They say you shouldn't judge a book by it's cover. You can't see it too well in the pic, but this edition is actually an iridescent pink-purple that shimmers. I picked it up because I read Scarborough's work in an anthology of science-fiction, and she was the only author whose story I gave 5*. The shiny pink cover and cozy cover art made me think I was going to be getting a delightfully fluffy faerie tale retelling, maybe in the vein of Mercedes Lackey's 500 Kingdoms series.
You shouldn't judge a book by its cover.
This was a "stealth read," which means that I read it without adding it to Goodreads first, and didn't post any status updates. Had I added it to Goodreads, my status updates would have been growing increasingly unhappy and dismayed with what I was reading.
Here's the basic premise: Rose is a social worker who wants to do good in the world and save children from bad situations. She lives in Seattle, and as with most big cities, there's a lot of crime and other bad stuff. One day, in her friend's curiosity shop, she spies a crystal necklace that's supposed to be good for wishes or magic or something (I forget), and jokes to her friend that she wishes someone would "save the whole damn city." Enter Felicity Fortune, fairy godmother extraordinaire, who plans to do just that.
In THE GODMOTHER, Scarborough modernizes and synthesizes several faerie tales to fit the narrative, including a homeless teen whose luck changes when he meets a talking cat (Puss in Boots); a rebellious former drug addict with a rock star father whose jealous model stepmother is trying to murder her (Snow White); and a girl who works in a stable whose greedy relatives are doing their best to get her fired from her job, as well as disinherited from her father's will (Cinderella). There's also a Vietnamese kid who came from a refugee camp and while at first he counted his good fortune, his bitterness has corrupted him and now he steals and is part of a gang (I am not familiar with the faerie tale that this was based on, but the "goddess" he referred to was Kwan Yin which seems to be an alternate spelling of Guanyin, an enlightened figure in the Buddhist religion).
All of this would have been fine, except for the "Hansel and Gretel" retelling: a child molester who ends up getting his hands on two kids whose selfish mother keeps trying to ditch them since her new boyfriend hates kids. There are few things that I absolutely cannot stand to read about, and will actually affect my rating in a negative way, but two absolutes are children being abused and having this abuse written about in a graphic way, and animal abuse and torture. And man, this book is graphic. The child molester in this book sexually assaults and tortures these poor kids, and we're treated to an absolutely gruesome scene that tells us what he's done with some of the others.
I know stuff like this happens, and it's awful, and it's so important that people be made aware of the reality of abuse so they can stand against it. But there's a time and a place, and it just felt so unnecessary here. Especially with that deceptively innocent cover and the quirky, oh-so-adorable summary on the back cover. "She is Rose's wish come true. She shines a light of hope on this city of lost souls. And she lives in every heart that ever dared to dream..." P.S. RAPE, TORTURE, AND DISMEMBERMENT AWAITS THOSE INSIDE! HAVE FUN! I so did not sign up for that.
Scarborough is a good writer, but this is not her best. If you want faerie tale retellings, you would be far better off sticking with Mercedes Lackey's 500 Kingdoms or Elemental Masters series. I see that there are two more books in this series, and I'm not sure if I'll read them. I love the premise behind these books but if they're as dark as this one was... yeah, no thanks. :|
Edit: Lost a few friends over this book, so on it goes to the books-that-made-me-lose-friends shelf, where it can party with my feminism and anti-Trump reads. #NeverthelessSheKeptReviewing
Sarah J. Maas is basically the Taylor Swift of books: they are both among the most well known (if not THE most well known) in the genres they create work for, and have cultish fan bases that believe they can do no wrong. And both, in my opinion, are over-hyped.
I originally started THRONE OF GLASS three years ago. I hated it, and wrote a scathing one-star review of it filled with swear words and vitriol. That original review was actually deleted by me, along with about 3000+ books I rated and reviewed between 2009 and 2016, for a variety of reasons, which I discuss here (and will touch on as well at the end of this review). I originally planned to read and review the entire series, but the first book put me off so much that I never attempted the series again - until now.
