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540 reviews by:
rubeusbeaky
This book did not age well :/. The paranormal plot is that the world will end on Y2K. Youch.
The book felt dated in uglier ways, as well. The messages were pretty toxic. You have a crush on someone at work, but they just want to keep things professional? Stalk them, they'll change their minds! You meet someone at work who is feeling suicidal? Guilt trip them about what a burden they are to the family and workers who will have to find their body! You learn that an old friend, a classmate who has become depressed and distant, was raped. Should you comfort them? Heck no, guilt trip them too, make them feel responsible for their mother's sorrow for having a distant daughter! On and on and on.
Even if I overlooked the lousy messages, and I were in the mood for a nostalgic 90's setting, I would still have had problems with how old-fashioned this book is for a manga. The art style reminded me of Dick Tracy XD. Such big shoulder pads, such weird hats! But more importantly, for being "the first boys love story published in The West", this book is outdated with its queer representation. It was almost as if they needed to make Subaru "safe": Giving him a twin sister who is a buffer in almost every scene Subaru and Seishiro share; Making him look small and effeminate and having him get mistaken for a girl; Having him rebuff Seishiro's confessions of love as if they're jokes... This book seemed not committed to the queer romance, at all, and like it wanted to leave plausible deniability for readers who might not be comfortable with such a thing.
Outdated, in every sense.
The book felt dated in uglier ways, as well. The messages were pretty toxic. You have a crush on someone at work, but they just want to keep things professional? Stalk them, they'll change their minds! You meet someone at work who is feeling suicidal? Guilt trip them about what a burden they are to the family and workers who will have to find their body! You learn that an old friend, a classmate who has become depressed and distant, was raped. Should you comfort them? Heck no, guilt trip them too, make them feel responsible for their mother's sorrow for having a distant daughter! On and on and on.
Even if I overlooked the lousy messages, and I were in the mood for a nostalgic 90's setting, I would still have had problems with how old-fashioned this book is for a manga. The art style reminded me of Dick Tracy XD. Such big shoulder pads, such weird hats! But more importantly, for being "the first boys love story published in The West", this book is outdated with its queer representation. It was almost as if they needed to make Subaru "safe": Giving him a twin sister who is a buffer in almost every scene Subaru and Seishiro share; Making him look small and effeminate and having him get mistaken for a girl; Having him rebuff Seishiro's confessions of love as if they're jokes... This book seemed not committed to the queer romance, at all, and like it wanted to leave plausible deniability for readers who might not be comfortable with such a thing.
Outdated, in every sense.
This book is magnificent!!! I was expecting it to be a cozy, popcorn read, but it wasn't at all. The story had some very prescient things to say about virtue-signaling versus living virtuously, and the importance of choosing empathy over outrage. Also, Dora's plight in the book may be magical, but her muted ability to connect to her emotions, or to read social situations, read to me realistically on so many levels. Having someone REAL at the forefront of a regency novel, moved me unexpectedly. I love Dora and Elias, and my only regret is that I only got to spend fewer than 300 pages with them.
TL;DR - Boring and derivative. I felt like I was reading an inexpert mashup of Six of Crows, Game of Thrones, and the Hebrew Bible, but with most of the heart and/or stakes stripped away. There’s a lot to break down. Spoilers ahead.
~~~
The Book Overall:
Character Motivations and Fake Stakes - We are told that Kel's whole raison d'etre is to act as body double and bodyguard for Prince Conor. But for the majority of the book, Kel is off doing his own thing, not shadowing Conor, and not attending courtly duties in Conor's stead. We are told that Conor is One of The Good Ones, a prince who understands and despises the corruption of politics. Buuut for the majority of the book, he's a drunk, violent, rapey monster, who bullies and belittles everyone around him (mostly for sport). And we are TOLD that everyone on The Hill is conspiring against Kel, possibly against the crown, but we are not SHOWN any obviously guilty parties yet, so the warnings come across as tepid and vague. All together, this seems like the kind of story where the majority of the conflicts wouldn't have happened at all if the main characters had just TALKED to each other. But since they keep acting counter to their character, they manufacture dangerous circumstances. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy, that something bad is going to happen, because everyone is behaving badly.
Queer-Baiting - Kel and Conor are LGBTQA, but the detail is only used as set dressing or shipping fodder, not in any subplot-relevant way. Androgynous attire, a fleeting hookup, but nothing that effects their romances or political intrigue. The world itself is allegedly more progressive, allowing for queer couples as rulers... but they still have to make heirs the old-fashioned way, which seems.... old-fashioned. How is the conflict of this book about who Prince Conor is going to marry and procreate with? It's cheap, for the book to sell itself as a queer ally, but not REALLY make queer space. The book's main ships, and world-building, are all heteronormative.
((Also, sidebar, but Sword Catcher sounds like a gay slur. It's a terrible title for an allegedly woke book. XD))
Technical Writing - There were a lot of typos, mixed metaphors, incorrectly used words, and long unnecessary lists. It really seemed like this book's editor wasn't reading critically enough.
~~~
Six of Crows:
I know that Leigh Bardugo doesn’t have a monopoly on the band of merry thieves trope, but there were too many similarities between The Ragpicker King’s entourage and The Crows to be merely coincidental. Two rival crime syndicates, one spearheaded by a gentlemanly crook, the other by a tycoon who buys up all he can get. The “gentleman” in question dresses all in black, walks with a cane, and appears to know everything about everyone. The gentleman’s business is overlooked by the crown. He has a right-hand gal who is proficient with knives, acrobatics, intimidation, interrogation, and discretion. She has a purple-and-black aesthetic, and a tragic backstory (from which gentleman saved her and earned her undying loyalty). Joining them is a cherubic chemist with a vendetta against a merchant lord, and a redheaded mage with the ability to magically heal people (even, it is foreshadowed, to reanimate the dead). Redhead is brazen, passionate, and has the audacity to spit in the patriarchy’s face… but regardless, she falls for the enemy. Now… Did I just describe Andreyen, Prosper Beck, Ji-An, Merren and Lin? Or did I describe Kaz, Pekka Rollins, Inej, Wylan and Nina? Even their names sound/look too similar!
~~~
Game of Thrones:
Similarly, GRR Martin certainly doesn’t have a monopoly on historically-inspired fantasy with tons of political, theological, and fantastical suspense. BUT Game of Thrones IS in pop culture now, it happened, we all know of it, the back of our collective brains can’t help but compare. So it’s hard not to see a massacre at an engagement party and think, “The Red Wedding did it better.” Or, to hear a scheming queen (with obviously more loyalty to her home province than the kingdom she married into) profess disdainfully to anyone not of her blood that she would do anything to protect her spoiled, violent child, and NOT think, “OK, Lannisters, why don’t you Lannister a little harder for the people in the back!” Even the family colors and mascots are too familiar. Really? Red and gold lions for the royal family? Gee, where have I seen that before. Lin especially is often just a weak Daenerys ripoff XD. Coddling a magic stone/petrified egg; Being both attracted to and repulsed by a violent, self-entitled prince/Dothraki warlord; Claiming to be a goddess/queen reborn from a fire. It's pathetic how many crutches are there, leaning on pop culture and nostalgia, rather than standing on Clare's own storytelling. Too often, Sword Catcher comes across as Clare smugly nodding at the audience, "Did you like that scene? Watch me write my own!" No... It doesn't compare. It's not far enough away to compare. It's only far enough away to not call it plagiarism.
