This was a tough one to rate, and if Goodreads had halves it would be more of a 3.5. The characterization is stellar, let's get that right, every character is diverse and conflicted and struggling with their senses of identity, purpose, and Right and Wrong. A fantastic ensemble for a story about whether or not to respect status quo/dogma/natural order of things, or whether to revolutionize and redefine what the world can be.

HOWEVER... in the end, the different couples' plots and motivations boil down to about the same thing: Get the McGuffin, deny my feelings until I do. And the "plot" is contrived as all get out, most characters being sped through plot points by deus ex machina instead of their own agency. Prophecies (intentional visions, written, dreamed), riddle clues conveniently left in ancient ruins Indiana Jones style, secret societies and the right mysterious benefactor showing up just in the nick of time, the villain cutting a deal instead of murdering our heroes on the spot... our heroes were adrift in an OCEAN of conveniences that just /happened/ to push them all to shore. :/ Not very compelling to read about characters struggling with choices... who ultimately don't have to make many choices.

The last 30 pages of the book, especially, suffer two-fold: They are confusing, and they are slightly derivative. Which is, again, a BIG shame, because the ensemble is SO diverse, and the world is beautiful and inspiring and draws from real world Middle Eastern civilizations that don't get highlighted enough in fantasy... It is just a shame to take so much great representation, and funnel it down to a Marvel level Like vs Like laser battle. Realizing that a brave hero, a kind one, a smart one, and an ambitious one, were searching for a sword McGuffin, a chalice, a crown (which is totally not a diadem), and a rock on a silver chain - guys, this is Horcrux-hunting, this is Deathly Hallows... Or Infinity Stone hunting, or or or... And the McGuffins bestow Graces on non-magical people, so...why do all of our villains claim they need to hold our heroes hostage as human puppets in order to use the McGuffins? Why the extra step? Why the magic needs to be operated by proxy is never adequately explained. And if our heroes are so special...why aren't they strong enough to draw on the McGuffins' powers, multiply their own magic, and overthrow the villains? Because... love stays their hand? With ten pages to go, I watched the same people negotiate around and around, "No, take me instead!" and the villain just kept trading hero hostages for each other. He might as well have been refereeing a game of Red Rover, telling So and So to come on over, for all that who his hostage was mattered.

So, hey, a wonderful book for representation and adventurous fantasy... If you're willing to go along for the ride, it's exciting and heartfelt. But if, like me, you expect as much psychology from your villains as you do your heroes, you're going to be bummed by the ending - which, after all, is what this entire book is building towards: the convergence of players and McGuffins at the end which will trigger an apocalyptic event. You kind of...need to stick that landing...book... You can't promise The Apocalypse and then deliver The Monologuing Megalomaniac... Just my two cents :/.

EDIT: Also, the title and cover art make no sense! XD The deity that gets unleashed is a being of Light... It's as the LIGHT rises, guys. That should be a bright white hand on the cover XD.

It took me THREE DAYS to come down from the finished-a-good-book high, and center myself enough to write out this review. For those first four days, my thoughts were largely, "AAAAHHHHH!!!!! KAZ!!!!!!!!! <3 <3 <3"

This book is phenomenal <3. It's quotable and relatable, my heart is aflutter! There are major character arcs, changes, deaths - actions have consequences, and Leigh Bardugo is unafraid of making them /dire/, world-altering, consequences. I love that the story is strong because of the risks it takes, the trust it puts in the reader, and the emotional journeys each character goes through.

Once again, representation is EN POINTE! I love that queer relationships are presented as... relationships. They're not taboo, nobody feels the need to hide their truth from their parents or their church or whomever... Characters are encouraged to pursue healthy relationships with whomever, the end. It lifts my spirits, to see people treated with dignity, and not living in fear (of anything more than bullets XD). If only the real world were as woke as The Grishaverse. Representation matters! Thank you for making this safe space in Fictiondom, Leigh.

