Reviews with content warning for Classism - The Bone Season

Reviews tagging 'Classism'

The Bone Season by Samantha Shannon

11 reviews

lararosemary's review against another edition

adventurous dark slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.0

hmmm, where to start? First of all I enjoyed the concept of the world and the ‘magic’ system, however, it is introduced way too dry and theoretically. I would have liked to see many more examples of actual clairvoyants in action instead of just name-dropping types and never getting to see how their powers actually work… also, this whole time I was worried

about Emim being a massive problem but they hardly mattered in the end

.

The main character makes crazy decisions, her survival instincts are all over the place. Are you telling me she has a gift that allows her to sense other dreamscapes and she STILL gets ambushed and surprised a billion times? Everyone thinks she is a prodigy and special but she needs to be saved all the time. Her

BEST FRIEND dies and 10 minutes later she is worrying about potentially being out of a job

.

I get that this is supposed to be a book in a series and therefore some foreshadowing needs to be done in advance but I don’t think I care enough to continue this series. There were very few characters that I cared about and I found the main character especially annoying.

Overall I liked the writing and I think that it’s impressive that the author was so young when she wrote it. For the most part I enjoyed reading the book and, though I found it predictable, I was curious throughout. The last part was really tedious though. I got this book as a gift and therefore I will treasure it. However, for me it was just too long for the story it was trying to tell and it didn’t manage to hook me. The prequel ‘the Pale Dreamer’ gave me some hope for insights in Paige’s character but these were quickly squashed, though I really liked the ‘side quest’ and more insights into the syndicate business (I still don’t get the value of buying a bound spirit however?).

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gillian_aftanas's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-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? It's complicated

5.0

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lamianoctalis's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense 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? It's complicated

5.0

Fabelhafte, mitreißende Geschichte, die eine alternative Geschichte der Welt mithilfe liebevoll kreiierter, gut ausgearbeiteter Figuren erzählt.
Tolle Erzählerin
Empfehlung an alle Fantasy-/Mystery-Liebhaber

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aroma_of_books's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

5.0

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chasinggrace's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious 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? No

3.0

Wait because I’m so sad that I am giving this book a three star rating. I absolutely loved Priory, and I had such high hopes for the beginning of this series. However, it’s the writing that ruined the story for me. There was SO. MUCH. telling instead of showing. I also don’t think the first person POV worked to the story’s advantage here. Unfortunately, there were many obvious statements, convenient jumps back in time, and sloppy character-building. I think the magic system and world is so interesting, but the descriptors of what is what and who is who were not weaved into the story well. At many times, it felt like info dump after info dump.

Particularly, the jump from “I will lead this rebellion” to the Bicentennial or whatever was CRAZY. We spend 400 pages watching Paige suffer and fight against the system as a stubborn individual and are so ready to follow her through the intricate steps of sowing a rebellion amongst prisoners, just for the book to…skip 2 months of scheming? That would have been INTERESTING. Instead, I now have to read 20 pages of “a few weeks ago we did this, and Jules handled this, and I planted bombs here, and shoutout to the performers who helped me do this.” Like, I would have liked to SEE ALL OF THAT, not just be told about it. Or at least go over the plans through dialogue, not just Paige telling the reader everything that’s been done point-blank.

The writing took me out of the story more times than I can count, which made me so frustrated because the story is interesting.

Other than the frustrating prose - and the choppy world/character building that went along with it - I was enamored by the story. I found the interactions and banter between Paige and Warden to actually be done quite well. His personality and speaking style was distinct, and their interactions kept me interested without them being overly obvious or corny.

As stubborn as she can be, I did enjoy how Paige’s past in the syndicate helped her in the lost city. She’s not a bulletproof FMC but she’s also not hopeless. Can she be dumb and rash? Yes. And a little too “let’s save everyone even though that’s illogical.” But overall, I was rooting for her and wanted to read about her more.

My favorite aspects of this story were the dialogue between Paige and Warden, the setting within Magdalen, and the relationships Paige had between the Seven Dials and the other humans in the lost city. I also loved the ending, but didn’t want it to be the end! It ends in a way that really makes you want to read the next book, despite this one’s flaws.

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