Good but not great. A slow introduction to arthuriana, hopefully subsequent books will have more of the Morgan of legend

Part of this rating is definitely due to the voice actress on this book, if this was a physical I don't think I would have finished it at all. It's a solid set up for Morgan La Fey as we know her, allows us to see us to grow and the writing is beautiful at times. Morgan's friendship and the relationship with Arthur (which we see coming down to the very end), even her lil budding romance, are some of the highlights to this book.

However, if one was looking for magic and action, this most definitely is not the book for you. So while it was not a BAD book, I genuinely don't see myself going out of my way to recommend it to anyone. I would go on to the second book (out of the hope that she and Arthur become siblings that don't play about each other) as I do adore the Alice's and Morgan's friendship. 

You know what, somehow I feel like the contents of this book could have been cut short but at the same time.... It was needed in the plot idk. Anyway the voice acting was wonderful and added to much, 10/10 would recommend. 

This book felt like a wandering journey through Morgan's life. We met her as a fearless child, stood with her in front of a king... our hearts crashed and soared and crashed with her through her win and losses, languished next to her in her waiting, and triumphed with her in her freedom. 
Morgan is my Name felt like the story we needed before Arthur. 

This was the hard and beautiful story Morgan deserved; though she deserved so much more. She deserved all the books and more.

This is a debut and it reads as such: there are rough patches and the book falls too much on telling instead of showing. As such, a lot of elements fall flat for me, as they don’t seem to be organic developments, but more so “because that’s what the script says.” 

A lot of the romances in this book were very insta-love, but a lot of page time was devoted to them. Since the romances didn’t really change, it made for a bit of a boring read. 

Speaking of things that didn’t change, most of the characters were rather flat and one-dimensional. Our protagonist, Morgan, doesn’t really have a character arc. To be honest, a lot of her character felt very modern—which contrasted with everyone else acting more “medieval.”

At one point, she says something about not wanting to be sold to the highest bidder, which just felt out of place with the setting.

 

I’m a big fan of the Arthurian mythos, and as such, tend to read anything that comes out in relation to it. This retelling didn’t really offer a fresh take on the mythos. If you have read The Mists of Avalon (ignoring MZB, if you can, for a second), this reads like a flat rendition of that book. The most unique element of this book, in comparison to other retellings, was

the convent element. I liked the way her time in the convent was portrayed: a place of learning and refuge, a mix of scholarship and religion. It reminded me a bit of The Book of Gothel in that sense.

The other element that I really enjoyed was

how Arthur and all of those going-ons were shoved off to the side. Guinevere isn’t named in this book; it’s just presented as “Arthur suddenly got married for love.” This also goes for Mordred—we can see how both Arthur and Morgause know about this, and her child is described as blonde, but there is nothing that Morgan knows about the situation.

If you are looking for something you can breeze through in a couple hours, maybe pick this up, but if you are looking for something fresh, I’d skip this one.