In the spirit of representation, I love that a new character is introduced strictly to lampoon YA Fantasy tropes XD!!! Dunyasha, a white assassin princess from a holy order of trained killers, is treated thoroughly with disdain or disinterest by the cast of Crooked Kingdom XD XD XD! It's fabulous! It's a poke at the overabundance of courtly killers in YA Fantasy, a dig at herself for the Chosen One (Alina) in the orig trig, and an overall empowering message for the "invisible girls" who make up the main cast of Six of Crows and the main /audience/ reading this book. #InvisibleGirls #TeamWraith

But as much as I could gush about this book until the end of time, I will knock off 1/2 a star - not even, 1/8 of a star, a smidge, some stardust, if you will - only because Six of Crows was SO good that it slightly overshadowed Crooked Kingdom. I mean, which is more exhilarating: A Nordic prison heist, or a rigged auction? My thoughts exactly. Also, because this book doesn't read like a /conclusion/ to a duology. It reads like the second book in a trilogy, or even a larger series. The main heist of seeing Kuwei Yul-Bo rescued (and the gang getting paid) gets resolved, but there are so many other plot threads waiting to be knit into something bigger... As Inej says, we're not done with Ketterdam ;).

This book was terribly, TERRIBLY, boring. I get what it was trying to say: about the importance of free will; the difference between faith and dogma; and the two-sided coin which is love, how people will do both great and terrible things in the name of love. But I never felt like the book was delivering its messages /well/. Sometimes it was too heavy-handed, other times too abstract, it was messy. And a book has to be balanced between its messages and its STORY. This /story/ was blah :/. The characters travel aimlessly, endlessly, aware that they have no plan and no powers, and in the last 20 pages are handed the answer a la Dorothy had the ruby slippers all along!

It would be one thing if the heroes were hitting rock bottom before the finale, a hopeless /moment/ before rallying to save the day. But when I look back on the trilogy as a whole, I see how ineffectual our merry band was.
Book 1 - Was at least interesting, getting all the principle players in the same space at the same time, and introducing all their personal conflicts and key abilities... They were flawed in a fun way!
Book 2 - Threw all of that out the window to have our heroes hunt down McGuffins which THEY KNEW shouldn't be in the same place at the same time, or else bring about an apocalypse... But they did it anyway... Because book's got to book, I guess. So all the interesting aspects of how these characters behave, clash, or work together, were diminished to exalt the importance of these special shinies.
Book 3 - Throws the shinies out the window, too!! Now, the most special special SPECIALS are dead Prophets, who just give their magic away to our heroes. The protagonists "choices" don't /really/ matter, their friendships are tenuous and forced because, hey, the world is ending right the beep now, so what are they going to do, deny this chance for a magical power-up and die?! And up until the point that they receive said power-up, each "friend" is snipping at the other "How dare you throw your life away to try and save the world!" "How dare YOU put your life on the line when countless others are dying?" So much, "I love you, dangnabbit!" that it was painful, actually unfun to read. The stakes are so disproportional:
- World ending.
- Usurper needs deposing.
- Aaaand "why don't you love me enough to survive The Apocalypse?!"
Really? Why are these three different threads being given equal time and weight? They are not equal conflicts, whatsoever! XD

The griping, the hopelessness, the ineffectuality of our heroes... all to be deus ex machina'ed away at the end, was very dissatisfying. Why introduce characters with diverse abilities, if they're all going to be leveled and equaled in the finale? Why introduce powerful McGuffins not to use them? Why write 500 pages agonizing about choices, when really there are none?

