michaeldrakich's review against another edition
2.0
Standard fantasy fare with some twists and holes.
Chrysanthe has a number of standard fantasy features. A lost princess. A young knight in search of her. An evil lord who wants her crown. A perilous journey. Magicans, monsters, mayhem and war. On these standards it delivers.
There are a few different wrinkles. The made worlds. The Book. The Law.
Chrysanthe is the real world. All others were made by wizards many years ago, but not too many. Chrysanthe is only 6,098 years old. Obviously the author ran with the time frame proposed by Creationists on how old the Earth is. There are other religious references as well, though they are simply back story and not really pertinent to the main one. The Book is not an actual book. It is something from which God creates things. The Law is God's law. One of its rules is that no harm may befall the ruler of Chrysanthe or his descendants in line for the throne. There are Heroes in Chrysanthe who are created from the Book.
The story plods along slowly, too slow for my liking, to the eventual 'battle royale' with the good guys winning.
About a third of the way into the book the author forgot who the main protagonists were - Christine and Quentin. Quite simply, the parts they play throughout the balance are almost non-existent. Instead a new character, Melogian, a female wizard, takes center stage. Even some of the sidekicks like Captain Veraless get a lot more play than our original two heroes. When you invest the reader in two characters and then drop them like hot potatoes, you drop the attachment.
What is also frustrating is the plot holes.
Reading from here contains spoilers.
The made worlds are limited in number, yet limitless. It seems that when wizards, or those empowered by wizards, travel from Chrysanthe into the made worlds the move down a gradient whereby the made world deviates constantly. The best analogy would be a multiverse where things are not quite the same in each copy. It's made clear only wizards or those empowered can travel the gradient. The heroine Christine, daughter of Edisthen, the king of Chrysanthe, cannot travel the gradient. She is trapped in a made world and it takes a knight, Sir Quentin, who is empowered by the magic of Orion, to save her and do so. Her father, the king, gets trapped in a made world and dies traversing down the gradient. Wait a second. Only wizards and those they empower can do so. How did that happen? A lot of people liked the made worlds. I just found them confusing.
The Book is the only place Heroes can come from. Only God controls the Book. Hold on now. Melogian, a wizard, through a spell creates not one, but six heroes.
The Law, as in God's law, will strike down anyone who harms royalty. The story goes how Edisthen replaced Vaurd as king as ordained by the Law. At the point Vaurd dies, his children are no longer in line for the throne. Yet, behold, the Law still applies to them for some unknown reason. Why? They have no right to the throne. No title. If a usurper is protected by the Law, then everyone in Chrysanthe should be protected because everyone could possibly be a usurper.
Then there's the demons. Trapped below the earth for millenia by the best wizards of all time because they could not be killed, all get killed! Seriously.
There are other irritating tidbits like how God is a female for most of the book, but in the middle he's male. Someone missed that. Or how Duke Corlin gets captured, then is dead, then, oh, he was only captured after all. Who's editing this thing? There's more, but I digress.
All in all, I was disappointed, both in the story and in the plot holes. The only character I felt any empathy for was an evil wizard, Mathellin. His story delved into him.
I picked up this book at my local book store for only $5.00. As a fan of epic fantasy I figured it was worth a shot. There is a glowing tribute by Ursula K. LeGuin on a previous work by the author. Next time I'll make sure the review is for the book in question.
Chrysanthe has a number of standard fantasy features. A lost princess. A young knight in search of her. An evil lord who wants her crown. A perilous journey. Magicans, monsters, mayhem and war. On these standards it delivers.
There are a few different wrinkles. The made worlds. The Book. The Law.
Chrysanthe is the real world. All others were made by wizards many years ago, but not too many. Chrysanthe is only 6,098 years old. Obviously the author ran with the time frame proposed by Creationists on how old the Earth is. There are other religious references as well, though they are simply back story and not really pertinent to the main one. The Book is not an actual book. It is something from which God creates things. The Law is God's law. One of its rules is that no harm may befall the ruler of Chrysanthe or his descendants in line for the throne. There are Heroes in Chrysanthe who are created from the Book.
The story plods along slowly, too slow for my liking, to the eventual 'battle royale' with the good guys winning.
About a third of the way into the book the author forgot who the main protagonists were - Christine and Quentin. Quite simply, the parts they play throughout the balance are almost non-existent. Instead a new character, Melogian, a female wizard, takes center stage. Even some of the sidekicks like Captain Veraless get a lot more play than our original two heroes. When you invest the reader in two characters and then drop them like hot potatoes, you drop the attachment.
