Banshee’s Comments (group member since Jul 13, 2023)

Banshee’s comments from the Beyond Reality group.

The book is sitting on my nightstand as my next in line physical read. I just need to finish Record of a Spaceborn Few first. So maybe a week or two?

edit: It's 8 days later I have officially started reading The Dragon Republic.

It's interesting that in every single book written by Kuang there will always be criticism about certain themes and messages being delivered in a heavy-handed manner. I didn't feel it so much in The Poppy War (though it's subjective, so I don't say I disagree), but it annoyed me in Babel to the extent of spoiling my appreciation of the book. I heard Yellowface is also very explicit in its messaging so I'm giving it a pass.

And it's not about the messages being correct or incorrect. It's about how organically (or not) they are woven into the story.

I suppose this author just doesn't do "subtle"?

That was one of my most anticipated new releases. And it was really entertaining - I liked the humour, the flow of the story, the intricacies of relationships between the different characters. I also always appreciate having a female protagonist who is a bit older than 20 as I myself drift further and further away from that magical age, haha!

But it wasn't nearly as good as The Daevabad Trilogy which happens to be one of my favourite series of all time. It was sooo atmospheric! This novel, on the other hand, was really good, but it just didn't cross the threshold into "great".

Hello! I'm originally from Poland, but now living permanently in Denmark. It probably won't be very surprising when I say that I'm primarily a SFF reader. I'm not new to Goodreads, but I haven't stumbled on to this group until very recently. What compelled me to join was the idea of reading series. I'm awesome at starting series and not that great at finishing them, so I need all the motivation possible to get better at it :)

I have also read the novel some time ago and ended up putting the trilogy on hold. I'm trying to get better at actually finishing the series I start, that's why I'm here.

I'm not a grimdark reader at all (I absolutely hated ASOIAF, just to give you an idea) and yet the ugly side of the book is what I found to be the most compelling about it. Some scenes reminded me so much about what I previously read in the history of some countries, and yet it was so skillfully woven into a fantasy plot in a fictional country that I never found it to be too on the nose, but just lurking there in the corner of my vision. (The same can't be said about some other books of the same author, but that's another discussion.)

There was also a lot of other things to like:
- a greatly done master-apprentice relationship
- an intriguing magic system and well-built mythology at the roots of it
- characters who weren't likeable but felt very human in their goals, endeavours, flaws, mistakes and even the worst possible decisions.