crybabybea's reviews
239 reviews

This was fun!

I was surprised at how dark the themes were, and how the author included complex topics such as complicated relationships, political intrigue, and advanced world-building for a middle-grade novel. It's the perfect high fantasy for younger kids. 

I found the writing to be a little too on-the-nose at times; I know it's written for elementary schoolers but I think there were some bits that could be entrusted to the reader to discern. Despite that, the author included a huge amount of foreshadowing which I was impressed with, it makes for a fun read with some interesting twists, and I think there are still some twists to come in the later books. Great pacing, though some plot beats felt a bit unbelievable and convenient.

The dialogue was off, it felt stilted and cringey. Again, I know it's for elementary schoolers but the dialogue left a lot to be desired. It also had the issue of being too on-the-nose, pointing out things that I think the readers (even young ones) could be trusted to figure out themselves. 

For such a high fantasy setting, the book sometimes lacked description and sometimes had the issue of "white room syndrome", where it felt like the characters just kind of existed and interacted in a void.

Still a super fun read and any elementary aged fantasy lover will absolutely devour this.

I'm into it but I'm slumping hard AF right now and this just isn't it rn.

I don't like the way the author is portraying the Venezuelan people, it's giving me the ick. Multiple times the author implies that Venezuela struggles as a country because its people are lazy or stupid. It's also weird to me to go through poor areas of the country and almost sensationalize the people's lives and struggles. The author makes some weird comments about people "expecting handouts" and seems to imply that this "learned helplessness" is why people in Venezuela "refuse to seek a better life".

A couple of quotes to show what I mean:

This will be my biggest disappointment of 2024, damn I was excited for this. 

It was fine, but the world-building was lackluster despite some really cool ideas. Main characters have really unique struggles that made them interesting. I can't get past the heavy exposition dumping, messy writing, and whiplash tone changes. If I were more interested in the plot I would keep going, but I have no interest in reading a training/trials story. Feels uninspired and overdone. Also there's a borderline incest romance happening and I just can't handle that lol

Might pick it up later but I feel myself actively avoiding reading it so I'm giving up for now.

How could it be anything less than 5 stars? Not only is Chanel Miller's writing beautiful and practiced, but the sense of reflection and cohesion is perfectly crafted.

Miller's vulnerability is astounding. She takes us to the deepest parts of herself, showing the good, bad, and the ugly. Yes, it's the story of her struggle to find justice in our corrupt system. Of course it's a feminist critique on victimhood, rape culture, and the pervasiveness of sexism. But what I loved most about it was the sense of humanity at its core. Chanel Miller takes care to highlight the many ways that the people around her, strangers and acquaintances, mentors, family and friends, and her patient partner, helped her in small and large ways. Every step of the way she stops and shows gratitude to the people that helped her fight. I was just constantly amazed at her ability to move past the rage, the injustice, the unfairness, the grief and pain, and find love. Love and meaning and purpose and humanity. Just stunning.

In the way she chose to write it, she accomplishes her goal 1,000x over; to show the world that survivors are more than their tragedy and are defined by more than what was done to them. They are human, each with rich lives, full of memories and mistakes. Every victim has a name and a story, and most never get the chance to show it. 

Guys I cried so much at this. Powerful, moving, beautiful.

So so cute. I'm willing to chalk it up to librarian bias but I cried like a little baby. Just a wholesome story, obviously about books, but also about people who love books and community and the way our lives are tied together without even realizing it.

Not my favorite, but it's an okay "turn your brain off and vibe" thriller.

Such a cool premise that fits so well for a folklore-inspired gothic horror, but the prose and pacing needed tightening to increase the tension and up the intrigue.

Super overwritten, which sometimes helped the immersion and other times ruined it. It worked well to describe the setting of a colonial Sri Lanka, and I liked that the author included words, descriptions, and dialogue in Sinhala. But it bit the author in the ass because everything was overexplained, including the main character Amara's thoughts, feelings, and motivations. Nothing was left up to the reader to decipher. Something would happen that would increase the tension, then the narration would waste time explaining Amara's feelings and spell out her every inner thought in reaction. It felt very hand-holdy and made the book feel unnecessarily long.

There are two main mysteries that unravel side-by-side, the animal-esque attacks happening to men in the village, and Amara's terrifying dreams that seem to coincide with them. It was heavy-handed, with not a lot of nuance and some in-your-face foreshadowing. The twists were predictable. About midway the author introduces a mysterious character named Bhagala (forgive me I listened to the audio and couldn't find the actual name) which basically replaces the main character's sense of agency, which was already almost non-existent.

Loved the themes but felt the overwritten prose held it back from being amazing. The focus on Amara's internal monologue makes the reader feel disconnected from the story and ruins any amount of tension that the narrative works for. I guess it's a story of female rage, but we don't really get to feel it in the impactful way that it should have.

I will say the horror elements were well done, but I almost wish the author pushed them further. Some really good, gruesome scenes with a folklore inspiration. I think if this book leaned more into supernatural horror rather than an unreliable narrator mystery, it would be saur good.

Beautifully written, if a bit long-winded at times. I was really taken aback by how similar stories of abuse are, even though the circumstances vary from person to person. I connected it with my own life a lot, and I saw the resemblance to similar memoirs such as Educated. 

I also appreciated that Safiya Sinclair included information about Rastafari and Jamaican history, so we would have proper context as we read.

Safiya is clearly an incredible writer, and she does a wonderful job weaving together the complex emotions that come from experiencing abuse. On top of that, the complexity is deepened even further by the generational trauma of colonization and poverty. I found it to be a very well-rounded memoir with a great balance of personal experience and historical research.