dbguide2's Reviews (863)

 

I sort of expected Lovelace to narrate the audiobook and she did a really good job! The audio actually had a little bit of extra in it – sometimes Lovelace would expand on a poem, or explain why she wrote the poem. I like how simple the poems were and at the same time meant a lot. As always I could see the passion she had for writing in her poems – both for poetry and for the topics in general. 

Persephone is a big part of this poetry collection. Some people see the (Hades and Persephone) myth as a happy one – where Hades and Persephone are in love; others as more of a horror story – where Hades kidnaps Persephone and tricks her into eating the pomegranate seeds. This collection focuses mostly on Persephone and her knowing that she’s more than just a love interest, that she’s powerful and she knows it. 

 I sort of expected Lovelace to narrate the audiobook and she did a really good job! The audio actually had a little bit of extra in it – sometimes Lovelace would expand on a poem, or explain why she wrote the poem. I like how simple the poems were and at the same time meant a lot. As always I could see the passion she had for writing in her poems – both for poetry and for the topics in general. 

Persephone is a big part of this poetry collection. Some people see the (Hades and Persephone) myth as a happy one – where Hades and Persephone are in love; others as more of a horror story – where Hades kidnaps Persephone and tricks her into eating the pomegranate seeds. This collection focuses mostly on Persephone and her knowing that she’s more than just a love interest, that she’s powerful and she knows it. 

I actually was not going to read this book because I didn’t know where to get an e-arc of it. THEN I went onto Book Sirens (a site to receive e-arcs) for another book, but that wasn’t available. I just decided to scroll on the site a bit. And then I happened to see this and I clicked SO FAST because this has definitely been an anticipated release and I was so happy to have read it ahead of its release.

As I said earlier, I started this after I finished Lightlark – as much as it gave me extreme amounts of annoyance (so so much) – it was definitely the right choice to go from Lightlark to Reforged. The reason I say this is because Lightlark… is a really bad book (of course that’s just my opinion). Reforged made me remember why I like fantasies and adult fantasies so much. I read YA Fantasy most of the time but this just makes me want to go back to Adult Fantasies (or just find my favourites and reread them constantly 😄).

I was immediately drawn into the story – as in from the first chapter with the oath swearing ceremony, to the very last sentence – I didn’t want any of it to stop and I would have loved the book to have been longer or Haddon to write a sequel. It had all that I wanted in fantasy books, and also what I didn’t know I wanted, but was very happy to see. It had magic, mystery, intrigue, and a romance I rooted for all the way! It even had a map and difficult to pronounce proper nouns! 

I first heard about the book on TikTok – from the author’s profile – and I could somehow tell I would love it. Was it because I could see the author loved fanfiction and the book read like fanfiction (a compliment)? Was it how the author presented the book? Very much so both. Haddon reads like someone who’s spent a good portion of his life between the pages of fantasy novels and several long fanfictions – you could read his passion for the genre and fanfiction throughout the novel.

The plot and world-building was done really well (even more so when I compare it to Lightlark 😄). Fantasies tend to have politics in them too, especially when a main character is royalty/involved in politics. It was well-written in here – motives and motivations, plots (not the writing kind), and plenty of intrigue to keep the reader turning the pages. The world-building was a bit simple but written well so you didn’t feel too confused by reading a fantasy book (as sometimes one is 😄) but complex enough to draw in a hard fantasy reader.

I loved the magic system and that it mostly flowed in the blood. Did I know understand what type of creature gedroks are or how the blood and the Paladins’ armour fully works? Definitely not but that was fine! I loved not understanding everything because that added to the mystery of the novel (and I actually much more enjoy a fantasy book when I don’t understand everything). I’m always a big fan of magic in books when it’s tied to emotions and that’s definitely the case in this one. I don’t want to give too much away but I really enjoyed how Zavrius uses magic – it fit his character well and also made him more interesting (than if he were a royal who couldn’t use magic). 

I loved the characters we got to know. Zavrius and Balen were two really fun characters. Easy to get to know, easy to love. I actually love second chance romance! Which is interesting because I feel like it’s often paired with friends to lovers or childhood friends to lovers – both are tropes I don’t really drop everything to read. With Zavrius and Balen you get hints of what they were before the novel begins and what they become – and it paired together really well.

Zavrius is a character I really enjoyed getting to know. He’s witty, knows what he wants, and what he doesn’t want. He faces a hard start to his reign as King as he’s not the favoured one or even the next in line for the throne. Despite all that he kept a strong face and carried on through it all. He also loved music and I’ve been on a bardic kick ever since I saw Joey Batey in The Witcher.

I love how both characters want to protect the other, even though Balen is literally the protector, as in The Prime Paladin. I didn’t really know I even liked the bodyguard trope (outside of fanfiction of course) and now I read this I might be getting the inkling for others (but rarely a contemporary romance, though). I loved Balen’s character, he’s well aware of his duties but he also knows what his heart wants and a lot of the book is about trying to find a balance between the two. I liked that he was determined to do his best – not only because he was trained for it all but because he believes he has to do his best.

Lance and Mallet were two characters I didn’t expect to love but I couldn’t help it! They were funny and knew how to make light of a tense situation – saying the right thing at the right time. I liked their character development – I especially liked how they would just treat Zavrius as if he were one of their friends at the pub and not the actual King. I could also see that Zavrius liked it as well – either because he understands humour and how to respond in a similar way – or because he liked not always having to be the King. 

 Ariel’s always been one of my favourite Disney Princesses. It’s definitely the fact that she’s a mermaid and it’s sad that there aren’t more Little Mermaid adaptations! But I’m quite happy with what we got in Once Upon a Time and I can’t wait for the live-action adaptation! 

