thefauxwriter's review
Hanging my boots on this one. I cannot do it. DNF at 40%
I had recieved an ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
It wasn't a bad story per se, but so many things went wrong with this one.
1. The protagonists had no chemistry. Either they themselves are so very confused or they managed to confuse the heck out of me. They felt so many things, in varying degrees without any preclude that made my head spin. Who are they as people? What are their aspirations? What do they wish to accomplish by the end of the book? I was never given a clue.
2. Subtext Subtext Subtext
I'm guessing reading the first book in the series will give me more context into what in the blue heavens is happening. And diving into this book without subtext is akin to torture. There are just too many characters, who are not introduced with a freshness for the debut reader, but rather with a baggage that gets lost in translation. I couldn't keep track of them and frankly I couldn't bring myself to care. The only character I found remotely interesting was Minerva but she too was so complex and shown so little that I lost my interest.
3. An unholy espionage mess
So the hero is a spy, the hero's 18-year old sister is a spy, the heroine is astute and can be a spy, the heroine's sister is as good as a spy. What in the blazes is going on? And what or on whom are they all spying over? If this does make sense in the end, the 40% of the story didn't captivate enough to stay till the end to find out.
4. If they say 'wicked ladies' once more I will commit arson
I get that the options for career, nay living was limited to women in the past, but this is a naive interpretation of what ladies were/could be upto. If you are something, you won't say(yell) it 50 times in 50 pages. SHOW DON'T TELL. not even once could I say oh yes they were wicked by their actions. Again, subtext. I felt like so much was taken for granted because this is the second book in a series. But even in a series that borrows storylines the readers deserves the courtesy of a summary. This was brutal.
5. I just didn't care for anything or anyone in this story. 40% in and I couldn't care less if either of these characters suffered a brutal death. I just don't care. And that's a sad state to leave your reader in.
Once again I want to say that this wasn't a particularly bad book, but the combination of all the things it contained went horribly wrong.
I had recieved an ARC from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
It wasn't a bad story per se, but so many things went wrong with this one.
1. The protagonists had no chemistry. Either they themselves are so very confused or they managed to confuse the heck out of me. They felt so many things, in varying degrees without any preclude that made my head spin. Who are they as people? What are their aspirations? What do they wish to accomplish by the end of the book? I was never given a clue.
2. Subtext Subtext Subtext
I'm guessing reading the first book in the series will give me more context into what in the blue heavens is happening. And diving into this book without subtext is akin to torture. There are just too many characters, who are not introduced with a freshness for the debut reader, but rather with a baggage that gets lost in translation. I couldn't keep track of them and frankly I couldn't bring myself to care. The only character I found remotely interesting was Minerva but she too was so complex and shown so little that I lost my interest.
3. An unholy espionage mess
So the hero is a spy, the hero's 18-year old sister is a spy, the heroine is astute and can be a spy, the heroine's sister is as good as a spy. What in the blazes is going on? And what or on whom are they all spying over? If this does make sense in the end, the 40% of the story didn't captivate enough to stay till the end to find out.
4. If they say 'wicked ladies' once more I will commit arson
I get that the options for career, nay living was limited to women in the past, but this is a naive interpretation of what ladies were/could be upto. If you are something, you won't say(yell) it 50 times in 50 pages. SHOW DON'T TELL. not even once could I say oh yes they were wicked by their actions. Again, subtext. I felt like so much was taken for granted because this is the second book in a series. But even in a series that borrows storylines the readers deserves the courtesy of a summary. This was brutal.
5. I just didn't care for anything or anyone in this story. 40% in and I couldn't care less if either of these characters suffered a brutal death. I just don't care. And that's a sad state to leave your reader in.
Once again I want to say that this wasn't a particularly bad book, but the combination of all the things it contained went horribly wrong.
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