vermidian's reviews
1167 reviews

This book was a gift from my partner because they know I love good world building - and this book delivers on that for sure. A lot is biblically based name-wise, but many of the cultures were all their own in terms of how they behaved and interacted. Sure, they were probably partially biblically based as well, but I enjoyed the cultural differences all the same.

The main characters drove me up a wall. Don't get me wrong! They were very well written! However their constant need to pick fights with each other was insanity inducing. I feel sorry for the children they will undoubtedly have in the coming books.

I'm on the fence on if I'd like to read on, because I did enjoy the world and I did enjoy the side characters, but I wanted to huck Rachel off a cliff some chapters and I wanted to shout at Gabriel some of the others. Having your two protagonists be married and yet hate each other was not super fun for me.

This was a lot of fun and I can see how it would translate well for screen! I binge read this all in one evening, though to be fair it is shorter than the average book that I read at only 149 pages, not including the preview for the second book.

The murderbot is so fucking awkward. I love it and also desperately want to teach it how to not make facial expressions. With hacking his chip, he also apparently turned off incognito mode which it DESPERATELY seems to need.

The mystery and drama was quite well developed, and I think the show will do better than the novella did at differentiating the different scientists - several of whom were mostly background characters. The important ones are very distinct though and I look forward to seeing who they cast and how they act out their roles.

I will definitely be looking into later installations of the Murderbot series of books.

I thought this book was delightful. Is it high art? Not at all. Is it a delightful reimagining of Sherlock Holmes? Absolutely. I loved that the book didn't take itself too seriously, delighting in the outlandish changes to the original script. I also love that this story, while it has the same general outline, has created their own version of Watson and Holmes to totter about this period urban fantasy world. The writing style reminds me a bit of A. Lee Martinez, who I love.

I binge read this all in one day. To be fair, it was fairly large type and it's a middle grade book, but I thought it was a delightful horror read! I can definitely see why an R. L. Stine quote would feature on the cover.

I will say, the book does dwell on the death of a loved parent fairly heavily, so if that is a concern for you as a reader, please be advised.

I enjoyed the characters and the world. I was not prepared for it to get as spooky as it did, honestly. This is right up there with the spookiest of Goosebumps, so if you enjoyed those, this one would be a good one to check into. I appreciated the friendships growing from nothing in this book into something the main character Ollie is happy she's built and seeing that she's started processing some of trauma by the end of the book regarding her mom, though I do worry her watch will become a crutch of sorts for her healing.

I will definitely be continuing on in the series! Clearly I need to read more Katherine Arden because I also enjoy her adult fiction.

I feel like the stories hit a good variety. Some were a little spicier than others, some had none. Some stories had good characters, some were batshit. Some stories had good world building, others seemed a little more random.

I originally read this for the Ilona Andrews story, but I actually enjoyed Carrie Vaughn's short story the most. I'm absolutely looking into Carrie Vaughn after this to see if I like more of her stuff. The Art of Misdirection was very Doctor Who feeling and I loved that aspect of it. While I enjoyed Retribution Clause by Ilona Andrews, it felt a little thinner than their usual books. I just didn't get all that awesome character development I'm used to in so few pages I guess.

The one I liked the least was BY FAR How Do You Feel? by Simon R. Green. It was absolutely the most pulp fiction random nonsense urban fantasy story I think I've ever read and I will absolutely be avoiding his other works in the future. Noooo thank you.

Here is how I would rate the stories out of 5 stars:

• Retribution Clause: 4 stars, maybe 3.5 - wish it was more fleshed out
• Bigfoot on Campus: 3.5 stars - some spice but not in a fun way, a little more geared toward the average straight white male reader than I liked
• Holly's Balm: 2 - spicy story, weird relationship dynamics made me uncomfortable but I liked the writing style
• Snow Job: 3 - interesting world building, but I felt like I was missing context
• Outside the Box: 3.5 - good action and story, but sooooo much info dumping
• How Do You Feel?: 1 - TERRIBLE, super random, would not recommend to anyone
• There Will Be Demons: 2 - spicy story, mostly just seemed like a back drop so two characters could bone honestly but even that writing was a little out there, no demons
• Cherry Kisses: 3 - fun concept, a little shaky on the execution
• The Arcane Art of Misdirection: 5 - loved it, I will absolutely be looking into more of this author's works.

