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shirarweiss's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
slow-paced
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
I wish I loved this book. I was so annoyed with it and just wanted it to end. I found myself wanting to skip through all the description and get to the plot. The writing felt more pretentious than charming. It reminded me so much of Thistlefoot in its style and format and Mr. Penumbra in its plot. There was so much going on here-multiple stories to keep track of, so many symbols, jumps in time- I’d need to read it again multiple times to understand it all. The ending was confusing, frustrating, and sad, and a whole fever dream. The romance was.. sudden, confusing, and shallow. My favorite part of the whole thing was the Kitchen but then the bees were so creepy :(
Content Warnings
Moderate: Gun violence, Violence, and Grief
shay43geek's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
emotional
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? N/A
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Stalking
Moderate: Suicidal thoughts
Minor: Violence, Pregnancy, and Injury/Injury detail
hellavaral's review against another edition
adventurous
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
4.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Blood, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Death, Violence, Grief, and Fire/Fire injury
ambenicole418's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
reflective
relaxing
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
“A game or a book that has meaning to me might be boring to you, or vice versa. Stories are personal, you relate or you don’t.”
10/10!!! NO NOTES!!!💖🐰🏴☠️⭐️🌊🍯🐝🗝️🗡️ Pass go 5x, build a hotel on Park Place, and collect 1 million dollars!!
This book was fantastic! I purposefully took so long to finish it because I just did not want it to end. I literally cried when I finished it, not only because it was beautiful, but also because it’s over now and I’ll never be able to experience it for the first time again 🥹, and now I have absolutely no idea what to do with myself 😭. Reading The Starless Sea is like reading a jigsaw puzzle. There are all of these stories that you know connect in someway, but you’re unsure how until the very end when you finally see the whole picture. And it’s absolutely stunning🥹.
I will say though if you are a plot girly and like stories with a very forward narrative then this book is NOT for you. However, if you love magic, whimsy, fairytales, myths, stories within stories, a little bit of romance, endings that aren’t really endings, and non-traditional forms of storytelling THIS is the book you’ve waiting for! 🩵🐝🗝️🗡️
Pro tip: I read this book while listening to the “Ambient Dreamscapes” playlist on Spotify and it was the PERFECT ambience for the story. That playlist matches the vibe and tone of this book to a T. In fact, if you told me Ms. Erin Morgenstern herself created that playlist specifically for The Starless Sea I would believe you.👌🏽😊
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Violence
Moderate: Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Suicidal thoughts, Pregnancy, and Fire/Fire injury
foom's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
reflective
relaxing
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.75
I loved the feeling of the book. How at the first half I was confused and then at the second half everything is connecting in intersting way.
My only take is that I didn't like how there is so many insta-love there is.like you met this person for the first time fo like a five minutes and you are already in love and already kissing and doing the deeds ??!!
Overall I liked it it was fun read.
My only take is that I didn't like how there is so many insta-love there is.
Overall I liked it it was fun read.
Content Warnings
Minor: Gore and Violence
grey_poppy's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
funny
inspiring
mysterious
reflective
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death and Violence
First book in a long time that gave me that nostalgic and magical feeling of possibilities and unveiling worlds that I would get when I was a child. Like the next door I find just might lead me to the Starless Sea.lizziaha's review against another edition
4.5
I can’t really explain why I rated this book as high as I did. The vibes were immaculate, but I feel like I don’t really understand the plot enough to pass judgment on it.
This book is like A Series of Unfortunate Events for adults. There’s secret societies and schisms and betrayals and replacements and (doomed?) love and loss and a love of stories and reading and knowledge and mystery and improbable events and the thieving of objects and the lengths which people will go to get them back and there’s fortune tellers and literary references and ordinary people and imagined futures and I could go on and on and on.
Despite being the cause of most of my confusion while reading, I enjoyed the way that the stories within this story began to blend, to the point where I as the reader couldn’t quite tell where one story ended and the other began. It was like I was being buried in the story, covered in layer after layer of words. As a lover of stories, this was ideal for me.
This book is like A Series of Unfortunate Events for adults. There’s secret societies and schisms and betrayals and replacements and (doomed?) love and loss and a love of stories and reading and knowledge and mystery and improbable events and the thieving of objects and the lengths which people will go to get them back and there’s fortune tellers and literary references and ordinary people and imagined futures and I could go on and on and on.
