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thecaptainsquarters 's review for:

Silk Fire by Zabé Ellor
1.0

Ahoy there mateys! This book sounded cool cause dragons, diversity, and a male courtesan as a main character but just ended up not really working for me at all.  I abandoned this at 62%.  Most of this stemmed from said courtesan, Koré.  He is a angsty character who spends half the time talking about how badass his political acumen is and all the secrets he has stolen from his clients and the other half talking about what a horrible person he is and moping about how he is a monster from birth who needs vengeance against the man who created him.  And yet Koré doesn't seem to actually DO anything with these supposed secrets or try to actually manipulate to get revenge.  He seems to do a lot of posturing on both fronts without accomplishing anything.  I got tired of him and didn't care about him as a character.  The world building was also strange.  I had a hard time understanding how the city was actually set up and how the streets and districts worked.  It was an odd mix of drones, dinosaurs, dragons, magic, sci-fi and fantasy.  I usually like the blending but it came across as nonsensical, particularly once Koré switches districts.  And all the sex scenes felt written for shock value but were just boring.  Too many random elements in this book to do any of them justice.  Even the diversity was somehow made boring.  Arrr! Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for the review copy.