mayajoelle's reviews
743 reviews

So I was supposed to be reading Little Dorrit... but this came from the library and I finished it in two days.

It was very different from the first one, and I missed certain characters, but overall I'm enjoying the series and can't wait to see where it goes!

(And the delvers... *shivers* so terrifying. Agh.)

An improvement from the first. The worldbuilding is richer, the plot thickens, and there's some cool stuff with "links" (which feels oddly like cognates from KOTLC). I still don't really understand how story strands work (and how they differ from other types of weaving), the Brac/Mor tension is quite annoying, and most of the characters aren't developed enough -- I couldn't remember who was who from the previous book, either. Tanwen's voice/narration is annoying. The switch between 1st and 3rd person is disorienting. Naith (a character I also do not remember) is a POV. So is Braith. And someone else is named Wylaith? What? Also, I just felt zero emotional connection to the characters. One of the most interesting is named Digwyn, but people call her Diggy, which I... really don't like. Another character is called Mor but is actually Mortimyr (what's wrong with spelling names normally?).

BUT. I did enjoy reading this. It was fun, and I hope the third is an improvement. Those are just my personal quibbles, and it was fun to list 'em all but please don't let that stop you from trying the series. If you don't like book one, you *might* like book two. If you liked the first, you'll like this better.

Rating this is pretty hard, but I think maybe it's a 3.5?? I don't know. It was interesting, and it was pretty good (obviously) because it's Sanderson, but I was mostly confused. I got to meet a sleepless, finally (creepy), and learn a little more about Lift and the Skybreakers, but I missed Hoid (unless he was hiding around somewhere) and the book really doesn't stand on its own. Even if you've read the first two Stormlight Archive books, I think you need to be more immersed in cosmere lore (I took the route of randomly reading Words of Brandon and looking things up on Coppermind/17th Shard. And if you don't know what those are, you definitely won't understand Edgedancer).

I've realized that the way I rate books is weird. I think of 5 stars as "this book was the best it could be," not "this book was the best any book could be." Meaning that 5 stars was my highest hope for The Lost Fairytales, and it got four for a few minor issues plus the fact that this isn't my favorite kind of book to read (though I miss the days when I loved middle grade).

But, say, Oathbringer, which also got four stars from me? It was phenomenally good, much better than this book. It just didn't measure up to my expectations/hopes for a Stormlight Archive book by Brandon Sanderson.

So *this* book is fairly good for those who enjoy middle grade fantasies with strong bookish elements. But if you're looking for the best books ever, this isn't one, while the Stormlight books probably are.

I don't even know if that makes any sense...

This was... weird. I already knew

Spoiler

that Kelsier was alive-ish

, but I didn't know how, and it was neat to see. I have so many questions about the difference in the Cognitive Realm on Scadrial vs. Roshar. It amused me that

Spoiler

Kelsier called Preservation "Fuzz,"

and the humor in this book was one of my favorite parts. Also Hoid (and I don't think that's a spoiler because, y'know, he's in every Cosmere book).

I'm looking forward to reading Mistborn Era 2 now, since apparently

Spoiler

Kelsier will be involved

, and I really hope we find out more about Mare and Spook. And Khriss and Nazh and the Ire, and all that.

Overall this was a fun story that would make *no sense* to anyone who hasn't read at least Mistborn Era 1, and requires you to remember a great deal of the plot points of this trilogy (because the main character will spend three weeks running around the ocean and then come back and someone says "head to Fadrex" and if you, like me, don't remember where Fadrex is, you will have no idea what is going on and what plot stuff he has to deal with now).

This is an unusual book. I'm not even sure what genre it is (historical fiction? non-magical fantasy?). I enjoyed it, but I can't remember it very well, and I'm not sure I'll reread it.

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read June 2020

An enjoyable read, but only if you're already familiar with the Enderverse.

I'd also advise skipping the "Ender's Game" novella unless you really want to compare it with the original book; they're very similar, and the discrepancies are distracting. The actual novel is much better.

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reread 2/14/2020