I also gave the first book a lot of respect for being diverse, and being inspired by cultures I don't normally get to see front-and-center in a YA novel. BUT, I lost all of my respect over books 2 and 3, which lost most of the diversity it had set up, and just turned into Christian fanfiction. The name of God has the power to create, destroy, and grant the total knowledge and power /of/ God. The sacred grail - sorry, chalice. The perversion of the flaming sword. The Garden, now being tended by a gay couple instead of Adam and Eve. Where, in the beginning of the series, it seemed like the author was finding inspiration in blending a lot of ancient cultures, giving nods to how multiple religions/cultures have common roots... the series going forward seemed to double-down on being a Christian story for teens. "Hey, it doesn't matter what you were taught; just trust your heart and don't be a selfish d---! Now, who wants a shoutout to their favorite part of the Bible?! Yeeey, Anton gets a Jesus reference! Look at you, alive again after 3 days!" It was more interesting, and more emotionally impactful to me when the series was drawing inspiration from real-world religions and cultures for its world-building (so it was grounding the fantasy in something relatable), than when it was just making shoutouts to Bible passages but adding a twist (making it only relatable to people who have studied the Bible). I mean, thanks for the PSA that one can be both Christian and gay. But I wish that the books had more to say than that, in the end.

An absolutely genius, whimsical, inspiring, chilling, delightful book!!! It is so rare to find a stand-alone anymore, and this one delivered a sweeping epic tightly and emotionally. The author is a master wordsmith! This book is equal parts Alice in Wonderland, Lemony Snicket, The Phantom of the Opera, The Hunchback of Notre Dame, The Golden Compass, and every fairytale about the wee folk from underhill - but I do not mean that this book is derivative, FAR FROM! This book is unique, GLORIOUSLY, REFRESHINGLY, unique! It's a "fairytale" that is human, if that makes any sense. The fair folk don't recognize themselves as fae, that's a human turn of phrase; these are PEOPLE, their magic a closely coveted science, their long lives obtained with rare potions and decadent foods, their scheming courts a real danger to all trapped in its web. They are a people who - through hubris and greed - have evolved a disassociation between their souls/feelings and themselves, and it is up to one, naive, honest, brave, friendly little girl to remind these people how to think and feel and /live/ in totality, not repressed or amputated. SOOOO many amazing messages about classicism, coming of age, and coming of age with privilege. It's relevant and remarkable. Read. This. Book!!!

This book is phenomenal!!!! Standing ovation! It deserves to be required reading. I am so angry at all the critics who read drafts over the years and told Kate Elizabeth Russell that Vanessa was unfathomable and the story should be from Strane's perspective. SHAME on those buffoons! Vanessa's psychology is COMPLETELY relatable, complex and contradictory and brooding; I love her, I See her, I am her. Not in a #MeToo way, but in an "I understand having conflicting emotions about a relationship which has failed in its promises" way. The entire teenage-to-twenties experience is captured so expertly: enjoying feeling powerful by literally flirting with danger; yearning for purpose and hidden meanings behind the mundane; self-isolation and melancholy feeling like a decadence which renders you intellectual, worldly, mature, and special; denying ugly truths and escaping into media or substances; second-guessing your perspective and memories; and of course the all-consuming pain of placing your value in a friendship/relationship/teacher's praise/any outsider's opinion of you, instead of learning to validate and build yourself.

And this book really isn't about "child abuse" at its core, not in a simple Victim and Villain way. Rather, it's about the fog and confusion, the gaslighting, the enabling, co-dependency, the mixed signals from something feeling both good and unhealthy at the same time - an amalgamation of contributing factors which make it difficult to just point at one overt act and say, "There, stop there, that's the bad thing." An entire system of relationships are involved: Parents and faculty turning a blind eye, journalists or concerned friends turning too critical an eye, the abuser painting himself as a martyr, and the victim having her own set of toxic behaviors... And everyone, everywhere, always being stuck in their own heads, never having quite the same perspective or recollections as another person, so how can anyone be sure what's "real"?! The out-of-body experience of trying to deny physical/sexual abuse pairs so, so well with the philosophical debate about "can we ever get outside our own minds and understand something another way?" The ending, with Vanessa grounding herself, reminding herself that she IS here, IS Seen, and is not just a floating fog of feelings with no control, was so moving, and universal. THAT everyone needs to hear.