What is also frustrating is the plot holes.
Reading from here contains spoilers.
The made worlds are limited in number, yet limitless. It seems that when wizards, or those empowered by wizards, travel from Chrysanthe into the made worlds the move down a gradient whereby the made world deviates constantly. The best analogy would be a multiverse where things are not quite the same in each copy. It's made clear only wizards or those empowered can travel the gradient. The heroine Christine, daughter of Edisthen, the king of Chrysanthe, cannot travel the gradient. She is trapped in a made world and it takes a knight, Sir Quentin, who is empowered by the magic of Orion, to save her and do so. Her father, the king, gets trapped in a made world and dies traversing down the gradient. Wait a second. Only wizards and those they empower can do so. How did that happen? A lot of people liked the made worlds. I just found them confusing.
The Book is the only place Heroes can come from. Only God controls the Book. Hold on now. Melogian, a wizard, through a spell creates not one, but six heroes.
The Law, as in God's law, will strike down anyone who harms royalty. The story goes how Edisthen replaced Vaurd as king as ordained by the Law. At the point Vaurd dies, his children are no longer in line for the throne. Yet, behold, the Law still applies to them for some unknown reason. Why? They have no right to the throne. No title. If a usurper is protected by the Law, then everyone in Chrysanthe should be protected because everyone could possibly be a usurper.
Then there's the demons. Trapped below the earth for millenia by the best wizards of all time because they could not be killed, all get killed! Seriously.
There are other irritating tidbits like how God is a female for most of the book, but in the middle he's male. Someone missed that. Or how Duke Corlin gets captured, then is dead, then, oh, he was only captured after all. Who's editing this thing? There's more, but I digress.
All in all, I was disappointed, both in the story and in the plot holes. The only character I felt any empathy for was an evil wizard, Mathellin. His story delved into him.
I picked up this book at my local book store for only $5.00. As a fan of epic fantasy I figured it was worth a shot. There is a glowing tribute by Ursula K. LeGuin on a previous work by the author. Next time I'll make sure the review is for the book in question.
dtaylorbooks's review against another edition
2.0
You know, for such an incredibly long book CHRYSANTHE was so unbelievably forgettable. Just a note on the sheer length: my copy is roughly 500 pages with microscopic font and margins that are maybe 3/4 of an inch. Look -
The majority of the books I read are half that, usually creating a longer than required book but it reads quickly. Except this book wasn't shortened by it's tiny writing. Extend it out to regular reading font and margins and you're looking at something that could possibly be broaching a 700 page book with no page breaks for chapters. They start a couple of lines down from the end of the former chapter. Only "book breaks" are allotted and there are seven "books" within this one. If CHRYSANTHE were actually parsed out into seven bound books it 1) wouldn't have taken me a month to read because 2) I wouldn't have read past the first book.
As it stands CHRYSANTHE is a strange one for me. I had neither the desire to stop reading nor continue. I wasn't engrossed with the story and the characters were wafer thing with Christine barely developing beyond the first few pages. Forget about Quentin. That boy's a lost cause. So I have no idea what compelled me to actually finish this title. It goes against all of the logic of my prior DNFs as it rightly should have been one.
In all honesty I do think it was the world. If nothing else the world was a pretty solid one and I found Quentin's and Christine's travels through the worlds to be fascinating and the concept that they're not even real once you leave them pretty intriguing. It kind of bodes for the whole "tree falls in the forest" thing. If no one's there to experience it does it exist after all? I wasn't too fond of the whole Hero concept in that if there's an incompetent ass on the throne then the Book (read: bible) will spit out a Hero to depose the crappy ruler and not much can be done because the Law (basically an intangible governing entity enforced by some kind of higher power) will kill you dead if you even so much as flick a royal's nose and mean the harm it causes. For instance Christine, at around 10 years old, got into a fight with a schoolmate in the made world where she was trapped and the girl kicked her in the shin. Because the Law followed Christine and applied in the made world the girl died a horrible death (which varies from death to death on the method). Neat concept, kind of crappy attribution. There are a lot of flaws in the world's logic but it painted a nice picture regardless.
