGalley for the free copy in exchange for an honest review.
The Silent Wife was going to be a very hard Will Trent book to top and I knew that going into this new book. And while this book didn't quite top TSW, it definitely had some standout moments and gave me an epic Sara Linton scene. Slaughter does such a great job of developing the stories and backstories of our main characters and that's no different here. While I feel Will definitely takes a backseat in this one, we get some more little details about his past but most of the development seems to be in Faith's life and Sara's backstory that is very much at the forefront.
The book got off to a great start with Sara on the phone with her sister while supervising her junior colleague and then being presented with an intense emergency case. From there we are introduced to some of the worst characters and even though some of them were downright reprehensible they made for good reading. My absolute favourite moment came at the end and oh my god, that might be my favourite ever Sara Linton moment. I've followed her story for so many books, across Grant County and this series, and this moment left me gobsmacked! I loved it! Can't wait for the next Will Trent book.
Thanks to NetGalley for the free copy in exchange for an honest review.
The plot was very slow but it was so intriguing. The characters are absolutely not people I would want to associate with but they certainly were entertaining. This book definitely confirmed that the Dark Academia genre is a genre I enjoy (Ninth House is the book that sold me on the genre) and now I'm intent on finding more Dark Academia books.
The final instalment wasn't as much fun as book 3 but still had it's high points. I loved the appearance of characters from the Liveship Traders trilogy (my favourite RotE series so far), Leftrin and Alise, Hest getting what was coming to him!
Ultimately, the Rain Wild books are my least favourite in the series and I expected that, but as usual, Hobb's character work and writing is excellent. As with the previous Rain Wilds books in there is a lot of romance among teenagers and I couldn't even pretend to care!
Still worth the read though.
Ultimately, the Rain Wild books are my least favourite in the series and I expected that, but as usual, Hobb's character work and writing is excellent. As with the previous Rain Wilds books in there is a lot of romance among teenagers and I couldn't even pretend to care!
Still worth the read though.
Much better than book 2!
As someone who despised whiny Malta in the Liveship Traders trilogy, I now love Malta. When I reread this series, I wonder if I'll see her differently? I still love Leftrin and Alise and oh my god, Seldon 😔 We get more dragon development and I love how much overlap there is with Liveships!
Reading the Rain Wild Chronicles is cementing the Liveship Traders as my favourite Realm of the Elderlings series. The Rain Wild books are much better read one after another, in my opinion and I would highly recommend reading Liveships before this (I mean, you should read Liveships anyway 😁).
As someone who despised whiny Malta in the Liveship Traders trilogy, I now love Malta. When I reread this series, I wonder if I'll see her differently? I still love Leftrin and Alise and oh my god, Seldon 😔 We get more dragon development and I love how much overlap there is with Liveships!
Reading the Rain Wild Chronicles is cementing the Liveship Traders as my favourite Realm of the Elderlings series. The Rain Wild books are much better read one after another, in my opinion and I would highly recommend reading Liveships before this (I mean, you should read Liveships anyway 😁).
As usual, Hobb's character work and writing is excellent. My main complaint with book two is that there is no real plot and as great as the character work is there is a lot of time spent with characters that I'm not overly fussed about (sorry Thymara and co) and a lot of romance among kids - not interesting to me at all!
Still enjoying the development of the dragons and learning about elderling magic. Alise and Leftrin are still the most interesting to me and Hest is just 😑
Still enjoying the development of the dragons and learning about elderling magic. Alise and Leftrin are still the most interesting to me and Hest is just 😑
The research is really good and Pelisek makes the victims the focus of the book, but not a great deal of information on the crimes in my opinion. Where the book fell down was whenever Pelisek would make a point of stating the importance of her own role in parts of the story. A minor complaint and it's very common in true crime books, especially books written by journalists.
I don't have a great deal to say about this one, other than it was a hard and disturbing read, and from the perspective of someone with no prior knowledge of the case, it felt well-researched. If you have any interest in the Columbine massacre and the people involved, I would highly recommend this book.
My only real complaint with this book was Dave Cullen's writing style, which is a little odd. Some phrases/sentences are written as if the author is writing from the point of view of the shooters e.g. when Cullen was writing about the shooters shooting off pipe bombs he added "and man, were those things badass", it was quite jarring and happened quite a few times but not enough to change my overall opinion of the book.
My only real complaint with this book was Dave Cullen's writing style, which is a little odd. Some phrases/sentences are written as if the author is writing from the point of view of the shooters e.g. when Cullen was writing about the shooters shooting off pipe bombs he added "and man, were those things badass", it was quite jarring and happened quite a few times but not enough to change my overall opinion of the book.
I went into this book with measured expectations and despite being a slow burn (particularly for the first two thirds of the book), it was a good read. The characters were well-written, the atmosphere was there throughout and even though the plot had no real surprises, it was worth the read.
I buddy read this with @bookish.tilly and we considered listening to the audiobook but we listened to a sample of the audiobook and decided that the English narrator just felt like it would take away from the story and I'm glad we decided to do that.
This wasn't the standout novel I would've expected based on the hype that surrounded this book's release, but I am keen to try another book by the author and I have The Daughter of Doctor Moreau on my TBR.
I buddy read this with @bookish.tilly and we considered listening to the audiobook but we listened to a sample of the audiobook and decided that the English narrator just felt like it would take away from the story and I'm glad we decided to do that.
This wasn't the standout novel I would've expected based on the hype that surrounded this book's release, but I am keen to try another book by the author and I have The Daughter of Doctor Moreau on my TBR.