Book 1 in new series
AUTHOR: Samantha Shannon
PUBLISHED: 2013
CATEGORY: Adult
GENRE: Fantasy
PREMISE: A woman gets pulled into the criminal society when she gets accused of murder...
MY REVIEW: This book is yet another example of why I implore publishers, particularly ones with new authors, to STOP USING OVER HYPE. It does no one any favors, particularly new authors such as this one. Because had I not had all those glowing praises in my head while reading this, I probably would have been more lenient while reading it. However, I kept thinking about how everyone kept going on about how original it was, brilliantly done, yadda yadda and while reading I kept thinking "really? What did they see? Because I don't see it".
Sorry, but I don't. This is actually pretty typical YA trope stuff, just in the adult genre. While it certainly is imaginative....it's what I like to call the uncontrolled imaginative. As in, the author had so many ideas that she put them all in here and didn't think about the fact that all these ideas going on at once don't really make much sense. The result is a world that leaves me completely confused, despite info dump, after info dump. I also couldn't ignore all the flat characters. I literally can not tell you one thing about the main character. Oh, I can tell you her powers, who her love interest is, and that she has a father. But when pressed to describe what she's like personally....I would draw a big fat blank.
Honestly, this felt like a really big rough draft that should have been worked on more. It's entertaining enough to get the job done. But it wasn't nearly worth all that praise it got when it was released. Possibly I would have enjoyed it more if my expectations hadn't been so high. Which is why I repeat: please stop using over hype. You're basically kicking yourself in the nuts doing that.
WHO SHOULD READ: fantasy fans who don't mind sloppy world building and lots of tropes
MY RATING: Three out of Five this could have been better sighs
No comments:
Post a Comment