Except for the poop. There's a lot of it. Literally. The author had an unhealthy obsession of demonstrating a character's ability to provide a BM. I have no idea why. But there was a lot of gut rumbling and voiding of bowels going on. Is this an aspect of fantasy I just wasn't aware of?
CHRYSANTHE was one of the few books where I read reviews as I was reading it simply because I wanted to know why it kept getting such low star ratings. Having read it I can understand. You're pretty much only going to tolerate it if you're a world whore like I am, and even that's a stretch. Reading it you're pretty much skating on the surface, reading a text book account of what's going on in these people's lives. There's very little by the way of character development and I believe only Christine does any developing at all. Barely. Having such vicious false memories implanted can have one hell of an effect on a person's psyche and if I said Christine didn't grow at all as a character I'd be lying but she doesn't grow much. She is rather stunted in the maturity department and she does end up with a lot shoved into her lap and I do believe she reacts accordingly. But since everything else around her is stagnant and the time elapsed is only a matter of weeks it doesn't help her. I think she's come a long way in a short amount of time, all things considered, but it's contextual.
I feel like reading something so incredibly dense I should have taken more away from it but it's fluid; it just runs from my mind. There isn't much that's all that memorable about CHRYSANTHE but it's not inherently bad either. I think if the author had a bit more focus and honed in on a single character or two instead of resorting to the third person omniscient voice I think more could have been done in terms of character development, especially for Christine. It's supposed to be mostly her story but once she gets to Chrysanthe she'd abandoned for other corners of the world most of the time. It's unfortunate.
I think the premise was fantastic and it had potential but the execution was lackluster at best. I really wanted to like CHRYSANTHE but it just fell flat.
The majority of the books I read are half that, usually creating a longer than required book but it reads quickly. Except this book wasn't shortened by it's tiny writing. Extend it out to regular reading font and margins and you're looking at something that could possibly be broaching a 700 page book with no page breaks for chapters. They start a couple of lines down from the end of the former chapter. Only "book breaks" are allotted and there are seven "books" within this one. If CHRYSANTHE were actually parsed out into seven bound books it 1) wouldn't have taken me a month to read because 2) I wouldn't have read past the first book.
As it stands CHRYSANTHE is a strange one for me. I had neither the desire to stop reading nor continue. I wasn't engrossed with the story and the characters were wafer thing with Christine barely developing beyond the first few pages. Forget about Quentin. That boy's a lost cause. So I have no idea what compelled me to actually finish this title. It goes against all of the logic of my prior DNFs as it rightly should have been one.
In all honesty I do think it was the world. If nothing else the world was a pretty solid one and I found Quentin's and Christine's travels through the worlds to be fascinating and the concept that they're not even real once you leave them pretty intriguing. It kind of bodes for the whole "tree falls in the forest" thing. If no one's there to experience it does it exist after all? I wasn't too fond of the whole Hero concept in that if there's an incompetent ass on the throne then the Book (read: bible) will spit out a Hero to depose the crappy ruler and not much can be done because the Law (basically an intangible governing entity enforced by some kind of higher power) will kill you dead if you even so much as flick a royal's nose and mean the harm it causes. For instance Christine, at around 10 years old, got into a fight with a schoolmate in the made world where she was trapped and the girl kicked her in the shin. Because the Law followed Christine and applied in the made world the girl died a horrible death (which varies from death to death on the method). Neat concept, kind of crappy attribution. There are a lot of flaws in the world's logic but it painted a nice picture regardless.
Except for the poop. There's a lot of it. Literally. The author had an unhealthy obsession of demonstrating a character's ability to provide a BM. I have no idea why. But there was a lot of gut rumbling and voiding of bowels going on. Is this an aspect of fantasy I just wasn't aware of?
CHRYSANTHE was one of the few books where I read reviews as I was reading it simply because I wanted to know why it kept getting such low star ratings. Having read it I can understand. You're pretty much only going to tolerate it if you're a world whore like I am, and even that's a stretch. Reading it you're pretty much skating on the surface, reading a text book account of what's going on in these people's lives. There's very little by the way of character development and I believe only Christine does any developing at all. Barely. Having such vicious false memories implanted can have one hell of an effect on a person's psyche and if I said Christine didn't grow at all as a character I'd be lying but she doesn't grow much. She is rather stunted in the maturity department and she does end up with a lot shoved into her lap and I do believe she reacts accordingly. But since everything else around her is stagnant and the time elapsed is only a matter of weeks it doesn't help her. I think she's come a long way in a short amount of time, all things considered, but it's contextual.