I had so many people ask me to review this book series that I decided I might as well give it another shot. I try to keep an open mind when I review books, and even though I'm very critical and snarky, I try to be fair as well. I was also feeling somewhat optimistic, too, as two books that I fully believed I would hate due to what I viewed as excessive hype - THE SEVEN HUSBANDS OF EVELYN HUGO and THE CRUEL PRINCE - actually ended up becoming some of my favorites.
Spoiler: THRONE OF GLASS did not end up becoming my favorite.
Although honestly? I didn't hate it as much this second time around. I still didn't like it (and the hype escapes me), but I've read so much worse. THRONE OF GLASS does have some things in its favor: an interesting world where, like POISON STUDY, magic has been suppressed and outlawed, and using it is punishable by death; likable secondary characters (Nehemia <3); and fairly decent writing that, at times, can be lyrical (at other times, cheesy - but hey, I'm a lover of bodice-rippers, so sometimes that pompously-written purple prose has a time and a place: just ask Rosemary Rogers and V.C. Andrews). Also, speaking of bodice-rippers, I loved that Celaena was reading some in her room, cheesy prose and all. Based on the writing, it totally sounded like a Johanna Lindsey viking novel.
So, let's talk about where this book went wrong.
*draws in a deep breath and inflates like a balloon*
Reason #1: The heroine. Celaena is a terrible heroine. She reads like the self-insertion character in a fanfic. She has all the boys, all the powers, all the talents - and none of the characterization or skills to back it up. It got to the point where I would roll my eyes every time she admired herself in the mirror and listed off her features or humble-bragged in the narrative about how beautiful she used to be until she wasted away in the stupid salt mines. When she's not doing it, the two love interests are doing it for her, either while pining outside her window (seriously), pining over her playing the piano like Christian Grey did while watching from a shadowed corridor (SERIOUSLY), or pining over her looking up all tragically at the sky while being carted away to her "terrible" fate (OMG).
What makes this even more irritating is that she is supposed to be a strong female protagonist, and yet she is basically the total opposite. Not only is she incredibly vain and arrogant, she's also a total jerk. She insults everyone around her, especially the people she shouldn't be insulting (read: the people who are in charge of her fate and could send her straight back to those salt mines with a flick of their wrists) and other women. Celaena loves to slut-shame other women, especially in the beginning.
I mean, how can you like a heroine who says stuff like this?
"I hate women like that. They're so desperate for the attention of men that they'd willingly betray and harm members of their own sex. And we claim men cannot think with their brains! At least men are direct about it" (70).
And then there's the fact that she doesn't really live up to the "assassin" part of her attributes until the very, very, very last possible moment of the book. For the first however many pages there are in the ebook edition that comprise the first 85% of the book, Celaena will tell everyone who will listen (well, everyone who knows who she is) about how deadly she is, and in the narrative she's constantly making stupid makeshift weapons out of hairpins and soap (!), but she never gives me the impression that she's someone who's particularly qualified. People sneak up on her all the time, and she isn't a light sleeper because on several occasions she wakes up, surprised to see someone standing over her.
And then. And then. There's this line:
"Candy!" A large paper bag sat on a pillow, and she found that it was filled with all sorts of confectionary goodies. There was no note, not even a name scribbled on the bag. With a shrug and glowing eyes, Celaena pulled out a handful of sweets. Oh, how she ADORED candy! (234)
This is probably the stupidest moment in the entire book because in Celaena's competition to be the King's Champion, someone is killing off the other competitors. Also, one of the Tests they did shortly before this one involved poison. So obviously, someone wants her dead and even more obviously, there is poison lying about somewhere on the premises that someone could probably steal (if they didn't already steal some from the competition). And it never once crosses her mind that someone might have dropped off a batch of poisoned candy to her bedroom knowing her insatiable lust for sugar. Never. Once. Crosses her mind. I face-desked pretty hard at that. How do you come back from that?
Reason #2: It's boring and slow AF. This book is very back-heavy. Not much happens until the end of the book. You would think that a competition between a bunch of thieves, murderers and soldiers for a high-ranking position in an evil kingdom would be exciting, like, the Medieval Times' version of THE HUNGER GAMES. But no, these scenes are vastly overshadowed by much more important scenes. Like Celaena going to the library. Celaena debating about how much sugar to add to her oatmeal. And Celaena looking into a mirror and admiring her fiftieth sparkly, low-cut dress.