But I think my bigger problem with Sword Catcher’s attempt at Game-of-Thrones-ing is a twofold lack of finesse and stakes.
Let’s start with finesse. In GoT, there is a huge cast of characters to remember, and two continents to memorize, including ruling families and their allies/rivals. But GRR Martin took the time to introduce each faction in chunks, allowing us to spend time with a particular group of people, or in a particular area, and come to understand their culture and motivations. Contrastingly, in Sword Catcher, Cassandra Clare always mentions all factions in a giant list. If there is a description of a drinks bar, there will be an alcohol from every corner of the map. If there is an impressive receiving room, there will be ornamentation from every corner of the map. If Prince Conor is discussing marriage prospects, he goes down a list of women from every corner of the map. If there are foreign dignitaries arriving for dinner, there is an ambassador from every corner of the map. If Kel goes into the city to snoop for shady dealings, there will be a market stall, or a restaurant, or a burough, from – you guessed it – every corner of the map! Mentioning all nations, instead of highlighting one place at a time, means that all the cultural descriptions just bleed together, and I ended up not remembering a one. What this book needed were more scenes devoted to one or two players at a time, to show how they relate to each other, and to intrigue the reader. Or, it needed a world map and possibly an appendix with each nation/royal family and each trade charter family, and then maybe Clare wouldn’t have felt the need to describe every single one in every single scene. Too many lists instead of immersive lore.
Now… stakes…. In GoT there is an imminent threat: Foreign enemies are at the border (which is poorly manned, by traitors and felons), and the king is dead, leaving two big power vacuums at opposite ends of the country, and our heroes spread too thin trying to solve the concurrent crises. It’s a bloodbath, as rival factions take advantage of the chaos to bend the world to their whimsy. “When you play the Game of Thrones, you win or you die.”
Sadly, in Sword Catcher, the world-shifting conflict is: The crown prince owes money to a crime lord. Not for having done anything criminal, just because this crime lord bought the prince’s debts from other businesses... Economics... Riveting. In the immortal words of Cloudy June, “That sounds like a you problem.” But anyway… Not wanting to owe his debt collector any favors, Prince Conor enters a hasty engagement, and uses the dowry to pay off the crime lord. Embarrassing as it is, that seems like a resolved conflict to me. Book over? Nope. This is a 600 page setup!!! Within the LAST 30 PAGES OF THE BOOK, shenanigans ensue at a quasi-engagement party for the reluctant couple, that ends on a cliffhanger implying that the aftermath of the party will be the beginning of a war with the bride's home nation. Much bigger stakes, for sure, but it took too long to get there, and it never reaches the same gut punch as, “The Lannisters send their regards.” There is no surprise; Castellane was always going to go to war with Sarthe, this tragic party was just the catalyst that finally kicked it off. And there is no reward for super-sleuths trying to read between the lines for who is scheming against whom, because all we're left with is a big, "Tune in next time, folks!" It was too much setup, and too boring a setup, to realistically expect the audience to be intrigued enough as to come back for Book 2 (which may also be too long, too cryptic, and not deliver any answers or satisfying conflicts!).
~~~
Jewish Representation and Exoticising The Other:
The Ashkari aren't literally Jewish, but they pull A LOT from Jewish religion, culture, history, and folklore, and for that reason I found Clare's depiction of them to be extremely tone deaf. This is not like how Shadowhunters featured Christian iconology. No one TODAY is searching for the Holy Grail, or is traumatized by literal angelic appearances. But TODAY, right this minute, there ARE Jewish people who are displaced, their homes destroyed. There are real people being hunted down in the street. There ARE women who are denied positions of power, or denied education. And within the last 100 years (short enough that there are still witnesses/survivors of the event), Jewish people were segregated for their religion, massacred, made pariahs, and denied basic civility in their own countries. Exoticisizing that trauma by making them MAGICAL is obscene and disrespectful. Change their name all you want, we know who you're talking about, and we know you're cashing in on their trauma. Further twist of the screw, Lin is eroticized by Prince Conor, her otherness and untouchability making her enticing. Whether that is meant to be a character flaw of Conor's, or the beginning of an enemies-to-lovers arc, is unclear. But the inclusion AT ALL of "Your foreignness makes me horny" is gross, and makes Lin's RECIPROCATION of Conor's lust feel dirty and disingenuous. What upsets me about Lin's PoV as a whole is that you can tell that Clare thought she was being inclusive, thought she was giving us something fresh and special, and that just makes it even more tone deaf.
~~~~~
Final Thoughts:
There are characters here. Dumb ones, knockoffs of other stories, but here nonetheless. There is a plot here. It takes 600 pages to really pick up any momentum, and then it immediately stalls itself by forcing you to wait for the next book. If you're patient, good for you. There is something to invest in here. But the consistent over-reliance on outside knowledge (be it pop culture or history) to make up for a lack of creativity, coupled with the under or poorly represented marginalized people this book is claiming to champion, means that I am unwilling to invest. I am unwilling to give Cassandra Clare the benefit of the doubt. This book failed me, in every way.
~~~
The Book Overall:
Character Motivations and Fake Stakes - We are told that Kel's whole raison d'etre is to act as body double and bodyguard for Prince Conor. But for the majority of the book, Kel is off doing his own thing, not shadowing Conor, and not attending courtly duties in Conor's stead. We are told that Conor is One of The Good Ones, a prince who understands and despises the corruption of politics. Buuut for the majority of the book, he's a drunk, violent, rapey monster, who bullies and belittles everyone around him (mostly for sport). And we are TOLD that everyone on The Hill is conspiring against Kel, possibly against the crown, but we are not SHOWN any obviously guilty parties yet, so the warnings come across as tepid and vague. All together, this seems like the kind of story where the majority of the conflicts wouldn't have happened at all if the main characters had just TALKED to each other. But since they keep acting counter to their character, they manufacture dangerous circumstances. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy, that something bad is going to happen, because everyone is behaving badly.
Queer-Baiting - Kel and Conor are LGBTQA, but the detail is only used as set dressing or shipping fodder, not in any subplot-relevant way. Androgynous attire, a fleeting hookup, but nothing that effects their romances or political intrigue. The world itself is allegedly more progressive, allowing for queer couples as rulers... but they still have to make heirs the old-fashioned way, which seems.... old-fashioned. How is the conflict of this book about who Prince Conor is going to marry and procreate with? It's cheap, for the book to sell itself as a queer ally, but not REALLY make queer space. The book's main ships, and world-building, are all heteronormative.