I feel like reading something so incredibly dense I should have taken more away from it but it's fluid; it just runs from my mind. There isn't much that's all that memorable about CHRYSANTHE but it's not inherently bad either. I think if the author had a bit more focus and honed in on a single character or two instead of resorting to the third person omniscient voice I think more could have been done in terms of character development, especially for Christine. It's supposed to be mostly her story but once she gets to Chrysanthe she'd abandoned for other corners of the world most of the time. It's unfortunate.
I think the premise was fantastic and it had potential but the execution was lackluster at best. I really wanted to like CHRYSANTHE but it just fell flat.
mayhap's review against another edition
4.0
A very old-fashioned sort of fantasy, weird and wonderful.
alesia_charles's review
5.0
Apparently I'm in the minority here, but I burned a pan in the kitchen and put off important work because of being engrossed in reading this book. And this despite initial grave doubts about the whole secretly-a-princess plot (which had been rather overdone, don't you think?).
I found the world-building fascinating - so similar to Zelazny's Amber universe, but also distinctly its own - and the tactic of having Christine hidden in a world that's almost-but-definitely-not our own makes her permanent relocation from it easier to take than might otherwise have been the case (clever, I think).
The semi-omniscient viewpoint was not a problem for me, and using it enabled the author to present scenes out of strict sequence that made a lot of things clear to the reader, even though many of the characters never actually knew the details (or in one case, refused to acknowledge them). This is overall one of those books that's as much about the world as about the characters, and it hit the right balance between those for me ... although it did hold off on explaining exactly what Heroes are for long enough to make me impatient.
While most of the villains were a bit over the top (Casimir is clearly a sociopath, while Evered is merely scenery-chewing irrational) I thought the character of Mathellin added an important note of complexity to the villains' side - and in fact, even the villains were presented as having limits to their villainy. Or at least faint twinges of guilt.
The good guys have the damaged Christine and the knight Quentin (who's the only slightly tarnished other side of Mathellin's coin, actually), plus the sorceress Melogian and, for a time, King Edisthen. Although the latter did not hold the point of view very much, those were key scenes and added an unexpected layer of pathos to the story.
The plot, of course, starts with setting the scene in the place Christine has been hidden, and then lurches abruptly into a lengthy chase across the multiverse featuring only Christine, Quentin, and Mathellin. When they finally reach Chrysanthe, everything slows down again, naturally. Christine and Quentin (who's been away for nine years) are trying to settle in. The rest of the cast have to be introduced and the war plot set in motion (rebellion against Edisthen by the sons of the previous king and one of three duchies). Melogian spends a fair amount of time explaining the world to Christine and we also learn further key information about how the world works from backstory scenes about her. This is probably the part that most frustrated some other readers, but I enjoyed the elaboration of the characters and the world as an alternate form of plot; and it was also the only way to eventually make everything make sense.
I was very impressed by Meynard's solution to the problem of Edisthen's [spoiler], the seeds of which had been present all along; likewise, the climax of the story - with the rebellious forces at the very gates of the castle - had obvious elements but also unexpected ones. Perfect.
I still don't know if the pan I burned is going to be salvageable, but I'm quite sure (I checked) that Casimir raised seven demons, not the six that appeared for the war. I don't know if that portends a sequel, or is just an error ... nor am I sure that I'd enjoy a second book about Chrysanthe as much as I did the first, since most of this world's secrets have been revealed. But we'll see, perhaps.
I found the world-building fascinating - so similar to Zelazny's Amber universe, but also distinctly its own - and the tactic of having Christine hidden in a world that's almost-but-definitely-not our own makes her permanent relocation from it easier to take than might otherwise have been the case (clever, I think).
The semi-omniscient viewpoint was not a problem for me, and using it enabled the author to present scenes out of strict sequence that made a lot of things clear to the reader, even though many of the characters never actually knew the details (or in one case, refused to acknowledge them). This is overall one of those books that's as much about the world as about the characters, and it hit the right balance between those for me ... although it did hold off on explaining exactly what Heroes are for long enough to make me impatient.
While most of the villains were a bit over the top (Casimir is clearly a sociopath, while Evered is merely scenery-chewing irrational) I thought the character of Mathellin added an important note of complexity to the villains' side - and in fact, even the villains were presented as having limits to their villainy. Or at least faint twinges of guilt.