I liked the scene with the poisons. It kind of reminded me of that scene in Harry Potter, when Harry has to go through all of those trials before he faces down Voldemort (that, and the flying keys). The Tests had the potential to be so much MORE, and it was so frustrating to read about all this pointless stuff when what I wanted was action, adventure, and showmanship.
Rule #3: Book-pandering. One of my biggest pet-peeves is when authors make their characters love books in an attempt to get us to like them + to add "character" or "personality" where there is none. Liking books is not a personality trait, please, and thank you. This is something I mention in MY LADY JANE, as well - a book, incidentally, that I disliked a lot more than this one. There's nothing wrong with writing a character who reads, but when it's their only hobby and seems like it's just an excuse to give people quotes to make them go, "OMG! I TOTALLY RELATE! SQUEE" it feels cheap. That's just my personal opinion, but it bothers me a lot, so I'm mentioning it.
Chaol and Dorian were fine. Chaol had the personality of a fence post, but he had that tall, dark and brooding vibe down that I'm a sucker for, although Valek from POISON STUDY did it better. Dorian is the typical womanizing bad-boy rich-boy stereotype, and I didn't care for him much at all, especially what with his "you're not like other women" attraction to Celaena. Boy, bye.
Nehemia was honestly my favorite character in here. She's powerful, cool, mysterious, intelligent, and courtly - basically everything Celaena was not. I also think it's ironic that Nehemia and Celaena had much more chemistry than Dorian and Choal did with Celaena combined. Too bad this wasn't an F/F fantasy romance. I would have totally shipped them. They were cute together. Celaena was almost tolerable when she was with Nehemia. *coughs* Almost.
I honestly felt bad for Kaltain - probably because it felt like we were supposed to hate her. But hey, I was tired of Celaena, too, so I can't really blame her for wanting to be rid of Lady Special Specialton, Eater of Suspicious Candies and Bragger of Little Merit. She was honestly one of the more tragic characters in here, and her narrative ARC reminded me a little of Anne Boleyn's. Ambitious women are rarely treated well in YA, particularly if they're sexual and/or beautiful. THRONE OF GLASS does its damndest to distance Celaena from such "unlikability" by making her childlike and sexually inexperienced, which I found extremely irritating and boring.
I can't really remember why I hated this book so much when I first read it. Maybe because I went in expecting more, whereas this time I knew what to expect? Or maybe because I've read several particularly awful books this year that made this one seem better by comparison? I don't know. But this time I actually found some redeeming facets of the narrative that made me sigh and go, "Well, I suppose it could have been worse - and I did like this thing and that thing, so there." The funny thing is on my first review I got all these irritating comments telling me that if I read the book again more carefully, if I even really read it at all (omg, how dare u), I would love it. Condescending comments aside, I did actually "like" the book more this second time around, although I still think it's pretty bad (although I'll be trying to give the other books in the series a shot because damn that curiosity).
Lastly, since this book has so many passionate fans, I would like to issue a caveat:If you leave me rude comments, I am going to delete these comments and block you. It is not personal and it does not mean that I hate you, or harbor any ill-will towards you.I just have zero interest in interacting with people who don't distinguish between criticism of a book and ad hominem attacks of an individual. Part of the reason I deleted all my reviews back in 2016 was because I was getting a lot of nasty comments on about five reviews and I made the novice mistake of arguing back with them and giving them that satisfaction of a response. I've grown up a lot since I first started using this site and now have little interest in arguing or fighting with people. I would rather spend my time and energy on writing snarky reviews or having positive interactions with my friends and followers.
In sum, THRONE OF GLASS was not a very good book in my opinion and at times was incredibly annoying. I have heard that the second book has more action and fight scenes, and since those were the parts of this book that I enjoyed the most, I will be reading CROWN OF MIDNIGHT soon (probably this week) to see if it's enough to compensate for the glorious bore that is Celaena.
I did have a lot of fun posting snarky status updates for it, though. ;-)
Also, this meme I made w/ MS Paint for my status update of THE BLADE ITSELF seemed relevant.
My romance group read CINDER for our Science Fiction Romance theme read, and it was such a hit that a number of us decided to go ahead and group read the sequel, SCARLET, as well. I'm always super leery when it comes to hyped-up YA books - especially retellings with shiny covers, because 9 times out of 10 I end up not liking them - but CINDER was such an unexpected delight that I, too, was eager to read the sequel.
