A review by athenathestorier
These Rebel Waves by Sara Raasch

adventurous emotional tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

While not necessarily new in concept, I did find myself getting swept away by this story. The subplots and characters reminded me of Chima’s Heir Chronicles and Maas’s Throne of Glass series. I liked that we see a lot of racial diversity within the set-up of this fantasy world, with some of the same micro-aggressions and concerns that you would see in real life, especially within a melting pot country ripe with conflict. Also of note is that one of our 3 POVs/Main characters is a queer man, as well as a few support characters, and this is never made a big deal of within the story. This is representation that a lot of us have been calling for for a while. 

However, the fast-paced story was so plot-driven that the characters felt like they were being excessively dragged by it. None of their actions really made a difference during the entire duration of this book. And even though Lu was presented to us as composed and battle-efficient, she loses any semblance of these traits at the mere mention of the real enemy or their associates. Granted, this is due to battle trauma, but we are led to believe that everyone wants her with them on the battlefield despite the ONLY show she’s done to warrant this is the escape at the very beginning of the book and the fact that she never spills their secrets. While I’m sure that book 2 plans to solve all of this, the description sounds like all 3 characters will be battling with same exact internal battles for a while yet. 

 Notable quotes:
"Lu clung to that pride like she clung to hope."
"Better to wound your ego with compromise than feed your own pride with blood." 
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