Daughter of Smoke & Bone

It's difficult for me to understand how a book could have such deep, creative and compelling world-building and such shallow and cliche romance.

The good: The world Taylor built is really lush. The politics in the war between the angels and chimera are nuanced and interesting, and more than that, you get a feeling that there's a depth of culture to both sides much more than what you even read.

The start of this book is one of the best I've ever read -- I loved the descriptions of Prague and the rapport between Karou and Zuze. I found Brimstone and Issa and the rest a compelling mystery, and I felt myself quickly caught up in the mystery of who Karou was and what the teeth were for.

For all that there are hundreds of books about the morals for and against magic, I thought that this was the first that really made doing magic feel weighty, but not objectively bad and I loved that. I liked the metaphysics of magic in general.

I love books that explore the tension between "real life" and the supernatural and for at least the first half of the book there was still classes and grades and friends that Karou was trying to balance with saving the world.

The medium: Karou is the Mary Sue to end all Mary Sues. She's slender (as we're told at least seventeen times) and The Best Draw-er and Everyone Loves Her Ideas and she has
"naturally" blue hair and never gets scared and is good at everything. But...I kind of liked her anyway. She's strong and self-contained and has a ton of agency, even once she meets up with the male romantic lead.

The ugly: Ugh, the romance. I'm not a romantic; I don't read romance and I certainly don't do paranormal romance, so clearly not the intended audience. But he's handsome and perfect and they're instantly in love and ugh, ugh, ugh. And even though they're star-crossed lovers from a past life, they were instantly in love then, too. So.... And when they're together all of the descriptions are bland and shallow and cliche.

Supposedly the sequels are more world-building, less romance. I'll check them out...

I finally got round to starting this trilogy which has seemed to get universal praise from amongst blogging friends. Beautiful angels are good and monstrous beasts are evil, right? I enjoyed the play on the traditional assumptions on good versus evil and the exploration of the pointlessness of endless war. Is the similarity of the words of Chimaera to Crimea on purpose? When I saw their war referenced as the Chimaeran War, I misread it as Crimean.

This first instalment is very much about the back story, or at least the discovery of it, which reveals itself in snippets until it all comes tumbling out. I enjoyed Madrigal’s story, which explored more of the other world, its customs and struggles. Learning about the chimaera and the relevance of the teeth was riveting, and it all ties back to little hints during the book. The ending broke my heart…

Before Karou gets all mushy, I liked her attitude and her best friend Zuzana. Their conversations were authentic and they were blasé about boys, even if Karou is annoyed about Kaz. She treats him in a way one would expect, well if we could wish itches on our exes. The story sets out with Karou as leading a very nearly normal life, and establishes her love of art and her limited social life in the streets of Prague.

I’d forgotten how rampant instalove used to be in young adult books. I understand there’s some sort of justification for it here, but there must be a better a way to write a bond between too people who barely know each other. It’s very intense and I know it’s arguable that’s because teenagers feel everything intensely, but then what’s Akiva’s excuse? I dunno, I just felt the romance was the weakest part of an otherwise amazing book.

Fantastic world-building and touching, non-romantic relationships mean I will definitely be reading the rest of this trilogy.

(hidden for minimal spooilers)

The world-building in this book is astonishingly good, and the sense of place for Prague is very well done. The main character has a mystery that she hides from others, and there are deeper mysteries hidden from her. The first third of the book is really beautifully drawn, and the initial questions are very well set up.

And then it makes an abrupt left turn into a doomed-true-love-on-first-sight-that-crosses-space-and-time-including-death romance. Which is fine, I have nothing against TWOO WUV, but this part of the...was just not as interesting as the actual story the novel began with.

The last third of the book is an extended flashback, and feels flat. Although yes, it explains the entire backstory, again: not nearly as interesting as the first third of the book. The final reveal has a kind of DUN DUN DUN tone, and the emotional upheaval between the lovers that CLEARLY has to result from that reveal happens offscreen, and is referred to in one sentence in the epilogue. The book just ends.

Which is not to say I hated the book, because I didn't (I bought the second one instantly after this), but Taylor is clearly an extremely talented fantasy writer and I wanted more.