User Profile

3 stelle scarse: 2.75 o 2.5.

Review to come.
It was overall a meh read. there were a few points I liked but were treated very superficially to focus more on the romance, which felt shallow, with an immature FMC and toxic side characters.
Glad I have it behind me and I am not sure I want to read about Calladia, which I didn't like, and Astaroth, who was the evil guy.

In terms of plot and pacing, nothing happens, if not towards the end. Many moments are spent around Mariel's mother who is very braggy and toxic and it was totally unnecessary. It just conveys that ridiculous sit-com tone throughout the book that was just cringy. The story was treated very superficially. I was very annoyed by that, because it could have been interesting and more gripping. The book could have been easily 180 pages long to tell the same story without the sitcom episodes with Mariel, her mum and Oz.
Here below a couple of examples:

Diantha took a deep breath, and Ozroth felt a prickle of dread, sensing the arrival of a monologue.
"I suppose I could have gone to the hospital," she said, "but I wanted Mariel's first moments to be connected to magic, and it's hard to access magic while machines are beeping and a doctor is elbow-deep in your vagina."
"Please stop talking about your vagina," Mariel said. Diantha looked at her fondly. "Darling, I don't know how you turned out to be such a prude. We're all adults here, and at least half of us have vaginas. It's the same as talking about an elbow."
"Is it?" Cynthia asked skeptically.

So many eye-roll moments, like how obsessed is Mariel with the demon's dick size. WTH!


Mariel has suffered all her life from her mother's pressure to become a witch worthy of the name spark. She feels a failure and constantly behaves in a way to confirm her negative opinion about herself. Her development doesn't feels realistic. She redeems herself towards the end, but it happens so fast that it felt like someone pressed a button and she is cured from her psychological issues.
She is also very immature and vents all of her frustration out on ozroth for sticking around instead of looking at what she did wrong or even improving in her spell making.

There were aspects of this book that I like because I love nature and animals, like that Mariel has a talent for nature magic or that the plot was revolving about the conflict between nature and economic interests.

In general, I am very annoyed and fed up with the paranormal romance genre. always including a love story, it would have a lot of potential. Very often a world is introduced that remains constantly underdeveloped even after 15 books, in the case of the Ward and Adrian series for example. the plot and events are very often centered on a drama concerning the couple. Developing over a series, there might be a longer and more complex story arc concerning all the characters involved, but very often even that is not known where it goes and often remains in an undefined limbo. and then, there is the erotic aspect that I don't understand why sex scenes have to be described in such detail and not left partially to the imagination. I find them always embarrassing the way they are written and I don't feel like going into detail on example sentences.

4.25 stars.

Un incrocio tra Venom per il concetto e l'atmosfera di Carnival Row.

Il libro è ambientato in quel di Blunder. Purtroppo non sussiste una mappa e non viene nemmeno spiegato cos'è Blunder. Mi sembra di avere capito che sia un regno. Anche se al fine della storia, saperne di più, non avrebbe cambiato molto, mi sarebbe comunque piaciuto avere più informazioni sul setting. Un aspetto a difesa di questa decisione è che contribuisce a gettare un'aura di mistero sull'ambientazione.

E' scritto in prima persona dal punto di vista di Elspeth che, dopo aver contratto un'infezione, convive con un'entità all'interno del suo corpo, con cui dialoga (da qui, il concetto di Venom) ma sa ben poco sul suo conto.

Il sistema magico è basato su delle carte facenti parte di un mazzo (chiamate carte della provvidenza), simile al concetto dei tarocchi. Ogni carta ha un preciso potere magico ma se abusata il potere diventa l'opposto, ad esempio, se la carta fornisce a chi la usa del coraggio, in caso di abuso, fornisce paura. Il sistema magico, descritto nel dettaglio, è il punto forte di questo romanzo.
La trama è di per sé semplice, ma tutto ha un sapore misterioso-gotico, che mi è piaciuto molto, e non manca di suspense. Piccola avvertenza: il libro finisce con un cliffhanger. Nel mio caso, non è stato un grosso problema, in quanto il seguito è già uscito.

Sicuramente consigliato per il periodo di Halloween. Perfetto per una lettura di novembre, hehe :)

Credits for the template below go to Melinda

CHARACTERS

4.5 stars.

Unpopular opinion: unexpected to me, I really loved it. In its simplicity, everything falls in the right place.

This book is dual-POV told by the two main characters. Asia is a Nefas, a monster feeding on fear, while Silas is a herald, sort of messenger of the gods and he who carries the souls of the dead to their destination in the beyond. They ally together to help each other (Silas wants to get his memory back and Atia wants to get rid of curse inflicted on her by the gods) and discover mysteries of their condition as well.

We have a map (hehe, I love maps) and we see that there is a mortal realm, which is divided into four kingdom, one for each of the four elements, and a divine realm, called Oksenia, divided in districts by rivers. In the mortal realm, also monsters live, like vampires and banshees, all subjected to the laws and punishments set by gods. I would usually dislike mixtures from different repertoires, but in case, I felt it worked pretty nicely.

I also loved the side characters and in general the characters and the romance were very lovable.

The weakest point of this books was its predicability. Nonetheless, I enjoyed the characters, the setting and the magic so much that I didn't mind it too much.


Credits for the template below go to Melinda

CHARACTERS

3.5 stars.

Premise:
I wanted to love this book so badly because I was enchanted by the premise, but here we go.

Plot and pacing:
So, what I liked was the part 1 and 4. In the first part, we get to know our main cast, Yumi and Painter, and their respective world. It took me some time to put all the information pieces together due to the constant change of point of view between the two of them. Brandon did his best to make the descriptions rich and vivid, though. I adored the japanese/korean spiritual vibes.
Part 2 and 3 cover the story that sees Yumi and Paint connected to each other, trying to figure out the reasons. The pacing here was off for me. The plot did not hold a grip on me and I had difficulties to see where the clues would lead. I am not sure if it was just me or was meant to be like that because in part 4 we have Hoid explaining how everything precisely went from beginning to end. One reason I loved this final part was all the juicy cosmere information, but on the other hand, it left me with the feeling I didn't really need to read parts 2 and 3. I was not happy with how all the plot, clues, and mystery were handled.
I felt like the stakes were never high enough. I did not feel any suspense or the dark atmosphere that I was expecting from a planet surrounded by a black layer and walking nightmares.

Characters:
The main cast was very well developed but the side characters were just forgettable, besides Design and Hoid, whom we meet in other Cosmere books as well. I loved Yumi's development, where she starts learning what freedom means. Their romance was very cute.
The noodle shop run by Design was everything, haha :D

Conclusion:
Design and Hoid saved this book for me.


Credits for the template below go to Melinda

CHARACTERS