It had gorgeous writing, just flowed across the pages and brought me into the story. It held true to the story we all know and love. The book also has The True-Hearted Tin Soldier, which was a happy surprise, as I love that story – so that was fun to see. 

Fun fact: The words the little mermaid appears 49 times in the book. 

I don’t know how long fathers are allowed to stay in the hospital after the babies are born. But they LITERALLY JUST HAD twins, let him stay in the room overnight? But if I think for too long about the little I read of Patrick, the more I got really angry at him. He uploads a picture to Facebook without checking WITH HER. And this is like just after she gave birth – you could’ve waited a few hours to post it? I think I must’ve only read about three scenes with him in it and I didn’t want to know anymore. 

This is another one where the writing tried to be flowery and more than what it turned out to be. So another bit of disappointment. I think that’s my issue with a lot of adult thriller novels – there’s something about the writing that just doesn’t do it for me. 

I managed to get to 18% before deciding to dnf and I was so bored throughout it all. From the apparent perfection of Cherry/Cerise and although her hometown views her as a bad girl for various reasons – she ran off with a man, left him, had a baby with another man, made sure her kids were fed and dressed (but that was with a job that left them clutching their pearls) but she’s still seen as the ‘darling’ of the town. Two men want to be with her, or maybe only one really did, but I saw absolutely no chemistry with Cerise (in fact it felt like she had no chemistry with anyone, including her kids) with either of them. The whole spiel of all the townspeople disliking her because of her choices but then also constantly showing up to help her annoyed me so much. Either have them dislike her outright or have them help her out.

The language trying to be flowery but it just fell flat for me and somehow added to trying to make Cerise out to be an amazing mom because she’s great with the kids even when they’re ‘difficult’. It’s just all of that just tried to make Cerise a strong character and I didn’t feel it at all.

So the older kid, Jonah, is disabled. It’s said he has a genetic disorder and although it’s not mentioned anywhere, he’s autistic and largely non-verbal too. The author said in the acknowledgements that she wrote Jonah based on/for her disabled kid – and then she names his diagnoses – so we basically know what Jonah’s diagnoses are. I don’t know when the book is set because the year is never mentioned. Phones, their cords and cradles are mentioned but seeing as the book is set in a small town it makes sense for them to still have corded phones – let’s say still into the 2000’s. Jonah wears headphones, but they’re actually not a new thing (dating back somewhere to the 1800s, surprisingly). All of that is to say – the r-slur is used a few times in the book – when is this book set? Their usage of it felt so casual). Either way, I don’t like the slur – whenever the book is set. 

I didn’t like how Cerise spoke about Jonah. Specifically there was this line where he wakes up and his eyes are like dulled by the reality of life. And then it says he’s ‘only fully himself when asleep’ which annoyed me a lot because he stims a lot. So what? He’s not himself when he stims? Stimming even helps the person feel more like themself. I stim (ADHD, not autistic) and stimming is something I like to do – it calms me down, it shows when I’m happy etc. Stimming isn’t only for happy or angry. sometimes we just like to make noise for fun! Also it felt like he was only there to prop Cerise up, to show how good of a mom she was because she’s taking care of him. 

 

I was excited to read this because it sounded so good and it’s set at a boarding school and I love boarding school settings but unfortunately that’s just how it goes! I don’t have any concrete reasons for not liking this, except I just… didn’t like it at all. I was bored through most of it – I told myself “okay let’s listen to 30 mins real time and then make a decision (to push through or just dnf). I think I didn’t even make it 10 minutes and I was zoning out and didn’t even want to make myself listen to the book. 

We were promised a lot in the book and I don’t think I saw any of that. I found everything so boring and I try to immediately stop reading when I find the book boring. Yes, I saw the book was dark and while I do like I couldn’t bring myself to actually care about it. Apparently there’s humour in the book – I did not crack a single smile through the bit that I read. I didn’t like the narrators so I think that added to my dislike of the book. 

I did not know that there were so many Grimm Brothers stories. Honestly, my knowledge mostly comes from The Brothers’ Grimm movie – with Heath Ledger (RIP) and Matt Damon. And then some of the more popular stories I know. But this had so many stories you could probably read this to your kids for years and still not reach the end. I even skim read most stories and that was still quite long. I think probably the most famous Grimm stories is Hansel and Gretel, but did you know they also wrote The Frog Prince, Rapunzel, and Cinderella? And most of the stories are… quite dark (which I’m not exactly sure you’d like to tell them to little kids, but I guess some kids’ movies are also violent and can get dark).

All in all, it was an enjoyable read and I’m definitely wanting to read more retellings that have the dark themes in common with the original. Or manage to find other, smaller collections of their tales and reading those. I think every storyteller has something different to contribute. My favourite storyteller is still Hans Christian Anderson because I love the way he tells the story. I now also really like the Brothers Grimm, also because of how they tell the story – very different to Anderson. 

 I absolutely loved this book – actually looked just now to Amazon and Goodreads to see when the second book is coming out, couldn’t find anything, so I went to the author’s website. Apparently it’s available as an audio fiction podcast which I’m excited about! Now I can reread the first season (I suppose I could call it that?) before I listen to the second one. 

The story is filled with action and quite a bit of humour, which I very much enjoyed. There’s mythology in, and honestly anything mythology is always going to get my attention – I’m just glad that it was well-written too. Iris and Andy were two fun characters to read, especially Andy. I feel like they played off of each other well and that they paired well with each other too.