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A review by amelianotthepilot
When Shadows Grow Tall by Maressa Voss
adventurous
slow-paced
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.0
*Thank you to the author and publisher for an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.*
First off the world was very cool and it has all the things I like in a fantasy novel: an adventure, interesting magic, beautiful and otherworldly world descriptions.
However, there were a lot of problems with this book and I think a lot of them could be solved with some editing. The writing itself was good but the plot wasn’t exactly cohesive and I didn’t love the characters. It follows Kylene, a 16 year old girl who is a self taught herbalist, and Lovelace, an adult man wizard. Who’s paths eventually cross as they both run from a rogue evil wizard and his peacekeepers.
I thought these were a bizarre choice of characters to follow as they are two demographics of readers and so I related to one and was utterly bored by the other. I found the fantasy names to be a bit cliche and also a bit of a pain. There were so many world building dumps that I just plowed through without really remembering who’s who and what silly fantasy words they’re talking about.
I think the main problem was the structure of the plot. The inciting incident sorta doesn’t happen until 100 pages in. The book itself is quite short for all of the world building it does. It’s only 200+ pages with all for the action happening in the later 100.
I thought the opening chapter about a random boy was very catchy and interesting but then bouncing between too seemingly unrelated characters plots didn’t really make sense.
The book ending ends up making the whole story feel like a setup for the actual plot (which would be book 2). It all felt like backstory.
I think the setup for the story is interesting but then it’s unclear what all the characters goals are until 100 pages in. I don’t know what Kylene is attempting to do really besides find her dad but she doesn’t seem to have a real plan or goal. Lovelace and Co’s goals are also unclear. We’re getting lots of wizard lore and then for some reason they stop in 1 town to recruit help but only 1 town and then give up and continue on their journey????? As a result there’s 0 character growth.
The two kids that Lovelace ends up picking up felt more like pets and plot devices than people.
Overall J thought it was a very mid fantasy book which was disappointing since the world building was cool and the synopsis sounded really promising.
SPOILERS FOLLOWING:
I don’t understand why Kylene goes by a different name at the end it was utterly ridiculous.
Also I don’t believe Lovelace and Gunner would have defeated Alev, he was far too powerful and the fact that they all died but then somehow they came back to life was ridiculous.
The Kylene pools bit at the end with the trippy death/transcendent montage was ridiculous.
First off the world was very cool and it has all the things I like in a fantasy novel: an adventure, interesting magic, beautiful and otherworldly world descriptions.
However, there were a lot of problems with this book and I think a lot of them could be solved with some editing. The writing itself was good but the plot wasn’t exactly cohesive and I didn’t love the characters. It follows Kylene, a 16 year old girl who is a self taught herbalist, and Lovelace, an adult man wizard. Who’s paths eventually cross as they both run from a rogue evil wizard and his peacekeepers.
I thought these were a bizarre choice of characters to follow as they are two demographics of readers and so I related to one and was utterly bored by the other. I found the fantasy names to be a bit cliche and also a bit of a pain. There were so many world building dumps that I just plowed through without really remembering who’s who and what silly fantasy words they’re talking about.
I think the main problem was the structure of the plot. The inciting incident sorta doesn’t happen until 100 pages in. The book itself is quite short for all of the world building it does. It’s only 200+ pages with all for the action happening in the later 100.
I thought the opening chapter about a random boy was very catchy and interesting but then bouncing between too seemingly unrelated characters plots didn’t really make sense.
The book ending ends up making the whole story feel like a setup for the actual plot (which would be book 2). It all felt like backstory.
I think the setup for the story is interesting but then it’s unclear what all the characters goals are until 100 pages in. I don’t know what Kylene is attempting to do really besides find her dad but she doesn’t seem to have a real plan or goal. Lovelace and Co’s goals are also unclear. We’re getting lots of wizard lore and then for some reason they stop in 1 town to recruit help but only 1 town and then give up and continue on their journey????? As a result there’s 0 character growth.
The two kids that Lovelace ends up picking up felt more like pets and plot devices than people.
Overall J thought it was a very mid fantasy book which was disappointing since the world building was cool and the synopsis sounded really promising.
SPOILERS FOLLOWING:
Also I don’t believe Lovelace and Gunner would have defeated Alev, he was far too powerful and the fact that they all died but then somehow they came back to life was ridiculous.
The Kylene pools bit at the end with the trippy death/transcendent montage was ridiculous.