((Also, sidebar, but Sword Catcher sounds like a gay slur. It's a terrible title for an allegedly woke book. XD))
Technical Writing - There were a lot of typos, mixed metaphors, incorrectly used words, and long unnecessary lists. It really seemed like this book's editor wasn't reading critically enough.
~~~
Six of Crows:
I know that Leigh Bardugo doesn’t have a monopoly on the band of merry thieves trope, but there were too many similarities between The Ragpicker King’s entourage and The Crows to be merely coincidental. Two rival crime syndicates, one spearheaded by a gentlemanly crook, the other by a tycoon who buys up all he can get. The “gentleman” in question dresses all in black, walks with a cane, and appears to know everything about everyone. The gentleman’s business is overlooked by the crown. He has a right-hand gal who is proficient with knives, acrobatics, intimidation, interrogation, and discretion. She has a purple-and-black aesthetic, and a tragic backstory (from which gentleman saved her and earned her undying loyalty). Joining them is a cherubic chemist with a vendetta against a merchant lord, and a redheaded mage with the ability to magically heal people (even, it is foreshadowed, to reanimate the dead). Redhead is brazen, passionate, and has the audacity to spit in the patriarchy’s face… but regardless, she falls for the enemy. Now… Did I just describe Andreyen, Prosper Beck, Ji-An, Merren and Lin? Or did I describe Kaz, Pekka Rollins, Inej, Wylan and Nina? Even their names sound/look too similar!
~~~
Game of Thrones:
Similarly, GRR Martin certainly doesn’t have a monopoly on historically-inspired fantasy with tons of political, theological, and fantastical suspense. BUT Game of Thrones IS in pop culture now, it happened, we all know of it, the back of our collective brains can’t help but compare. So it’s hard not to see a massacre at an engagement party and think, “The Red Wedding did it better.” Or, to hear a scheming queen (with obviously more loyalty to her home province than the kingdom she married into) profess disdainfully to anyone not of her blood that she would do anything to protect her spoiled, violent child, and NOT think, “OK, Lannisters, why don’t you Lannister a little harder for the people in the back!” Even the family colors and mascots are too familiar. Really? Red and gold lions for the royal family? Gee, where have I seen that before. Lin especially is often just a weak Daenerys ripoff XD. Coddling a magic stone/petrified egg; Being both attracted to and repulsed by a violent, self-entitled prince/Dothraki warlord; Claiming to be a goddess/queen reborn from a fire. It's pathetic how many crutches are there, leaning on pop culture and nostalgia, rather than standing on Clare's own storytelling. Too often, Sword Catcher comes across as Clare smugly nodding at the audience, "Did you like that scene? Watch me write my own!" No... It doesn't compare. It's not far enough away to compare. It's only far enough away to not call it plagiarism.
But I think my bigger problem with Sword Catcher’s attempt at Game-of-Thrones-ing is a twofold lack of finesse and stakes.
Let’s start with finesse. In GoT, there is a huge cast of characters to remember, and two continents to memorize, including ruling families and their allies/rivals. But GRR Martin took the time to introduce each faction in chunks, allowing us to spend time with a particular group of people, or in a particular area, and come to understand their culture and motivations. Contrastingly, in Sword Catcher, Cassandra Clare always mentions all factions in a giant list. If there is a description of a drinks bar, there will be an alcohol from every corner of the map. If there is an impressive receiving room, there will be ornamentation from every corner of the map. If Prince Conor is discussing marriage prospects, he goes down a list of women from every corner of the map. If there are foreign dignitaries arriving for dinner, there is an ambassador from every corner of the map. If Kel goes into the city to snoop for shady dealings, there will be a market stall, or a restaurant, or a burough, from – you guessed it – every corner of the map! Mentioning all nations, instead of highlighting one place at a time, means that all the cultural descriptions just bleed together, and I ended up not remembering a one. What this book needed were more scenes devoted to one or two players at a time, to show how they relate to each other, and to intrigue the reader. Or, it needed a world map and possibly an appendix with each nation/royal family and each trade charter family, and then maybe Clare wouldn’t have felt the need to describe every single one in every single scene. Too many lists instead of immersive lore.
Now… stakes…. In GoT there is an imminent threat: Foreign enemies are at the border (which is poorly manned, by traitors and felons), and the king is dead, leaving two big power vacuums at opposite ends of the country, and our heroes spread too thin trying to solve the concurrent crises. It’s a bloodbath, as rival factions take advantage of the chaos to bend the world to their whimsy. “When you play the Game of Thrones, you win or you die.”
Sadly, in Sword Catcher, the world-shifting conflict is: The crown prince owes money to a crime lord. Not for having done anything criminal, just because this crime lord bought the prince’s debts from other businesses... Economics... Riveting. In the immortal words of Cloudy June, “That sounds like a you problem.” But anyway… Not wanting to owe his debt collector any favors, Prince Conor enters a hasty engagement, and uses the dowry to pay off the crime lord. Embarrassing as it is, that seems like a resolved conflict to me. Book over? Nope. This is a 600 page setup!!! Within the LAST 30 PAGES OF THE BOOK, shenanigans ensue at a quasi-engagement party for the reluctant couple, that ends on a cliffhanger implying that the aftermath of the party will be the beginning of a war with the bride's home nation. Much bigger stakes, for sure, but it took too long to get there, and it never reaches the same gut punch as, “The Lannisters send their regards.” There is no surprise; Castellane was always going to go to war with Sarthe, this tragic party was just the catalyst that finally kicked it off. And there is no reward for super-sleuths trying to read between the lines for who is scheming against whom, because all we're left with is a big, "Tune in next time, folks!" It was too much setup, and too boring a setup, to realistically expect the audience to be intrigued enough as to come back for Book 2 (which may also be too long, too cryptic, and not deliver any answers or satisfying conflicts!).
~~~
Jewish Representation and Exoticising The Other:
The Ashkari aren't literally Jewish, but they pull A LOT from Jewish religion, culture, history, and folklore, and for that reason I found Clare's depiction of them to be extremely tone deaf. This is not like how Shadowhunters featured Christian iconology. No one TODAY is searching for the Holy Grail, or is traumatized by literal angelic appearances. But TODAY, right this minute, there ARE Jewish people who are displaced, their homes destroyed. There are real people being hunted down in the street. There ARE women who are denied positions of power, or denied education. And within the last 100 years (short enough that there are still witnesses/survivors of the event), Jewish people were segregated for their religion, massacred, made pariahs, and denied basic civility in their own countries. Exoticisizing that trauma by making them MAGICAL is obscene and disrespectful. Change their name all you want, we know who you're talking about, and we know you're cashing in on their trauma. Further twist of the screw, Lin is eroticized by Prince Conor, her otherness and untouchability making her enticing. Whether that is meant to be a character flaw of Conor's, or the beginning of an enemies-to-lovers arc, is unclear. But the inclusion AT ALL of "Your foreignness makes me horny" is gross, and makes Lin's RECIPROCATION of Conor's lust feel dirty and disingenuous. What upsets me about Lin's PoV as a whole is that you can tell that Clare thought she was being inclusive, thought she was giving us something fresh and special, and that just makes it even more tone deaf.
