I have been trying to write this review for over a month. First I was blocked because of something I couldn’t figure out how to say about it, and then I moved, and then I went on vacation, and I’ve only read seven books this month! SEVEN! I give up officially on writing a coherent review because I just want it out of my life. I have no idea what I’m about to type. Also, in order to get in a frame of mind to write this and my many piled up reviews, I may have had some wine. Soooooooo.
This was much different and much better than I thought it was going to be. I’m kicking myself for not reading it sooner. (I could think up lots of excuses for why it took me so long to pick it up, despite numerous recommendations from trusted sources, but honestly it was 99% because I haaaaate the cover. Cover model, close your mouth!) (I feel obligated to note that 99% of the time I will hate any book cover with a person’s real face on it. It’s book cover tyranny, I tell you. TYRANNY.)
Maybe I will get around my weirdness re: writing about this book by not even trying to describe the plot. After all, I read a lot a lot a lot of reviews for this book (many on this very site) before I picked the book up, and many of them had very nice plot summaries and shiz like that, and I still felt no interest to read it. But as soon as I picked it up, I was immediately compelled to continue, and rather enamored. The tone and the feeling of the characters and the setting of a book isn’t something you can convey in a plot summary. Especially since the plot wasn’t the draw for me. (In fact . . . this is actually a pretty plot light book. The emphasis is definitely on the more experiential type of story that I enjoy, not so much on “this happened and then this happened and then this”.) It’s the same issue I had with Big Little Lies and books of that type. I refused to pick it up for the longest time, only to find myself enchanted by the writing.
ANYWAY I LIKED THIS BOOK A LOT.
The first half in particular when our MC Meg is being introduced to the world of the Others (and they to her) was like book crack to me. I did think it dragged a little at the end, and perhaps could have been tightened up, but that’s a minor complaint, and may have been influenced by the fact that I listened to the first half in a marathon sesh while driving on the freeway, and the second half at home in my usual audiobook listening places (getting ready, in the car, etc.) Marathon listening is in general a much preferable way of sinking into an audiobook.
So if you like fantasy but have been reluctant to pick up this for any reason (stupid reason or not, aka like hating the cover, cough, kicking self) I would just give it a try. May not be your cup of tea, but you may end up really into it.
I feel it necessary to note because the alcohol is giving me fiery courage, I thought really hard about Melanir’s well thought out and interesting review the entire time I was reading this, because I don’t want to promote or like unreservedly and without thought anything that is icky or racist, but I just didn’t see it. (Actually her review was one of the reasons I did finally pick up the book! It made me curious.) Perhaps I am too generous a reader. And I don’t mean that like OH HOW GENEROUS I AM more like, I know that I read towards author intentions, rather than reader interpretations as a natural extension of my personality, which does mean that I tend not to mind things that some people see as problematic. Figuring out how to say that intelligently is one of the reasons I spent over a month and a half not writing this review, so I’m just going to leave it at that.
One thing I will say is that this seems to be shaping up to be a story about two opposing sides coming together, which is a kind of story my brain goes gaga for. I will probably be checking out the next three books in the series later this year.
Welcome back! This book has been near the top of my list for a while.
You should take the plunge!
Meanwhile, while I was gone badkittyuno read one trillion books.
I’m glad you liked it. I do like that this site will often have different views of books.
It never ceases to amaze me how two people can look at the same book and have such different experiences reading it.
You’re back! And you really liked Written in Red. Both of these things fill me with happy.
Yay! I’ve been so out of it what with moving and such. It’ll be nice to start reviewing and commenting again.
Glad to have you back!
I love these books. I know that lots of people have issues with them, but I can’t wait to get my hands on the new one.
They released the cover, and it looks like they changed the cover model! It’s very upsetting.
They released the cover the other day, and it looks like they changed the cover model! It’s very upsetting.
Okay, so here’ s my problem. I read everyone’s reviews of this one (since I read nearly all reviews posted here, unless they are for sequels of books I haven’t read), and I was very intrigued. I ordered it from my lovely library, started reading it, and HATED the first chapter so much that I immediately returned it to said library.
Which leads to this question – do you all feel the first chapter is indicative of the rest of the book? Should I revisit, or just move on? Is this one a smidge too fantasy for me? The world may never know…
It’s hard to answer that without knowing why you hated it, haha. Why did you hate it? And at what point did you stop in the story? (I don’t remember where the first chapter ended.)
Do you not normally read urban fantasy? (Which is a different beast entirely from regular swords and sorcery fantasy.)
If memory serves, the first chapter is all set up and I found the authorial voice to be… slow? Like it felt like reading molasses. Does that make sense? I also found everything murky in my mind.
I don’t read fantasy, urban or otherwise, and was hoping to expand into this one since such a variety of readers found something to like. (And I really want to do Fantasy next year for Book Club and its likely going to be a *struggle* for me).
Here’s my two cents: I agree that the pacing is slow, and that’s what I liked about it. It gave it a touch of realism in a made-up fantastic world. Yes, this is a city run by wolves and vampires, but someone still has to sign for UPS packages. That really worked for me.
Hmmm, that’s tough. Most fantasy starts off “slow,” simply because if you drop your reader too fast into a made-up world, they’re not going to know what the hell is going on. That also might account for that murky feeling. I get something similar when I’m first entering a new fantasy world. It does take some mental effort to push past it until you can get your bearings, which nearly always happens fairly soon. For example, I remember being SO CONFUSED when I read A Game of Thrones the first time. I still have the post-it notes I made with the Stark and Lannister immediate family trees stuck in the back of my paperback, and the one where I noted which Direwolf belonged to whom . . . this kills me because it’s basic information. I can’t for the life of me figure out how I had trouble remembering the five Stark kids plus Jon, and that Cersei and Jaime were twins (which I made sure to note on the post-it).
For me, that feeling is actually part of why I read fantasy. I looooove discovering new worlds in books. I love seeing how the authors set up the social dynamics, and exploring fantastical places. And this book really does an excellent job with that. It was one of my favorite parts about it.