Children of Blood and Bone || Book Review

Children of Blood and Bone by Tomi Adeyemi || 2/5

They killed my mother.
They took our magic.
They tried to bury us.

Now we rise.

Zélie Adebola remembers when the soil of Orïsha hummed with magic. Burners ignited flames, Tiders beckoned waves, and Zélie’s Reaper mother summoned forth souls.

But everything changed the night magic disappeared. Under the orders of a ruthless king, maji were killed, leaving Zélie without a mother and her people without hope.

Now Zélie has one chance to bring back magic and strike against the monarchy. With the help of a rogue princess, Zélie must outwit and outrun the crown prince, who is hell-bent on eradicating magic for good.

Danger lurks in Orïsha, where snow leoponaires prowl and vengeful spirits wait in the waters. Yet the greatest danger may be Zélie herself as she struggles to control her powers and her growing feelings for an enemy.

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Heyo, peeps.

So, everyone LOVES this book. I haven’t seen another poor review. But, I didn’t enjoy it. (Which is unfortunate because one of my closest friends loves it. But she didn’t like Six of Crows, so…)

I’m also trying out a new reviewing style: BULLET POINTS!!!! Come on, guys! Are you excited? I’m SO EXCITED ABOUT THESE BULLET POINTS.

Actually, I have no idea about how bullet points will turn out. But, I must be more efficient. School has started! And I am getting six hours of homework a night! I’M SO EXCITED (about bullet points, not school) AND SLEEP DEPRIVED. Ahh, AP Chemistry, my dear friend. (I hate your homework.) That’s right, six hours of homework a night from ONE class. (I really like chem. I hate homework.) That’s over a twelve-hour workday. In history, we’re learning about how peeps all reformed to eight-hour workdays. Mind you, these reforms were for adults. Children can keep the twelve-hour clock ticking. Bleh.

• A major issue I had with this book is that the pacing feels weird. It’s almost too fast and it felt like things weren’t fully fleshed out. The magic system or the world-building or the characters.
• A minor issue I had at the beginning was the overabundance of words unique to the book. I felt like they didn’t have enough context, and it made it hard to grasp what was going on at the beginning, but the problem did fix itself pretty soon. Both because they popped up less later in the books and that I finally figured out what they meant.
• The writing felt overdramatic to me and it didn’t actually make me feel anything (a difficult endeavor). I was never scared or worried for the characters, despite the book wanting me to feel that way. Is this making any sense? I don’t think I’m making sense. It’s a feeling.
• It’s a classic questing book. It’s not new or different. It’s been done a ton before. And I didn’t find a reason to read this book over the others available. Generic.
• I would’ve liked a bit more world-building.
• Over the course of reading this book, I had so many unanswered questions. It was frustrating.
• The book feels like it’d be a spectacular movie (that I’d totally watch), but it’s not that spectacular of a book.
• The writing style was repetitive.
• The ROMANCE! UGGGGGGHHHHH. There was no chemistry whatsoever, it is not logical, it’s INSTA-LOVE, and finally, it did nothing but create unnecessary drama.

Overall, I think my biggest issue with this book is that I wasn’t attached to the characters. I didn’t care about what happened to them, and so I wasn’t motivated to keep reading.

Read 7/21/2018 – 7/27/2018

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What did you guys think about the bullet points?

My hands are so cold.

Apologies for this rambly review. My brain is a mush from doing absolutely NOTHING but schoolwork for the past week. It’s the second week of school. I’m just putting that out there. As Imagine Dragons once put in Who We Are, “Don’t look clear, it’s all uphill from here.”