~~~~~
Final Thoughts:
There are characters here. Dumb ones, knockoffs of other stories, but here nonetheless. There is a plot here. It takes 600 pages to really pick up any momentum, and then it immediately stalls itself by forcing you to wait for the next book. If you're patient, good for you. There is something to invest in here. But the consistent over-reliance on outside knowledge (be it pop culture or history) to make up for a lack of creativity, coupled with the under or poorly represented marginalized people this book is claiming to champion, means that I am unwilling to invest. I am unwilling to give Cassandra Clare the benefit of the doubt. This book failed me, in every way.
Everyone has their demons. Literally.
Yeah, it's a cute metaphor. And there were some good extensions of that metaphor, like how having depression/traumatic guilt is like having a doppleganger vampire who consumes your every feeling and leaves you hopeless. But the rest of the book... The rest of the book was messy, and kind of boring. Some metaphors were repeated too often and lost their impact. The "twists" were obvious, too heavily hinted at in dialogues or prescient dreams. And even though - with codenames like Dante and Virgil - you knew a descent into Hell was imminent, it was still disorienting and dissatisfying to repeat the ritual and endure the dreamscapes of Hell over and over again. The gate is open, it's closed. Oops, it's not closed, but let's reopen it. Okay, close it this time. Whoopsies, we left it open AGAIN? Definitely close it this time, for sure. After we open it again - AHHHH!!!! Yes, ok, as a metaphor it makes sense, you never really shut the door on your trauma, something will always stay with you. But plot-wise, it was a lame fake-out every time, like thinking you're awake when you're still in the dream. A lot of this book felt like being stuck in the protagonists' hypno-therapy sessions. Yes, you learn a lot about them, their flaws, their shame, their resilience, (their redemption?). But you also wade through their mommy issues, and their sexuality, and their dream journal, and the death of their pet, and - AH Sudden bunny-headed daddy demon means... something?
But mercurial and personal as Hell is, metaphors alone cannot carry a book. The plot of this book didn't work as well as Ninth House. In the first book, the murders on campus are related to the opening of a gateway (a literal Hellmouth; a giant hellhound ate Darlington), and Galaxy is slowly revealed to both have a traumatizing past and a mysterious, magical future that inform her desire to fight for the present. She has a reason to sleuth. In Hell Bent, Galaxy learns about even more murders on campus, but she has no reason to assume that they are personally connected to her, so she doesn't go digging for answers. But because she's got that Main Character Energy, she stumbles into answers regardless. And wowzerz... the answers are stupid XD.
SPOILERS BELOW....
.
.
.
A demon piggyback's out of Hell when Galaxy botches a rescue attempt for Darlington. That demon is supposed to be Darlington's personal doppleganger vampire, it is supposed to consume every feeling until Darlington is a husk and it can wander the world in Darlington's place. Except, no wait a minute, it's actually a prince of Hell, and it made a deal with Darlington to give him all the knowledge he'll ever want in exchange for... something? Except no, that didn't happen either! It's a prince of hell who promotes Darlington into a half demon, and the two halves of Darlington playact a purgatory where Demon Darlington forces Human Darlington to raise his crumbling family home stone by stone without end, a la Sisyphus? Wait, no, wait... it's a prince of Hell who piggybacks out during a botched rescue, but it's interested in Galaxy, not Darlington, because Galaxy was a promised payment to this demon when four Yale frat bros opened a gateway to Hell 90 years ago?... WHAT?!?! OK, so, does Princey collect that payment immediately? No! He goes on a vampire pub crawl, sucking the life out of Yale professors and staging their corpses in semi-elaborate tableau to entice Galaxy to investigate the mystery of their demise... even though puzzles are meant to ensnare demons' attention, not humans... and even though... you're supposed to feed on the one person you're haunting... not...
Yeah, it's a mess. And we are no closer to understanding what Galaxy IS by the end of this book than we were in the first book. The character growth was too minimal, practically stagnant. The PLOT was stagnant (rescue Darlington, rescue Darlington, rescue Darlington)! And the different threads of the plot didn't weave together neatly, even when Darlington Explains it All about 80 pages before the end.
Aside from some decent (often too heavy) metaphors, and a messy plot that was more Inception than Paranormal Noir - aside from that... the book suffered for its setting. I think Leigh Bardugo let too much of herself bleed into the book this time. The different buildings or rooms at Yale are often name dropped with little or no description, making them inaccessible to the imagination if you haven't been there before (or paused your reading to do a Google search). The odd choice to make Galaxy's past try and catch up to her, and to keep L.A. and Yale as relevant settings to each other, by making ONE drug dealer who wants to run both coasts was... just laughable, to me XD. If Breaking Bad taught me anything, it's that rival cartels will lock up the shady business of ONE CITY, never mind TWO coastlines! XD Besides, when your two antagonists are the Prince of Hell vs. That One Rich Kid Who Won't Stop Texting Me, there are no stakes. You know the kid is a non-threat, he's a flea on a rhinoceros! Eitan would have been scary, another time, another place. He's not anymore, he's just annoying. And retconning the part of the first book which had Galaxy in the clear, had her literally get away with murder, just screams SEQUEL Energy. Let's peel back the curtain a second and see the wizard: The only reason L.A. and Yale are being smushed together as locations of equal, present importance, is because they are important to the author in her real life. They are what she knows, what she feels strongly about. In parts of this book, Galaxy became insert fiction, enjoying architecture and nature and a lazy day reading with a cup of tea... I don't feel the set dressing was always true to Galaxy's character, or propelling her character where it needed to go.
And speaking of characters trapped by Bardugo's own bias... HMMM, where have we seen a witty, curious, chivalrous prince turned half-demon by trauma and whose savagery is soothed by a dark, guarded, wounded, ruthless, brave queen? Hello, Nikolai and Zoya. Are we seriously recycling King of Scars? It hurts to see Darlington and Galaxy reduced to silhouettes, a pattern that Bardugo already knows how to cut out and deliver.
All in all, as much as I was chomping at the bit for a sequel... I think this book needed more time, more thought, before it was given to us. There needed to be an editing eye that said, "This seems convoluted", "This needs extrapolating", trust your readers here, hold their hands here... and Hell's Bells, get out of your own way. Take the author out of the book, and just let the characters tell their story. There was something in here about survivors that wanted to be told, but it didn't live up to its predecessors, and it didn't say anything new.
