Reviews with content warning for Police brutality - City of Nightmares

City of Nightmares kicks off with a strong start and a fascinating concept that carries well until about the midpoint of the book in which is takes a sharp downward spiral. This is only furthered by the poor handling of what matches up fairly well with a trauma response and its dismissal throughout the novel.

I thought the book started out pretty strong, there was a solid introduction to the world and the characters. I liked Ness and her best friend (who’s name escapes me at the moment whoops), they dynamic felt genuine and realistic. I thought the set up for the Totally Not a Cult was interesting and was totally down for it as a more sinister force to lurk in the background. Early on I thought the handling of nightmares as an allegory for multiple things, or at least is coming across that way, was really interesting and would allow for the covering of multiple topics under one concept. I was also looking forward to Ness growing over the course of the story and accepting she does have some kind of trauma response linked to nightmares due to her sister turning into one and killing their father, eventually seeing her switch to a more positive self-talk and stop saying she’s “just a coward” and learning coping mechanisms. I liked having a protagonist that couldn’t fight and how that felt consistent with her as a character and how that played into her handling of dangerous situations and ability to escape danger. Her running through the streets and trying to escape the people after her with minimal fighting was exciting! It allowed for a different approach to things.

However, a lot of these opinions changes about halfway through the book. I didn’t mind the slow start, but when I realised I was in the middle of the book I became extremely concerned about how the book would wrap up all the plot threads introduced. Unfortunately, I wasn’t extremely satisfied with how this was handled.

To start, the book continues the trend that Ness is just a coward. This frustrated me because the book seemed to be describing her episodes/encounters with nightmares as some kind of trauma response/panic attack. Only for it all to be brushed off as her just being a coward, which felt almost minimising. Furthermore, the book had ANOTHER separate reason for her fear aside from the extremely traumatic experience of her sister turning into a nightmare and violently killing their father in front of her. It was frustrating to watch it drive home this notion that Ness was just a coward and needed to suck it up and suddenly her trauma would be cured! (This worked btw.)

Next, and less frustrating, was the setting. I had a very hard time pinning down when this book was supposed to take place. It felt very 1920’s, which I could have completely gotten behind, but then would mention very modern things. It felt like a very strange and jarring mix of the 20’s of today and the 20’s of 100 years ago which made it hard for me to picture the characters or settings with any level of clarity. I think that this can 100% work in most cases where it’s either supposed to be set in a certain time period but has anachronistic tech (Sherlock Holmes: Game of Shadows) OR in which it’s supposed to evoke a certain time period but still has modern tech like elevators or future tech like spaceships (The Adventure Zone: Balance). I don’t think it’s impossible to have a setting that has the aesthetic of the 1920’s but includes modern tech, I just don’t think this book executes it very well. I wouldn’t even have a problem with it, if it didn’t make it difficult for me to picture the characters or settings of the book, because I couldn’t wrap my head around what building or outfits or hairstyles were supposed to look like.

Next on the chopping block before I get to the meat of my issues, is Ness as a protagonist. It’s disappointing to me I fell off with this character within the story. I thought she had the potential to be extremely interesting and wanted to see how she’d grow over the course of the story. Then I realised she’s a total idiot and was dragged along as she got worse. To start, my first tip off was when her bestie was telling her the boat she was boarding to deliver mail was an all night party boat where no one would be sleeping, Ness had to ask what the beds were for. I immediately caught on to what was being implied, but then Ness had it spelled out for her and got all slushy and flustered about it. Then, on the boat, when she meets Cy she quickly runs through the types of vampires and identifies him as one almost immediately. It was impressive and clever, and this never happens again. For the rest of the book it feels like things have to by spelled out for the main character by the far more competent and strong people around her. It felt almost infantilising. Not to mention I was pitched a morally grey protagonist and instead just got a raging asshole who repeatedly bullies this one girl (who we never see be mean to her without Ness being aggressive first btw) and is just rude and snarky to everyone around her. It wasn’t endearing, I just thought she was a dick.

Finally, we get to the rushed mess that was the last 50%-30% of this book. This is where I’m going to enter some spoiler territory, so just a heads up.

To start, we really kick off events post boat-explosion (there was a boat explosion at the beginning of the book) by an assassin being sent after Ness. Presumably by the people that arranged for the boat to go ka-boom. As a consequence she runs off to the vamp she escape the boat explosion with, Cy. She leaves the next morning, but the assassin never shows up again. Just completely dropped with no explanation. Cy and Ness trauma dump. It’s not until 70% of the way through the book things start happening again. Ness and the bestie break into a secret room and find all the Mysterious Documents that the head of the Totally Not a Cult they’re members of has. Out of literally no where there’s a big plot twist that they’re sending people off to be turned into nightmares and they were going to do this to the MC. When I say out of no where, I mean out of no where. We’re never once given the sense this is something the group would do, they wanted to relocate the MC because she sucks at her job (which is does), but that’s it. Never once does it seem like they want to experiment on her or anything. At least not until it’s relevant. They’re found by the director and saved by the girl Ness has been bullying non-stop, only to find out she’s an investigative reporter trying to uncover the human experiments. It’s here that Ness realises she’s been manipulated into being scared of nightmares and suddenly she’s cured. Whoo. Great writing. Then, Cy figures out who wanted to kill him and there’s a big plot twist with a shit reveal that had minimal build up (it’s his bestie’s gf who’s super jealous of two guys being friends.) Ness then goes on this long speech about how jealousy and abuse is bad with all the subtly of a brick to the face. It feels strange, like the author is trying to signal to everyone she’s a good person. This is also how I felt reading the long rants about the romanticisation of toxic relationships in media. Not that these things shouldn’t be discussed, but it feels weird to out of no where have characters go on these long rants about how evil and wrong it is. After the jealousy rant, Ness and Cy are kidnapped and taken to a secret jail run by the people who hunt nightmares. This of course, had no build up or foreshadowing, and I think the author just expects the reader to assume that the group is being evil because everyone else is. Then the book takes a hard left back into something alluded to after the boom went ka-boom, which was then dropped and never mentioned or alluded to again. Ness goes on this whole personal journey and then wakes up, someone else saves the day, and she escapes. There’s then what feels like a sudden romantic subplot coming out of no where as there’s a scene that feels somewhat implied to be sexual. Every scene after that seems to allude to them now having feelings for each other, it was a bit of a disappointment after being so invested in their friendship and being excited to have close friendship between a girl and a guy.

