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A review by chaptersofmads
Destroy the Day by Brigid Kemmerer
3.0
“Mind your mettle, Tessa”
In the wise words of Paramore, "How did we get here?"
Truthfully, the only reason this is getting a full three stars is because I genuinely loved following Harristan. Everything else was either super underwhelming or just poorly executed. From loving Defy the Night, I was originally expecting this to be a new favorite series. After struggling with book 2, I had hoped that was just a middle book slump and book 3 would redeem the series.
It - unfortunately - did not.
There is a difference between writing for young adults and the story reading younger and writing for older people (under the guise of YA) and the story reading incredibly immature. I am aware the characters were still young adults, but this read so NA without increasing the quality of the humor or the solutions to the problems. For such a long book, things were strangely rushed and awkwardly timed. The relationships felt stilted and immature, utilizing the characters telling us they cared deeply for the other person rather than making us care ourselves.
By the time the guard Rocco had beef with a 5 year old named Elmo, I wanted to put the book away. This might be some people's sense of humor, but it was not mine and felt strangely out of place after reading about someone being brutally tortured.
On top of that, Tessa and Corrick were absolutely ridiculous - but Tessa was surprisingly worse. It has been a while since I have found a FMC that annoying, especially when I previously hadn't minded her character. She was spoiled (more than usual), childish, and praised for everything she did with little to no consequences ever truly making an appearance.
Again, Harristan was a delight. His chapters saved this book for me, even when I was finding the solutions presented in his POV to be Disney direct-to-video-sequel quality at best.
Also... for the love of all things bookish, if you have multiple audiobook narrators, make sure they receive the same instructions. They should not be pronouncing character names differently or giving them different accents to the point it becomes cartoonish. (What was Corrick's Quint voice? That was a jumpscare)
Overall, while I can't pretend I wasn't disappointed in this book, it could have been much worse. For a 550 page novel, it read fairly quickly and by the end, I felt like the characters were where they were meant to be - even if the road there was laughable. I cannot say I will ever revisit this series, but somehow I will still carry fond memories of it.
If you struggled with book 2, I would recommend - perhaps - skipping this one.
In the wise words of Paramore, "How did we get here?"
Truthfully, the only reason this is getting a full three stars is because I genuinely loved following Harristan. Everything else was either super underwhelming or just poorly executed. From loving Defy the Night, I was originally expecting this to be a new favorite series. After struggling with book 2, I had hoped that was just a middle book slump and book 3 would redeem the series.
It - unfortunately - did not.
There is a difference between writing for young adults and the story reading younger and writing for older people (under the guise of YA) and the story reading incredibly immature. I am aware the characters were still young adults, but this read so NA without increasing the quality of the humor or the solutions to the problems. For such a long book, things were strangely rushed and awkwardly timed. The relationships felt stilted and immature, utilizing the characters telling us they cared deeply for the other person rather than making us care ourselves.
By the time the guard Rocco had beef with a 5 year old named Elmo, I wanted to put the book away. This might be some people's sense of humor, but it was not mine and felt strangely out of place after reading about someone being brutally tortured.
On top of that, Tessa and Corrick were absolutely ridiculous - but Tessa was surprisingly worse. It has been a while since I have found a FMC that annoying, especially when I previously hadn't minded her character. She was spoiled (more than usual), childish, and praised for everything she did with little to no consequences ever truly making an appearance.
Again, Harristan was a delight. His chapters saved this book for me, even when I was finding the solutions presented in his POV to be Disney direct-to-video-sequel quality at best.
Also... for the love of all things bookish, if you have multiple audiobook narrators, make sure they receive the same instructions. They should not be pronouncing character names differently or giving them different accents to the point it becomes cartoonish. (What was Corrick's Quint voice? That was a jumpscare)
Overall, while I can't pretend I wasn't disappointed in this book, it could have been much worse. For a 550 page novel, it read fairly quickly and by the end, I felt like the characters were where they were meant to be - even if the road there was laughable. I cannot say I will ever revisit this series, but somehow I will still carry fond memories of it.
If you struggled with book 2, I would recommend - perhaps - skipping this one.