SCARLET beings where CINDER ends, but with a new character named Scarlet taking the lead. Unlike the last book, which is set in Beijing, this book is set in the French countryside. Scarlet delivers produce while she looks for her missing grandmother, and on one of these excursions she meets a mysterious brawler named Wolf. Pretty soon, it becomes apparent that her grandmother's disappearance has some sinister implications and that Wolf, who she finds more attractive than she should, might have something to do with her disappearance in the first place.
At the same time, Cinder is breaking free from jail with a Captain (who I think is American) named Thorne. They're flying around in a spaceship that has Iko's chip in it, so picture a gabbing, gossiping, super-happy spaceship being piloted by people who are grim and on the run, and you get an idea of what that's like. Kai, meanwhile, is in Beijing, and spends his time between mooning after Cinder and making the same damn mistakes that he made in the first book. I felt sorry for him in the first book because he was naive and didn't know any better, but what do they say about fooling you twice? I no longer feel sorry for Kai. He's hot, but man, is he incompetent. Epic fail.
Part of the reason I liked CINDER was because it really let me get to know the heroine, CINDER. I wasn't sure about her in the beginning, but then I began to sympathize with her and by the end, I really admired her resourcefulness. SCARLET wasn't like that - it has way too many characters crammed into it. Just when we, the readers, finally got an opportunity to get to know Scarlet, Cinder & co. barged in to steal the limelight. The end result is that Cinder's arc is further refined, whereas Scarlet's storyline is just kind of crammed in there, so she never really graduates beyond shouty, immature dolt, and her love story comes across as super rushed and insta-lovey.
I liked Wolf, but I think that's because his conflict is so much more traumatic and apparent. It's so awful what's been done to him. In one of Levana's POVs towards the end, you really understand why he's so F'd in the head, and it's really, really sad.
I'd read further in the series, but at this point, I have to say that SCARLET is not as good as CINDER at all. CINDER shocked and delighted me, even though it was cliche and part of the reason it did this so well is because the storyline is relatively simple and easy to follow. SCARLET, on the other hand, sets out to accomplish way too much, with way too many characters, and ends up accomplishing far too little. The action doesn't even pick up until about 100 pages to the end, and while that may be acceptable in 900-page behemoths like OUTLANDER or GAME OF THRONES, it isn't at all, here.
My experiences with YA fantasy have consisted largely of crushing disappointments. It's an old story that you're probably familiar with: a new YA fantasy book with a pretty cover gets launched into the bloggersphere. Everyone hypes it up and raves over the cover and the summary. The book comes out. The initial reviews are all raving and overwhelmingly positive - and then I come along to burst your bubble and give it a one star review.
I tried to read CINDER three times, and kept putting it down in the same spot. Another plucky heroine wallowing in strife? Oh God, spare me, I thought. But then CINDER was chosen as our 2017 Scifi-Futuristic theme read in my romance group, and I thought to myself, "Okay, Nenia, the jig is up. You have to read it now. Maybe it won't be so bad."
And...to my surprise, it wasn't.
Don't get me wrong. That beginning is still tedious and awful. The book doesn't really pick up until Cinder is sold out by her wicked (very wicked) stepmother to the New Beijing government to test a cure for the plague that is ransacking the city. Poor Cinder is imprisoned and injected with the virus that's almost certain to kill her...only it doesn't, and that's where it gets interesting.
My favorite aspect of the book was probably the court intrigue. Queen Levana was an interesting villain, and I liked how she showed utilized her power. Hers is an iron hand in a silk glove. You feel the soft touch before you feel the vise grip underneath. Kai was also a good hero, I thought - not so much as a love interest as a leader who wanted to do right by his people, but felt conflicted about it at the same time. As a love interest, yes, he's very much the dreamy prince but the insta-love between him and Cinder was a bit eye-roll worthy. They didn't have any "moments" or chemistry that made me think that they needed to be together at all costs, unlike, say, Nevada and Rogan from the Hidden Legacy series, which I ship harder than the shippiest of shippers at the National Shipping Convention.
