Seriously, I was not expecting to love this, but by the end I was completely won over. The character growth for Enne was simply fantastiI’m shooketh.
Seriously, I was not expecting to love this, but by the end I was completely won over. The character growth for Enne was simply fantastic. She went from being a character who actively annoyed me to being someone I fully appreciated and could really root for. I loved the little found family that four of the characters formed by the end. I also became really intrigued by the shadow game and the politics of this world. I’m pleasantly surprised to say I had a great time reading this, and I look forward to continuing the series. ...more
I really enjoyed this! This book was exactly what I’m looking for in a horror novel. It was so well written. It felt like I was reading a horror movieI really enjoyed this! This book was exactly what I’m looking for in a horror novel. It was so well written. It felt like I was reading a horror movie, and was just a fun time. Nothing too deep, but an entertaining ghost story and slasher nonetheless....more
Please take my whole review with a grain of salt, given the fact that I'm a 30+ year old woman who clearly is not the target audience for this YA bookPlease take my whole review with a grain of salt, given the fact that I'm a 30+ year old woman who clearly is not the target audience for this YA book. Now onto the review...
So if "The Beautiful" by Renee Ahdieh was my breakup with YA (fantasy), then Crier's War was officially my divorce from YA (fantasy).
Does that make sense? Let me elaborate.
I'm not saying I won't ever read YA again. I still have YA books on my physical and non-physical TBR I want to get to. And I will probably keep adding non-fantasy YA to my TBR as well. I just feel done with YA fantasy at this point. I need more depth and worldbuilding in my fantasy, apparently, and the young adult age bracket is just not giving.
Crier's War felt so tropey, like I've read this story a thousand times before. I didn't enjoy the characters. Crier was *meh* and Ayla was downright annoying (she was a very hot-tempered character and I just couldn't jive with her). The plot had the whole "enemies-to-lovers" thing where one love interest wants to kill the other, but they obviously won't because as the reader you know the couple will end up together in the end. It also made very little sense to me why Ayla wanted to kill Crier anyway, when it was Crier's father who was behind everything. Supposedly it was because she wanted to destroy him emotionally? but with the fact that he and Crier are basically robots with little emotion I could hardly see how Crier's death would impact him that badly. It's also unclear to me how automae die, or how they are made, or how they have senses and supposedly heartbeats just like a human being. Seriously, how does that work? This is where I needed a bit more depth and explanation.
Clearly this didn't work for me, which is sad. But I am happy to get another TBR vet off my shelves (woohoo!)....more
I did it; I finally conquered reading one of the oldest books on my physical TBR. And it did not disappoint. This is what I want in my histo4.5 stars!
I did it; I finally conquered reading one of the oldest books on my physical TBR. And it did not disappoint. This is what I want in my historical fiction. A book that takes me to a time and place that I do not know much (if anything) about, helping me understand the history, but more importantly, focusing on the people of that time. What I loved most about this book was how real the characters felt. Akhmed and Sonja were especially powerful characters who I won't be forgetting any time soon. Also, the writing in this book was absolutely stunning. I wish I had annotated it because there were just so many beautiful sentences. One of my only real complaints about this book is that sometimes the plot did lag, especially in the past timeline chapters that were solely focused on characters other than Akhmed/Sonja/Havaa. My other complaint is that the ending was a tad too depressing. I appreciated Marra including humor throughout the book that brought some much needed levity. But I would have liked a bit more of that levity and hope for the ending.
Regardless, I'm happy I finally got around to reading this book. I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys a character-driven story and/or those who enjoy reading about lesser known historical events....more
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