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A review by davinareads
The Fragile Threads of Power by V.E. Schwab
adventurous
mysterious
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
A very hard book for me to rate but I think I'll settle for a low 4 star rating. The last 150 pages bumped it up.
In the recent years, I've read a handful books written by V.E. Schwab and while she is an extremely talented author, I find her work consistently inconsistent in the writing style. Some of her work is amazing while others not so much. (To me) This does allow her work to reach a wide range of readers but I always find myself unsure in what I'll be getting.
I bring this up because The Fragile Threads of Power was swimming between a 3 to 4 star rating when I was expecting the same pacing as The Darker Shade of Magic triology.
Let me go through all the things that I enjoyed first.
I liked how it felt like all these loose puzzle pieces were coming together to form a more coherent and connected story. Of course, I loved seeing our original characters back on the board and I enjoyed the glimpse of what they have been doing in tbe last seven years. I also enjoyed Tes as a character and I found her to be the more developed character introduced in this series. I'll go back to Kosika a bit further down. This book was definitely a character dependent read over plot development.
Perhaps I'm reading too much into it but it felt like there were some tributes to other books as well and if that was on purpose, I loved it. From the Six of Crows to The Midnight Circus, there were little settings and tie ins that felt too coincidental.
Nearing the end is where the story picked up and it felt almost worth it to read through 500 some pages to get here. Almost. The ending is where my rating solidify to a 4 because the plot was finally starting to move at a quicker pace. There was finally more excitement.
Now here are the things that I didn't quiet enjoy.
V.E. Schwab's writing is always easy to read which I appreciate but it was also very predictable. The story is on the simple side, the focus being mainly on the characters. I think it didn't need to be this long of a read because it was repetitive in descriptions.
With this, I think there were too many characters and found myself having to stop and go back to remember the smaller ones. Some characters like Tes's friend felt forced in and there was no real smooth introduction to him. After I finished this book, I can't even remember Tes's three sisters name. Just too much.
As for the characters that did matter like Kosika, I didn't necessarily care about her character and found myself slightly disappointed when I reach her POV. At the start it was very strong but it tapered out so I didn't feel anything towards her.
Because this book was so heavily character based, the story felt like the secondary thing and not the main one. The balance between story and character wasn't there.
Overall, it was hard for me to give this one a rating because it was a bit too long with no real plot movement, too many names and characters. When the story did move, it was awesome and the last 150 pages really helped to bumped it from a 3 to a 4 star rating. I did like seeing our favorite characters again which is always nice.
I do feel like this first book in the series is setting up for the future ones so I am excited to see where this book will go and hopefully it will be a much stronger series than what I've read so far.
In the recent years, I've read a handful books written by V.E. Schwab and while she is an extremely talented author, I find her work consistently inconsistent in the writing style. Some of her work is amazing while others not so much. (To me) This does allow her work to reach a wide range of readers but I always find myself unsure in what I'll be getting.
I bring this up because The Fragile Threads of Power was swimming between a 3 to 4 star rating when I was expecting the same pacing as The Darker Shade of Magic triology.
Let me go through all the things that I enjoyed first.
I liked how it felt like all these loose puzzle pieces were coming together to form a more coherent and connected story. Of course, I loved seeing our original characters back on the board and I enjoyed the glimpse of what they have been doing in tbe last seven years. I also enjoyed Tes as a character and I found her to be the more developed character introduced in this series. I'll go back to Kosika a bit further down. This book was definitely a character dependent read over plot development.
Perhaps I'm reading too much into it but it felt like there were some tributes to other books as well and if that was on purpose, I loved it. From the Six of Crows to The Midnight Circus, there were little settings and tie ins that felt too coincidental.
Nearing the end is where the story picked up and it felt almost worth it to read through 500 some pages to get here. Almost. The ending is where my rating solidify to a 4 because the plot was finally starting to move at a quicker pace. There was finally more excitement.
Now here are the things that I didn't quiet enjoy.
V.E. Schwab's writing is always easy to read which I appreciate but it was also very predictable. The story is on the simple side, the focus being mainly on the characters. I think it didn't need to be this long of a read because it was repetitive in descriptions.
With this, I think there were too many characters and found myself having to stop and go back to remember the smaller ones. Some characters like Tes's friend felt forced in and there was no real smooth introduction to him. After I finished this book, I can't even remember Tes's three sisters name. Just too much.
As for the characters that did matter like Kosika, I didn't necessarily care about her character and found myself slightly disappointed when I reach her POV. At the start it was very strong but it tapered out so I didn't feel anything towards her.
Because this book was so heavily character based, the story felt like the secondary thing and not the main one. The balance between story and character wasn't there.
Overall, it was hard for me to give this one a rating because it was a bit too long with no real plot movement, too many names and characters. When the story did move, it was awesome and the last 150 pages really helped to bumped it from a 3 to a 4 star rating. I did like seeing our favorite characters again which is always nice.
I do feel like this first book in the series is setting up for the future ones so I am excited to see where this book will go and hopefully it will be a much stronger series than what I've read so far.