Review

A dark prophecy is spoken, and several people find themselves entangled in it — they are unsure of who they are or what part they play. And even then, they may be wrong.

I know some of my friends really liked this book, and I liked it, but I didn’t love it. I thought that it had quite a few problems – none of which are deal breakers, but things that made this book a bit tough in parts to read. And that is unfortunate, because I’d heard such good things about it. People raved and I guess I read a little too much into the LGBT+ rep, because I didn’t feel that it was as overwhelming as people said it was. It was certainly there, but it wasn’t a “main plot point” as some people said.

She had taken his life because she needed it.

Part of my issue is that this book is a really, really long book that feels like it’s an introduction. Now, there’s nothing wrong with an introduction, but does it really need to be 500 pages long? No, it doesn’t. Clearly this book is setting up for a second book, but I just found so much of the middle part of the book boring…it is almost as if nothing happens for 500 pages. Not to mention even if no action happens there will be hopefully some character development.

Ephyra felt a sweet, sated relief, and in equal measure, a deep, inescapable fear — that killing monsters was turning her into one.

Nope. Nothing. No character development that I could see for the most part. There is exactly one character that I find interesting and the rest of them I care nothing for, and that character is Jude. He was by far the most interesting, and the one who went through the most character development. Anton was probably next on the list. This is the books major failing: if your plot isn’t really a plot, and you’ve got no action, you need something to push the book along and that would be characters. Not even the characters could carry the book. I found myself skimming portions of this book hoping something interesting was going to happen. The ending is where it started to get interesting, but that was 500 pages later! And that is the reason I will pick up the second book.

His destiny was finally here, and it did not care whether or not he was ready for it.

And the writing itself was okay. There was nothing spectacular about it. What kept messing me up was that there were a lot of POVS. I generally don’t like books that have a lot of POVs because often times it can become confusing and the personalities mesh together. This was not the case in this book, but at the same time I think there were too many POVs. This book would have done better with less. I also had issues as I said with the pacing.

I did enjoy the world building however, and I think that was really strong, and what little of the plot there was, was done well. And that is such a shame because this book is so long, and if you get bored in the middle people may DNF it. I think I would have liked it more if it were shorter and more concise overall.

I did enjoy the book though, despite my many complaints. I think it is interesting and keeps your interest when there is action or character development. I will be reading the next book when it comes out!