To whoever needs to hear it today: I See you.

Read. This. Book.

A heartbreaking, gut-punching ode to Earth, anime, and the near-sighted monkey-children who squabble over both. Red Rising and Princess Mononoke made a baby, and not in a nice way, painting a sweet mural in a nursery to welcome their lovechild - no, it was a brutal clash for dominance egged on by our own bets and bloodlust. (Are you not entertained!) Nobody is as they seem, everybody betrays or fails the ones they love, every echelon of society is treated like human waste, and it seems the planet itself is hell-bent on rejecting the necrotic germ which is humanity (assuming humans don't annihilate each other first).

Praise where praise is due: In the first book I was looking for the Jay Kristoff finesse I would come to know and love in Nevernight, and Kinslayer delivers on the artistry. There was far more natural character growth, and poetic prose, in Kinslayer than there was in Stormdancer. I'm thankful I stuck with the series. (Also, YEY for Yoshi and Jurou, this book needed some queer characters!)
THAT SAID... this STILL feels like a Nevernight first draft to me. You can't tell me Daken isn't Mr. Kindly! XD "Blood is blood"? You can't tell me that wasn't the first draft of "When All is Blood, Blood is All". A library of the dead. A female protagonist fueled for revenge by the public execution of her father (a man who cheated on her pregnant mother). The mirroring of Mia's/Yukiko's growing power and growing rage, personified by the multiplying magical animal friends' voices in her head... Come on.

More praise where praise is due: I liked the theme of nothing-is-as-it-seems: sympathetic guildsmen, butcherly gaijin, spies in abundance... It opened up the world, and made the fighting all the more dire. But I was REEEALLY hoping that Zuko-chooses-Azula moment wasn't going to happen :'(. I'm STILL hoping that Snape is a triple agent. I mean, it's kind of cool to set up the whole Nature vs. Machine fight with two characters who understand and love each other and each thinks they're doing their best for the world... but WHAT IS THE POINT of following Jaime Lannister around for so long, watching him grow humbled and wiser, if he's just going to run back to beeping Cersei in the end?!?!
Spoiler spoiler spoiler I still have faith in Kin. Here's hoping. Spoiler spoiler spoiler.
Only downside from all these dire perspectives... is that MULTIPLE viewpoint women were made helpless - trapped, beaten, raped - and Yukiko herself was practically written out of the story for the majority of the book, stuck on an island dealing with her own moral compass instead of being side-by-side with the people who needed her. Initially, the stakes were harrowing but intriguing, I was rooting for our underdogs to rally and rise from the ashes... But in the last hundred pages, when the hopelessness and helplessness was everywhere and everything, it seeped into /me/. Why was I reading this? Who was I cheering for? How could this book series possibly turn around into anything positive or satisfying? Was this story /only/ sensational violence, or was it going to respect the sympathetic characters it had built and gives these women their due?! And in the last 30 pages the answer was..."Kind of?"
Do better, Endsinger. There is a lot riding on you! You need to resolve a civil war, an international war, an apocalypse, and you need to redeem a bunch of traitors and marginalized women... YIKES! O_O I hope I look back on this and love Kinslayer for the stakes it sets up, instead of regretting it for the characters/world it lets down :'(. But it's impossible to review Kinslayer in complete isolation. Time will tell.

There are two quotes in this book which thoroughly summarize it: "To live is to grieve." and "No one wants to look too closely at another person's pain." This is The Book of Grief. It was emo, and painful, and sickening, and at times boring... Grief is such a personal journey, it's hard to completely empathize with someone, even a fictional someone. And being a reader, you sometimes can't get carried along by the story, but instead occupy the seat of the Literary Critic, judging whether a character's behavior is "authentic". Judging grief is not the seat I wanted to be in. This book was uncomfortable to read, not just for the subject matter but because I feel the characters were treated inauthentically for the sake of metaphor. Spoilers ahead.