Yeah, it's a cute metaphor. And there were some good extensions of that metaphor, like how having depression/traumatic guilt is like having a doppleganger vampire who consumes your every feeling and leaves you hopeless. But the rest of the book... The rest of the book was messy, and kind of boring. Some metaphors were repeated too often and lost their impact. The "twists" were obvious, too heavily hinted at in dialogues or prescient dreams. And even though - with codenames like Dante and Virgil - you knew a descent into Hell was imminent, it was still disorienting and dissatisfying to repeat the ritual and endure the dreamscapes of Hell over and over again. The gate is open, it's closed. Oops, it's not closed, but let's reopen it. Okay, close it this time. Whoopsies, we left it open AGAIN? Definitely close it this time, for sure. After we open it again - AHHHH!!!! Yes, ok, as a metaphor it makes sense, you never really shut the door on your trauma, something will always stay with you. But plot-wise, it was a lame fake-out every time, like thinking you're awake when you're still in the dream. A lot of this book felt like being stuck in the protagonists' hypno-therapy sessions. Yes, you learn a lot about them, their flaws, their shame, their resilience, (their redemption?). But you also wade through their mommy issues, and their sexuality, and their dream journal, and the death of their pet, and - AH Sudden bunny-headed daddy demon means... something?
But mercurial and personal as Hell is, metaphors alone cannot carry a book. The plot of this book didn't work as well as Ninth House. In the first book, the murders on campus are related to the opening of a gateway (a literal Hellmouth; a giant hellhound ate Darlington), and Galaxy is slowly revealed to both have a traumatizing past and a mysterious, magical future that inform her desire to fight for the present. She has a reason to sleuth. In Hell Bent, Galaxy learns about even more murders on campus, but she has no reason to assume that they are personally connected to her, so she doesn't go digging for answers. But because she's got that Main Character Energy, she stumbles into answers regardless. And wowzerz... the answers are stupid XD.
SPOILERS BELOW....
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A demon piggyback's out of Hell when Galaxy botches a rescue attempt for Darlington. That demon is supposed to be Darlington's personal doppleganger vampire, it is supposed to consume every feeling until Darlington is a husk and it can wander the world in Darlington's place. Except, no wait a minute, it's actually a prince of Hell, and it made a deal with Darlington to give him all the knowledge he'll ever want in exchange for... something? Except no, that didn't happen either! It's a prince of hell who promotes Darlington into a half demon, and the two halves of Darlington playact a purgatory where Demon Darlington forces Human Darlington to raise his crumbling family home stone by stone without end, a la Sisyphus? Wait, no, wait... it's a prince of Hell who piggybacks out during a botched rescue, but it's interested in Galaxy, not Darlington, because Galaxy was a promised payment to this demon when four Yale frat bros opened a gateway to Hell 90 years ago?... WHAT?!?! OK, so, does Princey collect that payment immediately? No! He goes on a vampire pub crawl, sucking the life out of Yale professors and staging their corpses in semi-elaborate tableau to entice Galaxy to investigate the mystery of their demise... even though puzzles are meant to ensnare demons' attention, not humans... and even though... you're supposed to feed on the one person you're haunting... not...
Yeah, it's a mess. And we are no closer to understanding what Galaxy IS by the end of this book than we were in the first book. The character growth was too minimal, practically stagnant. The PLOT was stagnant (rescue Darlington, rescue Darlington, rescue Darlington)! And the different threads of the plot didn't weave together neatly, even when Darlington Explains it All about 80 pages before the end.
Aside from some decent (often too heavy) metaphors, and a messy plot that was more Inception than Paranormal Noir - aside from that... the book suffered for its setting. I think Leigh Bardugo let too much of herself bleed into the book this time. The different buildings or rooms at Yale are often name dropped with little or no description, making them inaccessible to the imagination if you haven't been there before (or paused your reading to do a Google search). The odd choice to make Galaxy's past try and catch up to her, and to keep L.A. and Yale as relevant settings to each other, by making ONE drug dealer who wants to run both coasts was... just laughable, to me XD. If Breaking Bad taught me anything, it's that rival cartels will lock up the shady business of ONE CITY, never mind TWO coastlines! XD Besides, when your two antagonists are the Prince of Hell vs. That One Rich Kid Who Won't Stop Texting Me, there are no stakes. You know the kid is a non-threat, he's a flea on a rhinoceros! Eitan would have been scary, another time, another place. He's not anymore, he's just annoying. And retconning the part of the first book which had Galaxy in the clear, had her literally get away with murder, just screams SEQUEL Energy. Let's peel back the curtain a second and see the wizard: The only reason L.A. and Yale are being smushed together as locations of equal, present importance, is because they are important to the author in her real life. They are what she knows, what she feels strongly about. In parts of this book, Galaxy became insert fiction, enjoying architecture and nature and a lazy day reading with a cup of tea... I don't feel the set dressing was always true to Galaxy's character, or propelling her character where it needed to go.
And speaking of characters trapped by Bardugo's own bias... HMMM, where have we seen a witty, curious, chivalrous prince turned half-demon by trauma and whose savagery is soothed by a dark, guarded, wounded, ruthless, brave queen? Hello, Nikolai and Zoya. Are we seriously recycling King of Scars? It hurts to see Darlington and Galaxy reduced to silhouettes, a pattern that Bardugo already knows how to cut out and deliver.
All in all, as much as I was chomping at the bit for a sequel... I think this book needed more time, more thought, before it was given to us. There needed to be an editing eye that said, "This seems convoluted", "This needs extrapolating", trust your readers here, hold their hands here... and Hell's Bells, get out of your own way. Take the author out of the book, and just let the characters tell their story. There was something in here about survivors that wanted to be told, but it didn't live up to its predecessors, and it didn't say anything new.
Overwritten and full of tropes. I was bored to tears. Phantom of the Opera did it better.
The concept of this book - that the characters are these disparate threads that will weave together in time - is cute, but was never quite as tight as I wanted it to be. I wanted a clear, central thread that united all of the new characters. And truthfully, I wanted a less-is-more approach to the old characters. I wanted their intersections with the new cast to come as a pleasant surprise! I wanted the last seven years to be left to the imagination, allowing the reader to assume some happy adventures filled their lives before the next crisis rose. Instead, too much time was spent on the old guard's time skip, and how - more often than not - they had spent the last seven years suffering.
Lila, especially, comes off REALLY badly with all the backstory filled in: She doesn't love Kell but keeps him around out of...what... pity? Guilt? Trauma bond? She belittles his pain and depression, treating him like a bore and a crybaby. She uses her magic and other strengths to humiliate him, often against his will for her pleasure. She lies to him, replaces him as the self-righteous, worlds-policing Antarti...but she's still LILA, and has learned no self-restraint, no balance, no remorse, little compassion... She's insufferable and toxic. I hate to say it, but I was actually rooting for Berras to steal her powers, and give her a taste of how it feels. Holland and Kell sacrificed for the greater good. Lila keeps swanning on through like nothing will ever stick to her. She doesn't deserve to have everything and go unchecked. I wanted her to LOSE.
