Reviews

The Unbroken by C.L. Clark

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codnchips's review against another edition

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adventurous dark reflective tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

quolwy's review against another edition

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2.0

Here's the thing, I think I'm going to be in quite the minority rating it so low.

The story was well written and compelling-- for some people. Unfortunately, when I pick up a fantasy, I prefer there to be a lot more magic and fantastical things happening, and because I also never found a point where I connected with any of the characters, I found it hard to care about what was happening to them past the 50% point. I found the plot to be dragging, and lingering on things that I personally didn't care about, and struggled to push myself to finish this because of that.

HOWEVER, like I said, I think if you like military strategy based books, with little to no magic in them, I think this book could be great for you!
I'm just disappointed to say it didn't work for me.

Thank you to Orbit, and Netgalley for gifting me an e-arc in exchange for an honest review!

krzykot's review against another edition

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5.0

Touraine, making the worst possible decisions in any given situation: this will definitely turn out good for me

ivy_owl's review against another edition

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3.0

I thought I'd like this book a lot more than I did. The cover absolutely captivated me.
This book has two great female leads, POC and LGBTQ+ representation, interesting setting and astounding amounts of potential.
Unfortunately, a lot of that potential ended up amounting to nothing. And it was surprising because I kept thinking 'Oh I like where this is going' but then it would just abandon it? It feels like the author wanted and started to explore a lot of things (And I think that is a great thing!) but then left that exploration unfinished. I wanted it to delve deeper into certain topics yet it only scratched the surface. Show me more of Touraine coming to terms with her own heritage and coming to terms with the fact that she has a mother. Show me why she considers the Sands her family and why she is willing to risk so much for them. I can understand it to an extent but her relationship with them feels too distant.

Spoiler

This one especially bothers me because her actions and decisions are based on the fact that the Sands are her family. She makes the stupidest decision in the world and justifies it by saying it was save her family (Which still doesn't make much sense to me because she just made it worse and I don't quite understand what the logic behind it was). But I don't see them as her family, I barely know three of their names and they have very little significance overall so her 'excuse' doesn't stand. It just makes it look like something that was done to move the plot along, to make it more dramatic.

The plot drags for pages upon pages and then rushes through the important parts. Luca and Touraine spend 200 pages trying to find more information about the magic and yet Touraine simply fails to mention her own encounter with it. Luca prides herself on her intellect and her ambition to be a good queen and change something, but then all that crumbles so fast and she sweeps it all under the rug and proceeds to make contradictory decisions. I do understand her situation and that she is somewhat cornered, but the way she handles it is still vastly different from how she handled her prior problems.
I really like the writing style, the descriptions and how it doesn't shy away from the ugly stuff. Again, all of it has incredible amounts of potential to build up on, but I can't say I wasn't disappointed.

breekeeler's review against another edition

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The way this book deal with discussions of colonialism is stellar, and I wanted to like it because of that. However, halfway through and I still felt like the characters were completely flat and the stakes of the world - a war, a challenge for the throne - didn’t feel real. It was like the author knew the world’s structure and just didn’t bother to tell us. Also the power dynamics in the “romance” gave me the ick.