So I’ve never read or seen The Count of Monte Cristo so I don’t know how close to the story this was. BUT what I can tell you is that since that book/movie is so popular I’m going to say that it was probably actually good and not mediocre like this book was.

The beginning of the story was really intriguing and I thought it was really well written. Once I got to page 200 ish I just started to get bored. So I tried to finish it as quickly as possible hoping for a little resolution and to be completely honest I didn’t get much. I know this is a duology and the whole point is to get you to read book 2 but to not tie up a single string and to leave me utterly confused on what is going on just doesn’t make me want to pick the next book up. And things started to feel as if they were thrown into the story as tie ins without actually thought out behind them. Ex: Roach and Ash fever

It was slow, mediocre, and confusing. Another not great read from an Owlcrate

DNF.

The timeline/structure for this book was odd. I feel like it could’ve been been better by being split into chronological parts. Several scenes were told in flashbacks that could’ve easily been written in the present. The world-building was pretty weak, and I didn’t care too much for the characters. However, the writing was good and the plot is decent, with some interesting reveals.

More like, 4,5 stars! I was not expecting to love this as much as I did.

Revenge can swallow one up whole and make them blind to the truth, even if it's right in front of them, this spin on the Count of Monte Cristo truly reminds the reader of that. I guess I love a great revenge story, though Scavenge the Stars is also much more than just that.

Interesting, unique, unimpressive, and disappointing...I really don’t know what to think of this one. Some parts were super cool and others kinda lame 3.6/5

Scavenge the Stars was a surprising win for me. There has been an influx in retellings in the YA genre lately, mostly with limited success, so I admit that my expectations were reasonably low going into this. I'll also freely admit that the last time I read The Count of Monte Christo was close to two decades ago. So I'm mostly judging this book on its' own merits, rather than as an adaptation of a classic novel.

I genuinely enjoyed this book. Silverfish and her team of bugs were well fleshed out and interesting. There was a lot of politics and scheming happening with Cayo and Kamon Mercado. The main problem I have (that may be corrected with the final copy) is the world-building can be a bit daunting. Scavenge the Stars is a book that NEEDS a map, and I pray that there is one included in the final copy. There's also a pretty large amount of info-dumping in the first bit of the book, with no real explanation of the kingdoms that are in opposition to each other. Despite the number of references to the world of the novel, I still found myself with questions about the world that I feel could have been answered in this book. I would have liked a bit more explanation about the kingdoms themselves, but that seems to have been set up for the sequel.

Despite that, I did enjoy the book. Amaya is on a one-woman mission of revenge, and she's happy to do what it takes. Cayo was surprisingly nuanced. The book was also LGBTQ+ friendly, with several characters that did not identify as straight.

Unfortunately, I didn't end up loving this. It might have been the timing, though.