I think there were some HUGE missed opportunities to make the story tighter, instead of introducing more and more and more new characters. Why did Kell waste seven years becoming a sword fighter, knowing it would never be enough? Why didn't he leave Lila sooner to become a vigilante? He could have invented The Hand to draw out dissenters, and then sabotage them, like how he took out The Shadows. Why didn't Kell go full Batman, with magic-tech gadgets inspired by White and Grey London, returning to his roots as the guy who amasses illegal trinkets from all the worlds?
Why didn't Rhy attempt to follow in his father's footsteps, and develop an interest in magical metalworks, or runic defenses? Why didn't he become The Clockwork King, who designed a whole golem army so that no more lives be needlessly lost? Why didn't RHY invent the rings - inspired by the Antari rings - that could share power, so that he could use Alucard or Kell's magic? Why didn't Rhy accidentally invent a door between worlds after borrowing Antari power, and become obsessed with making magic equally available to the masses, instead of hoarded in the hands of the few (rationalizing that he was absolving Kell from having to be an ever-present superhero, and empowering his otherwise defenseless people)?
Why didn't this mutual obsession with who should have power, and how, drive a wedge between the inseparable brothers? Why didn't it bring any of the other Londons - especially Grey - into the foreground?!?!
Insteeeeead, this book tried to do a "strong female characters" thing that really backfired. Tes, Lila, Nadiya, Kosika, Ezril, and Bex are the heftiest part of this book, and there are too many similarities between them: Loners, ruthless, reckless, arrogant... Theirs isn't a story of empowerment; it's a story of entitlement. They threaten or manipulate their way out of consequences, and apologize to no one.
It's an odd jumble: To like - but not love - the book for what it introduces. To wish for both less and more.
Lila, especially, comes off REALLY badly with all the backstory filled in: She doesn't love Kell but keeps him around out of...what... pity? Guilt? Trauma bond? She belittles his pain and depression, treating him like a bore and a crybaby. She uses her magic and other strengths to humiliate him, often against his will for her pleasure. She lies to him, replaces him as the self-righteous, worlds-policing Antarti...but she's still LILA, and has learned no self-restraint, no balance, no remorse, little compassion... She's insufferable and toxic. I hate to say it, but I was actually rooting for Berras to steal her powers, and give her a taste of how it feels. Holland and Kell sacrificed for the greater good. Lila keeps swanning on through like nothing will ever stick to her. She doesn't deserve to have everything and go unchecked. I wanted her to LOSE.
I think there were some HUGE missed opportunities to make the story tighter, instead of introducing more and more and more new characters. Why did Kell waste seven years becoming a sword fighter, knowing it would never be enough? Why didn't he leave Lila sooner to become a vigilante? He could have invented The Hand to draw out dissenters, and then sabotage them, like how he took out The Shadows. Why didn't Kell go full Batman, with magic-tech gadgets inspired by White and Grey London, returning to his roots as the guy who amasses illegal trinkets from all the worlds?
Why didn't Rhy attempt to follow in his father's footsteps, and develop an interest in magical metalworks, or runic defenses? Why didn't he become The Clockwork King, who designed a whole golem army so that no more lives be needlessly lost? Why didn't RHY invent the rings - inspired by the Antari rings - that could share power, so that he could use Alucard or Kell's magic? Why didn't Rhy accidentally invent a door between worlds after borrowing Antari power, and become obsessed with making magic equally available to the masses, instead of hoarded in the hands of the few (rationalizing that he was absolving Kell from having to be an ever-present superhero, and empowering his otherwise defenseless people)?
Why didn't this mutual obsession with who should have power, and how, drive a wedge between the inseparable brothers? Why didn't it bring any of the other Londons - especially Grey - into the foreground?!?!
Insteeeeead, this book tried to do a "strong female characters" thing that really backfired. Tes, Lila, Nadiya, Kosika, Ezril, and Bex are the heftiest part of this book, and there are too many similarities between them: Loners, ruthless, reckless, arrogant... Theirs isn't a story of empowerment; it's a story of entitlement. They threaten or manipulate their way out of consequences, and apologize to no one.
It's an odd jumble: To like - but not love - the book for what it introduces. To wish for both less and more.
This book is a thrilling, immersive, page-turner!!! The political intrigue is so well done; truly everyone seems capable of the who-dunnit at various points in the story. I was worried that the foreground - the tea ceremony - would be too cozy a setting, but not at all. The author does a brilliant job evoking the feelings, powers, and messages behind each brew, AND of incorporating Ning's knowledge into harrowing situations.
There were only two minor aspects of the book which gave me pause:
1) Ning and Kang's enemies-to-lovers (to enemies?) thing was a little YA Bingo. They meet in the marketplace, but she learns later he's no street rat. She almost trips into traffic, he saves her, she swoons over his muscles. She falls in water, he rescues her, adrenaline is pumping, they smooch. She breaks up with him because, "You lied to me!" even though it's probably just a misunderstanding.... A lot of Disney Princess vibes. They have enough about THEM personally that is original, so I was invested, whether their romance pans out or not. But their romantic scenes almost felt like hard cuts, like a publisher said, "Now, do something shippy right here! Shipping fodder is how you sell books, you know!"
2) In the opening chapters it's revealed that tea can be brewed to magically enhance all kinds of things: Courage, Persuasiveness, Perception...and later we learn that truly magical abilities, like illusions, or necromancy, are a thing! But this book largely has Ning healing poisons or magical imbalances. Neither her deceptions, nor the larger politics, seem to be doing much with the range of magics available. I would love to learn that someone's understanding of who to trust/what was happening was corrupted by magical influence.
But despite those two little nitpicks, I was well invested in the story and the world unfolding. I love that the magic system is about understanding and empathizing with another person. It comes with a price: Yes, strength can be imparted, but only by first making oneself vulnerable. And a lingering connection remains even after the ritual is complete; bonded by shared experience. I love that the intention is to /give/ to another, to offer support, to even help shoulder their suffering as your own; and it is taboo to /take/ something, to use a bond to subjugate or manipulate another person.
Stunning, beautiful writing, and a complicated web being woven. I cannot wait to read the next book!
There were only two minor aspects of the book which gave me pause:
1) Ning and Kang's enemies-to-lovers (to enemies?) thing was a little YA Bingo. They meet in the marketplace, but she learns later he's no street rat. She almost trips into traffic, he saves her, she swoons over his muscles. She falls in water, he rescues her, adrenaline is pumping, they smooch. She breaks up with him because, "You lied to me!" even though it's probably just a misunderstanding.... A lot of Disney Princess vibes. They have enough about THEM personally that is original, so I was invested, whether their romance pans out or not. But their romantic scenes almost felt like hard cuts, like a publisher said, "Now, do something shippy right here! Shipping fodder is how you sell books, you know!"
2) In the opening chapters it's revealed that tea can be brewed to magically enhance all kinds of things: Courage, Persuasiveness, Perception...and later we learn that truly magical abilities, like illusions, or necromancy, are a thing! But this book largely has Ning healing poisons or magical imbalances. Neither her deceptions, nor the larger politics, seem to be doing much with the range of magics available. I would love to learn that someone's understanding of who to trust/what was happening was corrupted by magical influence.