The good guys have the damaged Christine and the knight Quentin (who's the only slightly tarnished other side of Mathellin's coin, actually), plus the sorceress Melogian and, for a time, King Edisthen. Although the latter did not hold the point of view very much, those were key scenes and added an unexpected layer of pathos to the story.
The plot, of course, starts with setting the scene in the place Christine has been hidden, and then lurches abruptly into a lengthy chase across the multiverse featuring only Christine, Quentin, and Mathellin. When they finally reach Chrysanthe, everything slows down again, naturally. Christine and Quentin (who's been away for nine years) are trying to settle in. The rest of the cast have to be introduced and the war plot set in motion (rebellion against Edisthen by the sons of the previous king and one of three duchies). Melogian spends a fair amount of time explaining the world to Christine and we also learn further key information about how the world works from backstory scenes about her. This is probably the part that most frustrated some other readers, but I enjoyed the elaboration of the characters and the world as an alternate form of plot; and it was also the only way to eventually make everything make sense.
I was very impressed by Meynard's solution to the problem of Edisthen's [spoiler], the seeds of which had been present all along; likewise, the climax of the story - with the rebellious forces at the very gates of the castle - had obvious elements but also unexpected ones. Perfect.
I still don't know if the pan I burned is going to be salvageable, but I'm quite sure (I checked) that Casimir raised seven demons, not the six that appeared for the war. I don't know if that portends a sequel, or is just an error ... nor am I sure that I'd enjoy a second book about Chrysanthe as much as I did the first, since most of this world's secrets have been revealed. But we'll see, perhaps.
prationality's review
1.0
o.o
Look I really enjoy books in which we find out the main character is a royal in hiding. Joyce Ballou Gregorian's Tredana trilogy and Paul Park's Roumania Sequence, not to mention Pamela Dean's Secret Country trilogy and Frank Beddor's Looking Glass Wars trilogy , are ALL based around this concept. And I *adore* those series. And to be truthful CHRYSANTHE sounded exactly like something I would love. Plus from a publisher I almost always enjoy (Tor) I thought this was a shoo-in for at least a 3 star rating. I was leery of the fact that a large piece of the story seemed to center on Christine's 'childhood trauma' (or perceived trauma, let's just say she takes a unique approach to finding out the truth).
But as I read more and more of the book (its over 500pages) I became less and less happy. I couldn't put my finger on it. I really couldn't. The book wasn't written badly--its blunt and a bit unsettling at first, but it had a certain....voice to it that I wasn't adverse to. Christine is hard to relate with at first, what she suffers at the hands of her therapist (and 'Uncle') are difficult to read. Though the tension and unsettling nature of those experiences are lessened because the reader already knows its all fake.
Its not until I put down the book and thought about it that I realized why I wasn't happy or satisfied.
I hated this book. I mean, full on hated it. Its been so long since I've hated a book with every fiber of my bookish being that I didn't understand the emotion. (for the curious the last book was BREAKING DAWN) Most books something interests me--like Andrea Cremer's books, I thoroughly disliked the choices made, the development of characters and ending, but I really found the concept fascinating. And Calla wasn't horrible, just made stupid decisions a lot--but by the end of CHYSANTHE? I couldn't recall a single instance, character or concept I wanted to know more about.
Even as I'm sitting here I can't recall anything to like. I have a vague feeling of disquiet and uncomfortableness with the book actually, and gave away my ARC edition as fast as possible.
Look I really enjoy books in which we find out the main character is a royal in hiding. Joyce Ballou Gregorian's Tredana trilogy and Paul Park's Roumania Sequence, not to mention Pamela Dean's Secret Country trilogy and Frank Beddor's Looking Glass Wars trilogy , are ALL based around this concept. And I *adore* those series. And to be truthful CHRYSANTHE sounded exactly like something I would love. Plus from a publisher I almost always enjoy (Tor) I thought this was a shoo-in for at least a 3 star rating. I was leery of the fact that a large piece of the story seemed to center on Christine's 'childhood trauma' (or perceived trauma, let's just say she takes a unique approach to finding out the truth).
But as I read more and more of the book (its over 500pages) I became less and less happy. I couldn't put my finger on it. I really couldn't. The book wasn't written badly--its blunt and a bit unsettling at first, but it had a certain....voice to it that I wasn't adverse to. Christine is hard to relate with at first, what she suffers at the hands of her therapist (and 'Uncle') are difficult to read. Though the tension and unsettling nature of those experiences are lessened because the reader already knows its all fake.
