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turtles1738's Reviews (93)
With a magic system that's a combination of Avatar the Last Airbender and Demon Slayer this book should have been right up my ally. However I'm sad to say this book just didn't work for me. I thought it started strong, but as soon as the invasion happened it took a nose dive. The battle it self dragged for what felt like hundreds of pages. Which would have been fine if the combat was interesting, but I found it extremely dull compared to my recent reads. Then after that we were left with the aftermath which again was another hundred pages of boring exposition. Telling us how we should feel about what just happened. Like M.L. Wang didn't trust her audience enough to understand the not so subtle themes of this very average story. Then the book wraps up by opening 5 other plot threads which I guess will never get closed, because the author said she's done with the series
I didn't find the mechanic of this floor that engaging. It also felt like the story was kind of just hopping from plot point to plot point. Which didn't leave any room for character relationships to breath. Like Katia goes through some pretty bad shit midway through the book. Then it kind of gets brushed off like nothing happened. Never really hindering her in any way. The saving grace was all the setup for the next floor. The ending hand me hype.
A mixed bag with the stories. With a majority of them being pretty mid. I will say it started strong and ended stronger. With Red Country being one of my favorites of Abercrombie. I was really hoping for a Dab Sweet short story.
Well I enjoyed the story for the most part. I couldn't get over how much it mirrored Red Rising, but was worse in every way. Nothing in this book is shown. Instead its all told to you through montage sequences. Resulting in you not caring about anyone but Mary Sue Vis. If you're into a book that's all plot with zero substance this is you.
(4.5 stars leaning more toward 4) It's definitely the funniest of The First Law books I've read. Every character has strongly written flaws and all. You'll be rooting for one character at one moment than some fucked up shit will be revealed and you'll switch sides. Only to realize every one of these characters is an asshole except Friendly. Friendly is forever the goodest OCD ridden boy. My major gripe with the book is just the general pacing. I feels like it moves too fast from one objective to the next. Maybe if lowered from 7 objectives to 4, it could have left more room for the story to breathe a little.
This is Abercrombie at his absolute best. Everything from the first two books comes together in such a satisfying, but also frustratingly irritating way. You'll be cheering for one character and then the next chapter hating their guts. I kept thinking the book was almost over and then I'd check and see I still had another 25% left. The ending just kept cooking until you reached the action packed finale.