But despite those two little nitpicks, I was well invested in the story and the world unfolding. I love that the magic system is about understanding and empathizing with another person. It comes with a price: Yes, strength can be imparted, but only by first making oneself vulnerable. And a lingering connection remains even after the ritual is complete; bonded by shared experience. I love that the intention is to /give/ to another, to offer support, to even help shoulder their suffering as your own; and it is taboo to /take/ something, to use a bond to subjugate or manipulate another person.
Stunning, beautiful writing, and a complicated web being woven. I cannot wait to read the next book!
Never has the second half of a duology failed the first book's setup soooo thoroughly. The political intrigue doesn't matter, because none of the antagonists are acting of their own accord; everyone is being puppeteered by an evil snake god. It's essentially a Christian allegory: People aren't evil, they're tempted, but all evil is just The Devil working through them. We've even got our leading lad and lady who had to give up the innocence of The Garden of Good and Evil, once Eve/Ning was tempted by a snake, and both protagonists learned some hard truths about Death. Paaaaathetic. Nothing original or noteworthy here.
If you liked Ning's fish-out-of-water story from the first book, where she struggled to understand the deceptions and war games being played around her, you will HATE how her agency is completely stripped in the second book. She moves from place to thing because it was prophesied in the stars, or by a tea-drinking hermit, or because of LITERALY DIVINE INTERVENTION! She doesn't have to be cunning or discerning, she doesn't even have to make decisions for herself. She is teleported from plot point to plot point, handed MacGuffins, and stands back while other people wield them.
If you liked Ning's relationship to nature in the first book - how her magic came from having respect and balance, both for the natural world and for other people who showed mutual respect - then you will hate how the second book is entirely about amassing holy relics, and using them like infinity stones to subdue the big bad. There is no heroic moment of martyrdom, no realization that Ning has to restore balance by taking on the enemy, or the people's, suffering as her own. No moment when she uses the balance of nature to combat snakey's chaotic influence. And barely a moment of using her tea to keep her teammates balance. Mostly, the final showdown is: She gives her boyfriend a knife, and he cuts the evil snake open... wahoo...
Did you like Kang's air of mystery in the first book? It was intriguing, trying to figure out if he was being sly or sincere? TOO BAD, because turns out he's a dumb-dumb, who can't tell that his father - who sentences innocent people to be publicly executed - is the BAD guy! He also couldn't tell that EVERYTHING Chancellor Zhou says about Ning is a lie, even though Kang was DIRECTLY INVOLVED in the coup, and knows she wasn't a part of it! Kang is, for no good reason, a moron in this second book. His blind affection for his father does not excuse the massacre at the capital, and his Happily Ever After with Ning is NOT earned. Plus, the second book makes the baffling decision to switch to third person PoV to inform the readers of what Kang is up to. The shift in narration takes all of the sympathy that would have been earned from first person, and all of the adrenaline from the political mystery, out of the story, handing the reader big exposition dumps instead. It's boring, and counter-productive.
If you liked Harry Potter, you'll be REALLY ANNOYED at how this book seems to borrow a lot of the same elements. Evil snake-enthusiast who possesses people, hides part of his person in nondescript tokens, and has a strong magical connection to the protagonist (which manifests in our hero having frequent migraines and scar pains)... Yeah, it's just Voldemort, guys. Snakeman even falls apart into scaly ashes when his body's killed, just like Voldemort at the end of the movies.
Penultimate point of contention: This duology makes the same mistake that a lot of YA tournament-based books do: NONE OF THE SECONDARY CHARACTERS MATTER!!!! Princess, bodyguard, sister, monk, rival, all her friends from the kitchens, the mysterious ally from the Peony teahouse, every single head of state... nobody matters!!! Either they die, don't interact with Ning or Kang at all, or interact briefly in the form of escort missions where they are sloughed off on another guardian a chapter or two later. This duology SUPPOSEDLY set out to be about balance, understanding, empathy, deception, betrayal - HUMAN emotions and conflicts - but in the end it was largely inhuman (gods vs gods), and not at all inter-human with its conflicts or resolution.
Final nail in the coffin: This book did not need to be a duology. Either it should have dared to be a really long stand-alone book, modeled after Chinese myths, OR it should have been a longer series, taking time to establish the lore, the world, and an ensemble of important characters. But a doulogy suggests a mirroring, it suggests that something set up in book 1 will have an echo and payoff in book 2. There were many ways to do it. This book chose none of them.
If you liked Ning's fish-out-of-water story from the first book, where she struggled to understand the deceptions and war games being played around her, you will HATE how her agency is completely stripped in the second book. She moves from place to thing because it was prophesied in the stars, or by a tea-drinking hermit, or because of LITERALY DIVINE INTERVENTION! She doesn't have to be cunning or discerning, she doesn't even have to make decisions for herself. She is teleported from plot point to plot point, handed MacGuffins, and stands back while other people wield them.
If you liked Ning's relationship to nature in the first book - how her magic came from having respect and balance, both for the natural world and for other people who showed mutual respect - then you will hate how the second book is entirely about amassing holy relics, and using them like infinity stones to subdue the big bad. There is no heroic moment of martyrdom, no realization that Ning has to restore balance by taking on the enemy, or the people's, suffering as her own. No moment when she uses the balance of nature to combat snakey's chaotic influence. And barely a moment of using her tea to keep her teammates balance. Mostly, the final showdown is: She gives her boyfriend a knife, and he cuts the evil snake open... wahoo...
Did you like Kang's air of mystery in the first book? It was intriguing, trying to figure out if he was being sly or sincere? TOO BAD, because turns out he's a dumb-dumb, who can't tell that his father - who sentences innocent people to be publicly executed - is the BAD guy! He also couldn't tell that EVERYTHING Chancellor Zhou says about Ning is a lie, even though Kang was DIRECTLY INVOLVED in the coup, and knows she wasn't a part of it! Kang is, for no good reason, a moron in this second book. His blind affection for his father does not excuse the massacre at the capital, and his Happily Ever After with Ning is NOT earned. Plus, the second book makes the baffling decision to switch to third person PoV to inform the readers of what Kang is up to. The shift in narration takes all of the sympathy that would have been earned from first person, and all of the adrenaline from the political mystery, out of the story, handing the reader big exposition dumps instead. It's boring, and counter-productive.
If you liked Harry Potter, you'll be REALLY ANNOYED at how this book seems to borrow a lot of the same elements. Evil snake-enthusiast who possesses people, hides part of his person in nondescript tokens, and has a strong magical connection to the protagonist (which manifests in our hero having frequent migraines and scar pains)... Yeah, it's just Voldemort, guys. Snakeman even falls apart into scaly ashes when his body's killed, just like Voldemort at the end of the movies.
