I thought parts of it were really enjoyable while others did not land for me. The main problem here is that expectations were super high. I have seen this book mentioned in many top books of all time lists and even placed fairly highly in each of those. So I was really excited when this book got chosen as a Discord buddy read with dozens of people reading the book on a set schedule and discussing it. The excitement was even higher because this was my first buddy read ever.

What I ultimately got though just did not meet up with the expectations at all. First of all let’s say that I am really not big on Anime and I might not know what I am talking about here but the whole setting, worldbuilding, magic system etc. of the book felt like very textbook and uninspired Anime to me. That led to all these vibes absolutely not flowing with me. 

My two other major gripes were a very undeserved feeling redemption arc and the just in general weird pacing of the book. The climax of the book actually happens about two thirds into it and the rest of it just deals with its aftermath, just leading to a super long epilogue. Some people call that genius and innovative storytelling but to me it just felt majorly off. There also have been lots of similar reactions within the buddy read group which just makes me wonder how this book is so highly regarded.

With the negatives out of the way. Let's get to the parts I enjoyed about it. I thought the main female character had a very compelling story arc and I really liked all of the chapters with her POV. The action scenes felt totally gripping, well written and just epic in scope as the magic system based on the elements came hugely into play to create monumental battle sequences. And yeah, all of that made the climax of the story feel super epic. I just had a lot of issues with what came before and after which ultimately just made the whole reading experience just kind of unexceptional.