Its not until I put down the book and thought about it that I realized why I wasn't happy or satisfied.
I hated this book. I mean, full on hated it. Its been so long since I've hated a book with every fiber of my bookish being that I didn't understand the emotion. (for the curious the last book was BREAKING DAWN) Most books something interests me--like Andrea Cremer's books, I thoroughly disliked the choices made, the development of characters and ending, but I really found the concept fascinating. And Calla wasn't horrible, just made stupid decisions a lot--but by the end of CHYSANTHE? I couldn't recall a single instance, character or concept I wanted to know more about.
Even as I'm sitting here I can't recall anything to like. I have a vague feeling of disquiet and uncomfortableness with the book actually, and gave away my ARC edition as fast as possible.
tani's review
3.0
I have very mixed feelings about this book. First, I should probably explain how I read it, it give some context. While it is just one book, it is divided into three sections, and in some places you may find it offered as a trilogy, rather than a single book. This is how I found it, and I got access to the first book far earlier than the last two. I was faced with the choice of if I even wanted to read the book under those circumstances. In the end, I decided to just read the first 'book' and then see if I felt like continuing.
I actually really liked the first book. I really liked the imagination of the made worlds and the world-building. I enjoyed Christine as a character, and I was simultaneously intrigued and horrified by the psychological torture that she experiences. When she was offered a way out of her world, I liked her reaction - her confusion, her disbelief, and yet her desperate will to embrace something completely different from what she had experienced before. Throughout the books, Christine remained my favorite character by far, even though she was often paralyzed by circumstance.
The second book was much slower, which was really counter-intuitive for me. In the second book, Christine has finally reached her destination and is learning about Chrysanthe, and yet, it was probably the least eventful of the books. There were a lot of info dumps used to teach Christine about Chrysanthe, and while it was absolutely fascinating world-building, there just wasn't much else to it.
The final book was the worst for me, and I think that was mostly an aura problem. The final book is very bleak. Not many good things happen, and a great deal of bad things happen. For a long time, there is not a lot of hope for the heroes of the story, and it was pretty exhausting to read. Especially because, again, not a lot happened for much of the book.
I did enjoy the ending of the book. By that time, some of the other characters had finally grown on me (yes, it did take that long), and I finally was able to get invested in how things were going to turn out. However, it was too little, too late. The pacing was just incredibly slow for more than half of the book. It could have easily been half its length, and it probably would have been a better book at that point. Chrysanthe is ultimately just too long for the story that it tells, and it suffers greatly from that problem. I thought that the world-building was impressive, but ultimately, I can't really recommend this book. The only reason I am rating it three stars rather than two is because I really did enjoy the first book quite a bit. It's too bad that the latter two-thirds of the book didn't live up to the enjoyment I received from that first part.
I actually really liked the first book. I really liked the imagination of the made worlds and the world-building. I enjoyed Christine as a character, and I was simultaneously intrigued and horrified by the psychological torture that she experiences.
Spoiler
For the curious, she is essentially hypnotized into believing that she was raped over and over again.The second book was much slower, which was really counter-intuitive for me. In the second book, Christine has finally reached her destination and is learning about Chrysanthe, and yet, it was probably the least eventful of the books. There were a lot of info dumps used to teach Christine about Chrysanthe, and while it was absolutely fascinating world-building, there just wasn't much else to it.
The final book was the worst for me, and I think that was mostly an aura problem. The final book is very bleak. Not many good things happen, and a great deal of bad things happen. For a long time, there is not a lot of hope for the heroes of the story, and it was pretty exhausting to read. Especially because, again, not a lot happened for much of the book.
I did enjoy the ending of the book. By that time, some of the other characters had finally grown on me (yes, it did take that long), and I finally was able to get invested in how things were going to turn out. However, it was too little, too late. The pacing was just incredibly slow for more than half of the book. It could have easily been half its length, and it probably would have been a better book at that point. Chrysanthe is ultimately just too long for the story that it tells, and it suffers greatly from that problem. I thought that the world-building was impressive, but ultimately, I can't really recommend this book. The only reason I am rating it three stars rather than two is because I really did enjoy the first book quite a bit. It's too bad that the latter two-thirds of the book didn't live up to the enjoyment I received from that first part.
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