I figured out the "twist" around chapter two or three, but I figure that this book is aimed at a younger, far less cynical audience, so maybe that "twist" will surprise him the way it did not surprise me. It was a good twist, and I'm looking forward to seeing how it plays out. I - and you, too, if you decide to read this - will have to wait until book two for that, though, as this book ends on the most wicked and unfair of cliffhangers. Right dead in the middle of a pivotal turning point, really. You're welcome.
Overall, though, CINDER was a pleasant surprise and a welcome change from the slew of disappointing reads that have demarcated my 2017 reading year. I'll be checking out book two soon to see if the series really does get better as everyone says, because if it does - watch out!
There are lots of reasons to DNF a book, okay? Sometimes I will read a book and I will think to myself, "This is a bad book." Sometimes I will read a book and think, "While I personally hated this book, I can see why someone might like it." Ultimately, there is not that much difference in how I will rate these two experiences (a two is a two), but I might actually recommend the latter to someone else if I thought it was a match for their own niche tastes. Because at the end of the day, I am a reader, and I love seeing people find the books that they're looking for even if I didn't enjoy them.
JUNIPER, GENTIAN, AND ROSEMARY falls into this latter category. This is my second Pamela Dean that I have tried and failed to finish and I think it's just a matter of her writing style not working for me. Her characters are so precious; picture a full-time dark academia girlie who wears peasant dresses and spends all her time reading clothbound editions with sprayed edges of Kierkegaard or Tolstoy, and that is the target audience for this book.
I saw people comparing this book to Madeleine L'Engle and I was like, YES. Because the characters in the book were a lot like the Murray family. I mean, this family literally does table readings of Shakespeare after dinner. I'm sorry, but what? This book is a retelling of a Scottish ballad called "Riddles Widely Expounded." Basically, a suspicious hot guy moves next door to this family with three girls and he seems to have echolalia or something like it, because rather than generating organic speech, all he does his speak in riddles and quotations. That sounds like an interesting premise, but apart from a few sinister foreshadowy moments, NOTHING OF INTEREST HAPPENED UP TO 51%.
The writing in this book is great and the dark academia vibes are immaculate for those who are interested in that aesthetic. But unless you're looking for THE SECRET HISTORY: MY SWEET SIXTEEN EDITION, I'm not sure you'll find this very accessible.
I did like the '90s romantic/alt girl aesthetic though.
This was an intimidating book to start. Go on its Goodreads page and you'll be greeted by a teeming sea of four- and five-star reviews. Also, it's expensive AF. I was really interested when it came out but the ebook was $9.99! $9.99! That seemed way too excessive for a book that not only wasn't in print form and therefore couldn't be lovingly toted around by me to and from my daily battles with big city public transportation, but also meant that I would be out almost $10 (that's two and a half small lattes from Starbucks!) if I didn't like the blasted thing. Luckily, it went on sale last year for $1.99 and I decided that the price was right.
The reviewers, however, were wrong.
I almost DNF'd this book at the 100-page mark. I couldn't believe it when I was greeted by halting, overwrought prose and a raging Mary Sue of a heroine named Agony (not her actual name, but her narrative induced throes of agony and it's close enough, so) who put even Queen Special herself, Addledstar Galactica, AKA Celery to shame. And then, when she finally meets the fearsome Dragon himself, instead of eating her...he makes her do CHORES?!
If I hadn't been invested in my buddy read with Elena, I would have dropped this potato so fast.
One thing that well-meaning fans do that really actually kind of gets on my nerve a little is tell me that a book is "going to get better" and that I should stick out my misery to get to the amazeballs ending that will be a total game-changer. I know they mean well (most of them, anyway), so I try not to get too annoyed about it, but it's a really frustrating thing to hear - "wade through this festering pile of boredom and inaction, there's an amazing ending four hundred pages down the road!"
Also, 9 times out of 10, they're wrong.