Despite being the cause of most of my confusion while reading, I enjoyed the way that the stories within this story began to blend, to the point where I as the reader couldn’t quite tell where one story ended and the other began. It was like I was being buried in the story, covered in layer after layer of words. As a lover of stories, this was ideal for me.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Violence, Murder, and Fire/Fire injury
ijustreallyliketrees's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
Atmospheric, loved the world building. I actually really enjoyed all the jumping around in time and stories though can see why others wouldn't. Very close to a 4.5 for me but just didn't quite get there because some sections of the beginning did drag on a bit.
CW: Don't bother picking this up if you DNF a book as soon as there's a slight Harry Potter reference in a book bc there's a couple minor ones in here.
CW: Don't bother picking this up if you DNF a book as soon as there's a slight Harry Potter reference in a book bc there's a couple minor ones in here.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death and Stalking
Moderate: Violence and Blood
Minor: Suicidal thoughts
talonsontypewriters's review against another edition
mysterious
slow-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
1.0
So convoluted and dense, and yet I cannot tell you a single concrete meaningful thing about the world, story, or characters. A perfect example of style over substance -- and not even a great style at that, because a million run-ons without a comma in sight (except in splices, i.e. where they're not supposed to be, and god forbid any semicolons or em-dashes) and shallow imagery repeated ad nauseam do not constitute strong, profound writing. Especially when they're surrounded by weak verbs and dry statements; a lot of descriptions start with the classic grammatical expletive "there is/are." If these quirks were only in one section, it might have been fine, but all of the narrators sound virtually identical. Rather than consciously breaking grammatical customs to create some obvious effect or unique voice, then, it reads like unnecessary padding or honest errors.
I can't even comment in depth on the other elements, I feel like, because what little is there gets completely overpowered by the writing. I don't mind purple prose or stylistic experiments, but they need to be supplementing an actually compelling narrative and/or about 70% shorter. Here, though, if you take away the technical frills, you're left with 500 pages' worth of a bunch of scattered concepts that could have been interesting but don't amount to much in execution.
I wasn't super impressed by The Night Circus when I read it either, but I don't remember it being quite this insufferable, so maybe there's some sophomore slump effect going on. Either way, a pretty big disappointment, and irritated me so much at times I would have definitely thrown a physical copy. Honestly, I blame the editor -- if anyone did indeed edit this -- more than Morgenstern, because a good editor might have at least said, "Hey, so if you aren't going to follow a coherent plot or fully flesh out any of your characters, maybe you could at least punctuate your writing so it's readable?" Alas, clearly nothing of the sort happened, and the certain kind of reader I am suffers for it.
I can't even comment in depth on the other elements, I feel like, because what little is there gets completely overpowered by the writing. I don't mind purple prose or stylistic experiments, but they need to be supplementing an actually compelling narrative and/or about 70% shorter. Here, though, if you take away the technical frills, you're left with 500 pages' worth of a bunch of scattered concepts that could have been interesting but don't amount to much in execution.
I wasn't super impressed by The Night Circus when I read it either, but I don't remember it being quite this insufferable, so maybe there's some sophomore slump effect going on. Either way, a pretty big disappointment, and irritated me so much at times I would have definitely thrown a physical copy. Honestly, I blame the editor -- if anyone did indeed edit this -- more than Morgenstern, because a good editor might have at least said, "Hey, so if you aren't going to follow a coherent plot or fully flesh out any of your characters, maybe you could at least punctuate your writing so it's readable?" Alas, clearly nothing of the sort happened, and the certain kind of reader I am suffers for it.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Gun violence, Violence, Kidnapping, Grief, Stalking, Alcohol, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Misogyny, Sexism, Sexual content, Suicidal thoughts, Death of parent, and Pregnancy
witheringcarnelians's review against another edition
challenging
emotional
hopeful
mysterious
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
5.0
It took me a while to get into reading this book Ngl but it is now defined one of my favorite books I’ve ever read. There’s something so enthralling about it and the prose. The characters and the stories.
I’ll be thinking about Fate and Time and the inkeeper and the moon until I die I think
I’ll be thinking about Fate and Time and the inkeeper and the moon until I die I think
Content Warnings
Moderate: Gore and Violence
Minor: Suicidal thoughts