Averaging all those together actually came out to exactly 3 stars, so there you have it! My rating!

This is a spoiler free review.

I would like to preface this review by saying that I thought the voice of the writer was excellent and her criticism of how white society has treated and continues to treat people is valid and important. As someone who lives in North Carolina, it was interesting to know the setting to some extent, though I didn't attend that particular college.

I also feel like I need to say that I don't particularly love Arthurian mythology. It's fun I guess? I've just never been into it but I keep wanting to find something that will draw me into the world of it in such a way that I find it enjoyable. This book was not it.

I also feel it is very vital to point out that a lot of this book deals with the trauma that the main character faces in her first two weeks of attending college, right after the death of her mother in a hit and run accident. She almost immediately gets wrapped up in a magical society of Arthurian blood purists, meaning every other page she's having to deal with the trauma of constant microaggressions and slurs. Please be advised going into this that this trauma is a constant presence throughout the book. Mostly that trauma is what Bree is facing, but there are other traumas present as well, such as how Nick and Sel were raised by a terrible parental figure, or what happened to Nick's mom. It can be a lot at times, so if you're looking for a lighter read, I would put this one down a little further on your TBR. Even the ending felt like a microaggression in itself, though I can't say a whole lot more or I'll hit true spoiler territory. There is also very little in the way of moments of joy in this book. The whole book felt very tense to me.

I thought the integration of the Arthurian world into a modern college campus was interesting, though the constant infodumping left me reeling a lot of times. And even after all that infodumping, I still don't feel like I have a solid grasp on a lot of it. Some might be that Bree just didn't get told all of it because a lot of the characters view her as an outsider. Regardless, it wasn't as polished as I'd hoped for. That being said, for this being a debut novel, it's still pretty decent. I think this is a skill Tracy Deonn will likely develop as she grows as a writer, and I look forward to that.

Tracy Deonn's writing is, by the way, beautiful. I love the way, she describes things. The metaphors, the descriptors, the almost tangible quality of the feelings she puts into the writing makes you feel how much she really loved this book and these characters as she wrote them. There's a poetry to her phrasing that is absolutely lovely.

One thing I noticed that took me out of the story a little was that most of the characters of Bree's generation seemed to have a nickname unless their names were already short enough to escape it. It was a little strange. I do have to say that with such a large cast of characters, I thought that Deonn did a good job keeping the characters and the personalities distinct, although I did sometimes mix up some of the smaller Knights and Vassals. I connected best with Sel, though hoo boy does he need to get hooked up with Bree's therapist. He was a DICK for a good two thirds of this book, but he starts to really get a grip by the end.

Ultimately, for a debut book, it was good. I don't think it's something I'm likely to reread, but a lot of others have found joy in it and I'm glad of that. I will happily pass this book on to another reader who is interested in reading the legend of Brianna Matthews.

This is a 4 star read for me. A lot of people seemed to really love this book, so I'm glad I finally got around to reading it.

Let's start off with what I really loved about the book:
• I love the world building. It's absolutely incredible. Sure, a lot of it is rooted in obvious inspiration of our world's cultures, but the scope and the lore of the world was fabulous. I loved the lore of the world and how it evolves as more is learned about the sealing of the Great One. I loved learning about the different types of dragons and how they're a balance of one another on a cosmic scale. I loved the three trees of power and how they created their own bloodlines in different ways. If nothing else is taken from this book, it should be the beautiful world building.
• I loved that the author was clear about her characters being diverse in culture, race, and sexuality - which seems like a low bar, but so many authors like to dance around it to keep people comfortable rather than challenging their perceptions.
• Meg, who deserved better.

Here are the things I didn't like:
• Fucking Niclays. If he ever becomes flesh and blood, it is on sight. He did not deserve his "happy" ending. He did nothing to ever atone for anything he ever did wrong and took no accountability and I WILL fight him.
• I thought the pace, especially in the first half, was very slow and could have been reworked to some degree. By the time the book was over, I was very ready to be done with the pacing of the book.
• There were many times where I wish the way the characters spoke were more distinct because sometimes I had to recheck who was speaking because I couldn't tell, especially as they all started sharing scenes in later parts of the book. They were all a little flat for me, emotionally, despite making very different and important decisions. I also thought they could have used a little more character growth for how many pages this brick of a book had, but you definitely can't say they didn't grow at all.
• I was very aware of the fact that Samantha Shannon, who is white, had a lot of characters that were people of color. I don't think she necessarily did anything harmful, and I hope she had beta readers to check on things, but it's worth mentioning because I worried some parts felt a little appropriated.