Penultimate point of contention: This duology makes the same mistake that a lot of YA tournament-based books do: NONE OF THE SECONDARY CHARACTERS MATTER!!!! Princess, bodyguard, sister, monk, rival, all her friends from the kitchens, the mysterious ally from the Peony teahouse, every single head of state... nobody matters!!! Either they die, don't interact with Ning or Kang at all, or interact briefly in the form of escort missions where they are sloughed off on another guardian a chapter or two later. This duology SUPPOSEDLY set out to be about balance, understanding, empathy, deception, betrayal - HUMAN emotions and conflicts - but in the end it was largely inhuman (gods vs gods), and not at all inter-human with its conflicts or resolution.
Final nail in the coffin: This book did not need to be a duology. Either it should have dared to be a really long stand-alone book, modeled after Chinese myths, OR it should have been a longer series, taking time to establish the lore, the world, and an ensemble of important characters. But a doulogy suggests a mirroring, it suggests that something set up in book 1 will have an echo and payoff in book 2. There were many ways to do it. This book chose none of them.
In a nutshell, the message of this book is that we are all at our worst at some point, but we shouldn't let the worst of us define us, and we should always strive to do better. Human hubris, compassion, and resilience are all showcased in beautiful, sweeping, sci-fi fashion.
You can tell that this book was written when #BlackLivesMatter was at its most intense momentum. There is a beautiful love letter/apology to conquered and displaced peoples, in this book. Mourning the loss of lives and culture, the loss of home, the generations enslaved and treated as inferior/other, the impotent anguish with no clear way forward, and the splintering of cultural identity where some cling to the past and others identify with their new, assimilated, culture. I feel a great many lost voices in America are represented here in this book, and the grief-stricken and sincere dialogue it opens is masterful.
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Buuuuuut, as I've stated before, this book series has PACING ISSUES!!! And in THIS book, Sanderson decided to be CUTE, and mock the audience! "It's the journey that's most important, who cares if the path's unclear." "A story doesn't need a through-line of meaning or conflict. It can be a series of vignettes, glimpses into other people's lives, and that's meaningful enough." "Of course an odyssey has some boring parts, but you shouldn't just skip ahead to the action! The act of slogging through dense or repetitive texts allows to reader to share the protagonist's journey!" Having multiple characters, throughout the book, break the fourth wall essentially, to say how good of Sanderson it was that he write these meandering doorstops, took all the emersion and fun out of the series for me.
I also strongly disagree with anyone who applauds the world-building of these books. I have said from the beginning, that the Cosmere is more alive in Sanderson's head than it is on the page; you need an Appendix to understand anything that's happening! I don't think Sanderson has made his ensemble visceral enough. I cannot tell the soldiers of Bridge 4 apart, or the political delegates from other nations. I cannot tell the races and cultures apart, save for a few. I cannot figure out the relationship between gemhearts, stormspheres, the soul orbs in Shadesmar, the chasm fiends, the thunderclasts, the carapace-covered Parshendi, and the crystallized human agents of Odium. I don't understand why the Mental plane was so alien in previous books, and now is just straight up Fairyland: Fully open and symbiotic with humanity, and even largely homonoidal themselves! I don't understand why traitors (won't name names for spoiler reasons) aren't given their comeuppance. Or why relationship beats go unexplored. And I see way too many instances where Christian iconography is used as a crutch instead of relying on original writing.
I can ALSO also see what Sanderson has spoken of in interviews: That he has a framework for a book in mind, and then writes little vignettes to link from major point to major point. The short snippet scenes method leads to some sloppy transitions, where the protagonists just ARE where they need to be, and in the middle of a battle or discovery, or even RESOLVING a conflict that happened off-page! It's not neat connective tissue, it reads like, "The author didn't know what to put here. So, he didn't!"
I'm over it. I have read 3 books, almost 4,000 pages, and I am done making excuses for this series. It has great messages, and great concepts. But it fails a lot of basic storytelling elements, like how to resolve a conflict, or how to build inter-character relationships, or how to communicate a completely made up world to a naive newcomer! I. Am. Over. It. I'm done. 3 stars for reading an odyssey that mostly made me say..."meh?"
You can tell that this book was written when #BlackLivesMatter was at its most intense momentum. There is a beautiful love letter/apology to conquered and displaced peoples, in this book. Mourning the loss of lives and culture, the loss of home, the generations enslaved and treated as inferior/other, the impotent anguish with no clear way forward, and the splintering of cultural identity where some cling to the past and others identify with their new, assimilated, culture. I feel a great many lost voices in America are represented here in this book, and the grief-stricken and sincere dialogue it opens is masterful.
.
.
.
Buuuuuut, as I've stated before, this book series has PACING ISSUES!!! And in THIS book, Sanderson decided to be CUTE, and mock the audience! "It's the journey that's most important, who cares if the path's unclear." "A story doesn't need a through-line of meaning or conflict. It can be a series of vignettes, glimpses into other people's lives, and that's meaningful enough." "Of course an odyssey has some boring parts, but you shouldn't just skip ahead to the action! The act of slogging through dense or repetitive texts allows to reader to share the protagonist's journey!" Having multiple characters, throughout the book, break the fourth wall essentially, to say how good of Sanderson it was that he write these meandering doorstops, took all the emersion and fun out of the series for me.
I also strongly disagree with anyone who applauds the world-building of these books. I have said from the beginning, that the Cosmere is more alive in Sanderson's head than it is on the page; you need an Appendix to understand anything that's happening! I don't think Sanderson has made his ensemble visceral enough. I cannot tell the soldiers of Bridge 4 apart, or the political delegates from other nations. I cannot tell the races and cultures apart, save for a few. I cannot figure out the relationship between gemhearts, stormspheres, the soul orbs in Shadesmar, the chasm fiends, the thunderclasts, the carapace-covered Parshendi, and the crystallized human agents of Odium. I don't understand why the Mental plane was so alien in previous books, and now is just straight up Fairyland: Fully open and symbiotic with humanity, and even largely homonoidal themselves! I don't understand why traitors (won't name names for spoiler reasons) aren't given their comeuppance. Or why relationship beats go unexplored. And I see way too many instances where Christian iconography is used as a crutch instead of relying on original writing.
I can ALSO also see what Sanderson has spoken of in interviews: That he has a framework for a book in mind, and then writes little vignettes to link from major point to major point. The short snippet scenes method leads to some sloppy transitions, where the protagonists just ARE where they need to be, and in the middle of a battle or discovery, or even RESOLVING a conflict that happened off-page! It's not neat connective tissue, it reads like, "The author didn't know what to put here. So, he didn't!"
I'm over it. I have read 3 books, almost 4,000 pages, and I am done making excuses for this series. It has great messages, and great concepts. But it fails a lot of basic storytelling elements, like how to resolve a conflict, or how to build inter-character relationships, or how to communicate a completely made up world to a naive newcomer! I. Am. Over. It. I'm done. 3 stars for reading an odyssey that mostly made me say..."meh?"
DNF at 50 pages. The writing is so immature, it's like reading a middle schooler's diary. Could not care less about the story when it's told by such a bratty voice.