A review by maddie_can_read
Tress of the Emerald Sea by Brandon Sanderson

adventurous emotional funny hopeful inspiring mysterious slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

I really enjoyed a lot of the aspects of this story: 

  • Whimsical
  • Fairytale adjacent without being very young
  • Writing/ storytelling style
  • Humour and the random tangents (reminded me of Hitchhiker's) 
  • Characterization
  • World-building
  • Lots of well developed female characters
  • Disability inclusion, they had a Deaf sensitivity/ representation reader, so cool!

What I didn't love:

  • I didn't find the actual story that compelling after about chapter 8.
    When I realized Tress was staying on the ship the entire novel and the story was going to go pretty predictably - she's obviously going to go get Charlie and have some form of happily ever after
  • Lack of tension
  • Felt the pace could've been faster/ the pace was a little inconsistent/ slogged a bit after chapter 8

This was my first Sanderson novel so I'm definitely going to check out some more as I've heard they vary a lot in tone. 

We want to imagine that people are consistent, steady, stable. We define who they are, create descriptions to lock them on a page, divide them up by their likes, talents, beliefs. Then we pretend some—perhaps most—are better than we are, because they stick to their definitions, while we never quite fit ours. Truth is, people are as fluid as time is. We adapt to our situation like water in a strangely shaped jug, though it might take us a little while to ooze into all the little nooks. Because we adapt, we sometimes don’t recognize how twisted, uncomfortable, or downright wrong the container is that we’ve been told to inhabit.
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