This is the 1 time out of 10 that the fans are sort of right. Around the 200-mark or so, when Agony and Dragon encounter the Wood, it starts to get interesting. Mostly because it stops feeling like a Medieval Guide to Domestic Drudgery and starts feeling like a classic horror novel. The heart-trees are freaking terrifying. I have the flu right now, and in the midst of a fever dream last night, I thought that the coat I had hanging on my closet door was a sprouted heart-tree, come to drag me into the woods. I almost screamed. It was so terrifying. It made me thing that Novik ought to give up fantasy for a while and try out writing an atmospheric horror novel instead. I haven't been so creeped out in ages. The magic system was interesting, but not very well-developed. It actually reminded me a lot of another fantasy novel I recently read, called THE BURNING SKY, where shouting foreign-sounding words Makes Magic Things Happen. That book also had a rather slow start and dreary protagonist. I felt like there was a five-star book buried in the heart-tree of this novel, screaming to get out, but it was utterly bogged down by the pacing, and the tell-not-show of the first person narrative.
One thing I did really like was the ending. It actually reminded me a lot of Moana (if you've read this book and seen the movie, you'll know what I mean). There is a definite feminist bent to this book, too. Agony's friendship with Kasia is more developed than her attraction to Dragon, and in many ways, I felt like Kasia was a stronger heroine than Agony was. I also liked the Moana-like twist I hinted at earlier, and I also don't think it was a coincidence that Agony, a female mage, was the one to do what she did. It reminded me of this Tweet I saw written by a survivor of abuse, who said that when she watched Moana, it made her think of the healing women can give each other in the aftermath of abuse, and the powerful bonds that form because of that sympathetic relationship. If Moana is an allegory for that, I think you could argue just as easily that UPROOTED is, as well.
That said, this book still had a lot of problems. Ultimately, I am glad I finished it, but it won't be topping any of my favorites lists, and I'm a little bewildered by all the unequivocal positive ratings. I'm intrigued enough that I'd be willing to check out her companion book set in the same universe, SPINNING SILVER. Novik has a style that's very similar to old school Diana Wynne Jones, and even though DWJ's books didn't always work out for me, I usually appreciated what she was trying to do.
CRUEL BEAUTY was our October book of the month in the Unapologetic Romance Readers group - in fact, it won by a massive landslide. Not that I was surprised. CRUEL BEAUTY made quite a stir when it was first released; it seemed like everybody was singing its praises and mooning over Ignifex. On the surface, it sounded like a great story - love and death, revenge, magic, fairy-tales, demon lovers. That's Nenia to a T. But it was also YA. And I've been burned by the YA genre more times than I care to count. My heart couldn't take any more disappointment. So anyway, we started reading CRUEL BEAUTY in URR, and I was defensive and hopeful all at once as I prepared myself for the inevitable let-down...
Only to fall in love with the book.
I couldn't put it down. I think I read 40% of the book the first day. I finished it as soon as I got home from work the next day. Nyx isn't like other heroines. She isn't perfect and good - she's angry and vengeful and bitter, and rightfully so. Her family sucks, man. Because of a bargain her father made with some demons, her mother died in childbirth and he selected her to be the sacrifice so he can keep the sister who resembles the mom while boinking the aunt under their own roof. How messed up is that?
But Nyx doesn't just have the responsibility of avenging her family. She lives in this Greco-Roman city called Arcadia that's been frozen in time for almost 1,000 years because of a curse. They have a parchment sky and a demon lord, called the Gentle Lord, who makes Faustian bargains that always end in curses and tragedy. To fulfill the bargain made by her father, she has to marry him. To fulfill the prophecy handed down by their alchemists through centuries, she has to kill him.
There's a lot of Roman mythology in here, but it also borrows heavily from European fairy tales and folklore, notably Bluebeard's Castle (one of my favorites), Faust, Rumpelstiltskin, and, of course, Beauty and the Beast. It should have felt clunky, but I felt that the author blended everything seamlessly. I liked the alchemic magic system and how it fit into the world. The descriptions of Ignifex's magic house were amazing - I could easily picture the Heart of Water and the Heart of Air, but I'd like to see it on the big-screen. Maybe not even by actors...maybe animated, by Studio Ghibli, like they did with HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE. That would be appropriate, I think. Especially since there's more than just a dash of HOWL'S MOVING CASTLE in here, too.
And can we talk about the feels?
[image]
"I suppose gods as well as men become stupid when they have a chance to get everything they want."
Oh, yes. CRUEL BEAUTY is a stunning, beautiful book that definitely lives up to the hype.
Nenia ✨ I yeet my books back and forth ✨
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