Beatrix White > Recent Status Updates

THIS BOOK

The way I am DEVOURING this series!

The perfect holiday read. I loved the balance of sweetness and longing (and the moments where I laughed out loud listening to the audio). I can see myself rereading this next Christmas. Can’t wait for book 2! ♥️

Yes, more sci-fi written by women, please and thanks!

So. Freaking. Good.

Lovely so far, though the audiobook narrator’s “tong” pronunciation of tongue makes me laugh.

This book. 🥹

This book is a lovely mix of current events, memories told in vignette form, and quotations from Saint Agnes. There are profound observations of grief, of love, of a woman’s place in the world.

I didn’t think I could love Helena and Thatcher even more after reading Priestess, but here we are. 💚

This book. 🥹

It’s always the grumpy ones who fall hardest. I’m lookin’ at you, Alric. ❤️

Women supporting women, a 38-year-old FMC, and a grumpy MMC (the best kind, because you just know they’re gonna end up feeling all the feelings).

This book is already a new favourite and I’m not even halfway through.

There’s a pronunciation guide. I’m already in love.

Gah, I love this story so far. A Slavic fairytale delight! (I was going to say “dark Slavic fairytale, but that just seemed repetitive).

I am already dreading finishing this book because I’ll be so sad it’s over. What a lovely, fantastical story. 🥹

Love. This.

Ahhh, this is the kind of book that reminds me all over again why I love to read. It gives me that same thrill of excitement that I had when I was a kid. Adventure! Monsters! Magic! So good.

Maas has a few annoying habits (including but not limited to):

1) She likes to describe characters’ scent with the same formula each time (always “his/her something-and-something scent”). It’s repetitive and reads a bit silly.

2) She’s in love with a few words and turns of phrase that she uses over and over. Like “lethal,” and “predatory,” and “so-and-so could have sworn that…”

ANYWAY.

There is a marked improvement between the writing in the first book of this series and the second. Though Maas can be a clumsy writer at times, she does excel at world building and plot development. I’m glad I stuck with this series so far.

Someone didn’t tell Maas to show, not tell. The inner monologue of the POV characters is…a lot.

Arrrrgh.

The lead character acts like a spoiled baby half the time but is supposed to be some kind of deadly assassin. We don’t hear much about her actual past as an assassin other than seeing that she is a more than competent fighter. I think the disconnect between the two makes her an unbelievable character, at least so far.

Chapter 18 ends with Celaena having a childish tantrum. And her crushing on someone like a 13 year old? Ew. How are we supposed to believe she’s some kind of stone cold assassin? I’m reading this because I’ve heard the series becomes much better and ties into ACOTAR, but geeeesh, the writing is…not good.

Oof, I started this book after finishing the ACOTAR series but it’s off to a rough start. Why are there so many exclamation points?

I’m almost halfway through and, while I don’t personally love it, my seven year old is on the edge of his seat and begging me to read more chapters so I’m begrudgingly liking it more than I would otherwise. It’s certainly not amazing writing but my kiddo is loving it so far. The author’s overuse of the words “stalactite” and “stalagmite” might be the death of me.

A terrible book that I am finishing only out of stubbornness. This reads like bad Tolkien fan fiction (I wasn’t surprised to see other reviews noting this) and seems to lack any originality. The characters are two dimensional and the plot is always too convenient (a wise old man living nearby your isolated town who just so happens to know everything you need to know and can also train you? What a coincidence!)

Ahhh, I’m not 100 pages in and I suspect I have the plot figured out. I hope I’m wrong and the author is sneakier than that!

I’m roughly halfway through this book and so far it is Extremely Tedious and Incredibly Annoying but I am stubborn and hate DNFs, so I shall persevere.