So far this is my least favorite of the Seven Kingdoms series. It was hard not to compare it to Graceling, mainly because I re-read it before reading Bitterblue since it had been about 4 years since I last read it. Bitterblue seemed sort of all over the place. It felt like it wasn't edited properly. And it was a heavy and sad story to read. Another series, The Lumatere Chronicles by Melina Marchetta, deals with similar themes of loss, grief and an entire nation that needs healing after years and years of trauma, and I've just recently read those so it was hard not to compare. My verdict is that this kind of story is not easy to tell.

It took about 400 pages for things to finally start to make sense to me. And then the truth of everything is so devastating that I would actually warn people against reading it if they have any kind of trigger issues with abuse. There was a bit of a surprise added in toward the end which made me smile but overall I don't feel as much love for this book as I do for Graceling and Fire.

The first half of this book is five stars. After Hazel heads into the woods, not so much. The language is gorgeous and lush but honestly there are only so many pages you can fill up with descriptions of how cold it is and how alone and useless she feels. That said, I recommend it highly. It will resonate with anyone who ever had a friendship change/end as a kid, which I think is most of us.

I didn't enjoy it quite as much as the film. This book is 25 years old so not really the sort of YA that I read nowadays; it's the sort of book I would've loved when I was twelve. Ultimately it left me a bit bored.

This isn't a bad book, that's not why I stopped reading it. First of all, it's more for Younger Readers than YA, and I just wasn't in the mood. Plus, it's a trilogy and I didn't LURVE it enough to really keep going. It may just be that YA is so over-saturated with trilogies/series that I'm getting burnt out. But if you have kids that like mythology definitely get them into this series!

Seriously impressed with this book so far! I hope that the rest of the series proves as well-plotted and gripping....