Blaming @theofficialstevenwalker on IG for this one jumping the TBR pile. I've heard plenty of good things about this series, and seen lots of fan art, so I've been intrigued about what to expect. And as I was able to get the graphic audios on offer a few weeks ago, it seemed like the stars were aligning for this to become another favourite. At this stage, I can see the potential, but I'm yet to be fully convinced.

The initial action is a great hook into the story, and immediately raises questions that make you want to keep reading/listening. At the same time, right off the bat you're getting all of the things you expect from the romantasy genre, so everything feels familiar. However, there then feels like a HUGE wait for actual worldbuilding to kick in. All those questions you have; what does it mean to be The Maiden? What's the Rite? Etc etc etc just hang there. The characters and narrative make such a big deal of the titles, events and so on, but there's just nothing to actually explain until very late on. Now, I appreciate this is only the first half of the first book and audiobooks are inevitably a slower way for me to ingest the story, but I just needed more far earlier. I get setting up a mystery and drip-feeding clues, but this feels like there a massive holes in the foundations of the story that the reader is just meant to keep jumping over in the hope there's going to be an explanation at some point. 

I only really became invested in the story when Hawk properly enters. His character is just gorgeous (literally and figuratively), with enough mystery surrounding him to give him that bad boy allure, while having that protective, caring, humourous side that makes me smile. And the dimple, mustn't forget that! Oh, I have plenty of questions and suspicions about him, but right now he's probably the only character I actually feel a connection with. The  voice actor for Hawk really helps with the characterisation too.

Poppy is just a bit... meh. Again, she has potential, but I don't feel like she's as well fleshed out as a lot of other romantasy leading ladies. Right now she only feels like a collection of the usual FMC character traits, lacking any real individuality to set her apart. I'm interested to see where how she develops as we progress into the series and hope that something happens to really bring her to the fore. 

I also struggled a bit with the premise of the Gods in this one. While I appreciate the 'higher power' is pretty standard in this type of story, the fact that everything seems to hang off of the Gods' approval isn't quite sitting right with me. It feels more pervasive than a lot of other stories. And while Poppy isn't exactly a model disciple, I think the fact that she doesn't appear to really question the status quo made her and iltimateky all of the characters feel like pawns, shackled to a belief system which (I assume) is about to be challenged big time. 

I feel like overall this is probably a book I would have been better eyeball reading first, as this would have increased the pace exponentially and I could have then gone into the graphic audio with some knowledge of the plot. Equally though, I know that most of the GAs I've listened to where the first book in the series is split into two, I've found the first half to be a bit of a slog whether or not I've read the book before. So while I'm not converted yet, I'm definitely willing to give it more time.