My opinions on this book came in chunks. The first 250 pages were sad and boring, as all the major viewpoint characters were directionless, defeated, out of options and out of plot.

Then the twist midway happened, and the book handled its world-altering reveal... like an 80's montage. Immense character growth happened off-page, in a very short amount of time, and without enough explanation as to the How's and Why's of the magical system being related. I had so many questions about The Darkling, The Saints, The Grisha: What they are, what their magic is, how it works... 6 books in to a series, I should hope I would already know some of that. It's hard to stay lost in the narrative, when I don't understand the world.

There were some genuine heart-pounding developments after the midway. But there were an equal number of groan-inducing moments. Each viewpoint character was done dirty. Nikolai was robbed of everything which made him fun and intriguing in Siege and Storm, and has been reduced to longing glances at Zoya (a ship I don't support, I know I'm bias) or sulking about his dark passenger. Nina is back to square one, trying to escort and cajole a racist Fjerdan. And Zoya is, maybe, the worst of the bunch: She becomes a dumping ground of traits from other characters. Hot-tempered and vain? That's Nina. Child sex-trafficking backstory? That's Inej. Ruthless but longing for human connection, using anger as a defense mechanism? That's Kaz. Feels a sympathy for animals, more so than people? That's Matthias. Practical, with more faith in her friends than in any religious idol? That's Mal AND Kaz! A girl from nowhere with a destiny ahead who fell for The Darkling's charm and Nikolai's ease? That's Alina! Who is Zoya? Who is she??? There is nothing original about her. A whole third of this book devoted to making her more sympathetic, a love interest, a shadow queen, and I still don't know who SHE is beyond "Sexy" and "Mean". I think Nikolai deserves more than Sexy & Mean. I think we, the readers, deserve a character who is less derivative, original in their characterization, and who didn't take until Book 6 to seem even moderately sympathetic (I know, I know, I'm a hypocrite, I'm Snape's #1 Fan!). I also think this series is now guilty of "pairing the spares". Why does EVERYONE get a love match?! Can't anyone in this universe be platonic friends? Or ace? Or just TOO DARN BUSY to worry about romance, right now?! I know it's YA, I know romance comes with the territory. It just feels so unearned this time. These two characters who had barely any interaction together on the page (though it is implied they have worked side by side for three years /off/ the page), suddenly the reader is meant to A) Give up on ever seeing peppy, curious, inventive, Nikolai again, B) Flip a switch with our feelings on Zoya, from Mean Girl to Little Wubby, and C) Desire to see them wrapped up in a forbidden romance while the world burns? It's too much.

Speaking of derivative... A few times this book quoted Disney movies, and I was taken immediately out of the book... And that ending... Can we say "Goblet of Fire"? Or Nikolai's demon basically turning him into a vampire, which reminded me of EVERY YA vampire romance... Just... Why? I'm so disappointed. I feel like Leigh Bardugo was watching TV inbetween writing chapters, and whatever she watched bled into her writing. Six of Crows was so full and unique and refreshing... This book was none of those things. This book felt tired of itself, borrowing phrases and plot points from other fantasies to fill itself up...

Which is kind of my last point on King of Scars: Six of Crows gave us normal people in an extraordinary world, who laughed and cussed and questioned the idea of grand destinies and miracles. For that, the characters and the conflicts had my complete sympathy and attention. There was a real world story being told in a fairytale setting: How do we navigate an unfair world... But King of Scars rolled back all the progress made in Six of Crows, giving us characters with destinies and uncharted powers and never-ending lives... diminishing the sacrifices of the normal, every day, "invisible" people... The second half of this book was the equivalent of the Marvel final boss battle: Somebody versus their evil twin, laserbeams in the sky; I don't understand what I'm watching, the stakes are forced, and I don't care.

I don't care. Sounds like a hammer on coffin nails :'(. I don't care about what happened in this book. Poor Puppy Prince :'(. I wish your title book had been better to you...