A review by bramboomen
City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett
3.0
This is my summary of the book
Then the gods come back
Epic battle
End
I guess this is just the first book in a series and therefore it needs a lot of buildup and worldbuilding, but to me it seemed like Bennett forgot that it had to be a story too. He just threw everything he got at me, humour, seriousness, horror, politics, magic, science, lore and put it into a ton of mystery. I normally like a book that tries to do different things at once, mashes them up, presenting a new and fresh thing, I just felt that this book overshot the sweet spot by 4 or 5 genres.
This all makes me really want to not like the book, but I'd be lying if it didn't entertain me or made me curious. It just completely failed to hold my attention. Therefore I would place this book in the 'meh, kind of decent' category.
Spoiler
First there are 400 pages of the gods not coming back even though EVERYONE knows they are going to come back.Then the gods come back
Epic battle
End
I guess this is just the first book in a series and therefore it needs a lot of buildup and worldbuilding, but to me it seemed like Bennett forgot that it had to be a story too. He just threw everything he got at me, humour, seriousness, horror, politics, magic, science, lore and put it into a ton of mystery. I normally like a book that tries to do different things at once, mashes them up, presenting a new and fresh thing, I just felt that this book overshot the sweet spot by 4 or 5 genres.
This all makes me really want to not like the book, but I'd be lying if it didn't entertain me or made me curious. It just completely failed to hold my attention. Therefore I would place this book in the 'meh, kind of decent' category.