Overall, it had good moments and had a strong start, but fell flat at the end in a disappointing way.

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takarakei's review against another edition

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adventurous dark medium-paced

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

2.5

Unfortunately another YA fantasy that falls to the "this duology probably should've been edited down into one book" pitfall. At the beginning I was really interested in the world building and the concept of this world - where people can turn into their worst nightmares. However, the plot really dragged and I wasn't really into the writing in general (a lot of repetition). I really just felt like things were starting to get interesting when the book ended, meaning that there wasn't enough substance in book 1 to keep me interested in reading book 2 (feels like all the action will be in that book).

Someone please explain to me this whole 'vampires shown in media is just making them seem sexy when they are evil' bit... but then she befriends one and lets her bite him (which we don't even get to see). Like what is this critiquing?? In fact this is like a main critique I have with this book in that a lot of important things happen off page and we're just told about them later?

Another example - when she confronts her old teacher at the end, I was like - why are we just being shown only this part? one encounter with him earlier in the book, and she just figures out he's the one sending kids off ??? where was the mystery building up to this reveal?

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lilifane's review

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adventurous dark lighthearted mysterious fast-paced

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

3.0

What a surprise read. I did not expect to enjoy this book as much as I did. It was such a quick and fun read, and I caught myself looking forward to continuing reading all the time. Almost gave it 4 stars just because of this positive reading experience.

But objectively, there are some flaws. Mainly the writing, I guess, it's not the strongest. It's on the simple side with lots of repetitions, not only certain recurring scenes and thoughts (which can be explained with the protagonist's mental state) but also words and phrases (which is a little more annoying).

My favorite part of the book was probably the anxiety representation. The protagonist has an anxiety disorder, and I think the author does a good job of showing how this can affect so many aspects of your every day life. How part of your brain knows there is probably no danger, but your body is still in hide/flight mode, and you can't do anything about it. But then maybe, in this specific world, the anxiety is actually warranted? Because there are random monster attacks, gang shootouts, people turning into literal monsters without warning, corruption so bad that you can end up in jail just because you didn't have enough money to bribe a random police officer passing you by. But then again, everyone just accepting this as normal and going about their day worked for me. I was enjoying the humor and lightheartedness of the narrative, they just took away from the atmosphere of the setting.

There were also some dialogues that felt a little forced and out of place. Yes, I do think that discussions about how media romanticizes toxic relationships is important, I just don't think the way it's done here is ideal. I really liked most of the dialogues and bonding moments between the characters, though. Was really rooting for Cy's and Ness' friendship development. And the discussion about how lonely and isolated you can feel because of trauma, trust issues and anxiety hit a little too close to home.

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azrah786's review against another edition

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2.5

**I was provided with an ARC through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review**

CW: violence, gun violence, blood, injury, gore, body horror, murder, death, death of parent, child death, grief, police brutality, animal cruelty, kidnapping, panic attacks/disorders
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Despite the promising initial concepts and the Gotham vibes of the setting I did not enjoy this one. I feel like this story had so much potential but for me the primary plotline just bored me to tears.

I think a lot of this comes down to the protagonist. Now there are times when books have leading protagonists who aren’t the “chosen one” or have anything special going on that have been written really well but I sadly didn’t find that to be the case here. Ness very much felt like a side character in her own story to me throughout the whole book, nothing about her journey ever stood out and just felt very minor in the whole scope of things especially when there are more interesting things occurring in the background.

I managed to push through because I wanted to see who was behind some of the more unknown elements of these background plot points but the story never fully followed these other elements.

Ness’s perspective just felt very repetitive and it got tedious fast and I also found literally every supporting character to be more interesting than her. The relationships that formed between the characters were well written but I don’t think they were given enough room to grow.

So it’s safe to say I won’t be picking up the sequel.
Final Rating – 2.5/5 Stars

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kirstenf's review

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adventurous dark funny hopeful mysterious fast-paced

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

4.5

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goldkatze's review against another edition

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dark funny mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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dragonwriter's review against another edition

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adventurous dark tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

I’m not sure which I loved more, the random pterodactyl flying around eating people, or the chapter specifically detailing the dangers and perversion of vampire romance and how perception is affected by popular media (as told by a vampire, lol.)

The world has been consumed by nightmares. If you fall asleep and dream, you will wake as your nightmare. This is something Ness knows all too well. Her mother was killed during a nightmare’s rampage, then her sister turned into a spider nightmare and ate their father. Naturally this traumatized her, sending her to the Friends of the Saints who offer free counseling and shelter, a little safe space from the monsters. However, her trauma has left her with crippling fear, making her incapable of doing basically any job, for she flees and hides at the sight of even the friendliest nightmare. In a final attempt to keep her place with the Friends, she volunteers for mail duty, and ends up on a ship that explodes. She’s saved from the blast and drowning by a vampire, and is left questioning everything she knows and her very safety.
This story was an absolute delight; I thoroughly enjoyed it!

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