I also have a pet theory, which I don't think was ever confirmed: I think the Golden Empress was the Lacustrine emperor's girlfriend that he broke up with.

All in all, I don't think this is a book I will likely keep on my shelf because I don't think I'm likely to reread it, but I can see why others would love this book. I would definitely recommend this book to others. This book is definitely geared toward adult readers and not children.

I really wanted to like this book. I really can't say that I did. I'm sure for the right person this will be a great book, but it just didn't appeal to my tastes. I hope my copy of the book finds a new owner who loves it.

The story follows a young girl who can speak to ghosts. She lives in Edinburgh, Scotland, although you never really get a good sense of the city from the way things are described. The world is apocalyptic in some ways, though you never get much information on what happened there. They hint at both the apocalypse and the city, but the few features they do describe seem to have been dramatically altered or only viewed from a distance. Ultimately, I think this book had big goals, but could have used more world building to make the setting really pop.

The characters were solid, but a little flat. The character you get at the beginning is the same character you'll have at the end. They really don't grow from start to finish, unfortunately. They just return to a state of equilibrium.

I don't think the plot was bad. Actually, it was a pretty solid one, though some of the final elements came out of nowhere. I think a little more foreshadowing would have been good. I also think it's a pity that the issue was only partially solved, though perhaps that's corrected in a later book.

I also would like to say that for a debut novel, this is still a solid read. I loved the diversity and the inclusion of a disabled person as a main character. I think the critique of class inequality is very legit, although definitely different due to the post-disaster setting. I think this author will grow well in later books, but this one just wasn't my particular cup of tea.

So I got about 20% of the way through the book and was kind of non-plussed about it. There really wasn't much action and the world was just a little meh in terms of anything actually interesting happening. The characters were pretty flat in general, but not unlikeable. They just weren't all that developed. I think it was finally starting to get somewhere when I decided to go google something about the book.

Where are the native Americans?

It turns out the author thought it was too inconvenient to write indigenous Americans into her story, so she wrote them out entirely. Among her quotes are things like wanting to avoid negative tropes, and something akin to "Well, the world I created would have been too wild to have been settled back in those days in that area." That's just a lazy excuse for a white woman saying that she didn't want to have to deal with what white settlers, which her protagonists very much are, did to the indigenous populations back in those days. I hope she eventually is capable of apologizing to the indigenous communities.

I absolutely will not be finishing this book. Nor will I be reading on in the books. I really loved Dealing with Dragons and that series, but you don't just eliminate a race of people and call it good. That's one more off my TBR.

It was a lot of fun to be back in the world of many Londons. I was very much looking forward to seeing how this series would play out, considering I didn't think that there would be a whole new series to come when I finished the original trilogy. I'm not sure where this series is leading, but I'm interested in taking the ride at the very least.

I'm not sure I liked this one as much as I liked the original trilogy. The time jumping was a little frustrating at times. I very much would have preferred to read some of those chapters in the order in which they would have happened, even if it was every other chapter or so. But that's an artistic choice and I respect Schwab for making it even if it wasn't to my preference. I almost wish that it had been its own section of the book, or perhaps its own novella, but it is what it is. I hope the next book is able to move forward without quite so much time jumping.

Tes was a fun new addition, who offered a very different perspective than our other characters. She was refreshingly not used to having to fight for her life regularly, which was occasionally quite funny. Her power was definitely neat. However, I found Lila to be a much angrier character than I remembered, which might just be a natural progression of settling into a life rather than being someone ready to run when things get hard like she was in the original trilogy. Kell was still very much Kell, though I enjoyed seeing him pick up new skills out of necessity. Alucard as a consistent main character was fun, although he was a bit of a sad boy in this one. I do not trust the queen in any way, shape, or form. She seems like the kind of person who would do a vivisection just to know what it's like and she's concerning, but I love her for it. She's a neat character and I think she'll be very important going forward.

I look forward to seeing how the plans laid out in this book unfold in the next installment.