After Review Thoughts 🤔 Review:📝 Another Morgan Rice buddy read with Faith! She is slowly but surely getting me to read this author. If that's for better or for worse we shall see. My Thoughts 💠Plot Writing This book was obviously not edited at all. The writing will state things multiple times a chapter or every other chapter even though it’s already been clearly established. For example: In the first chapter, Godwin’s body structure is detailed twice in only like the span of 2 pages. As well as his voice being compared to his royal sorcerer.
I'm pretty sure Rice watched Terrible Writing Advice's video on fantasy characters to prepare for writing this book: https://youtu.be/rR220D7OH1Y
I originally started this as yet another basic bitch Morgan Rice YA™ book to pass the time in between me dying from college courses. Eventually, this went from a decent, middle of the road Rice book read to an absolute dumper fire very quickly. I now have to live with the fact that I didn’t trust my gut instinct to DNF this when I had the chance.
Starts off with King Godwin of the Northern Kingdom finding a dead dragon. Then Godwin and his family start to get ready for his eldest daughter, Lenore’s, wedding. And a boy named Devin going about dreaming to be a knight and… and… well from there it’s a whole clusterf*ck of characters and POVs with no real ending. This book is more of the cut of a thought of an idea (if that doesn’t make sense neither does this book). Plots don’t really go anywhere and the ending will bring you absolutely no satisfaction, if there is any to be gained. There's also not a single original idea in this book, especially in the case of the characters (more on that later). By the 80% mark I had to physically force myself not to skim because I just wanted the book to end! AND IT WOULDN’T END!
In the beginning, the writing wasn’t bad, typical Rice style of basicness. However, it's at the 50% mark when the writing takes a nosedive into the 4 feet part of the pool. I didn’t even think that the bar could even go that low!
The setting of the story is described very weirdly. I think the kingdom is basically the setting for season 1 of Attack on Titan, but with water instead of walls.
The magic system: Nonexistent. Anytime magic appears in a scene the quality of the writing gets so bad it’s on the borderline of incomprehensible. The funny thing is I think that was done on purpose to show how confused the characters are by using magic, but it just doesn’t work and is just really bad writing.
Characters
Oh boy, the mountain of characters. Keep in mind, EVERY single person listed, except Grey, has their own POV at least TWICE or more in the span of about 200 pages.
King Godwin II: King of the Northern Kingdom and world’s sh*ttiest father ever
Just like how the Allies tried to keep the peace when Hitler came to power, Godwin tries multiple times throughout the book to use the politics of appeasem*nt to keep peace with the nobles and people.That plan however, just like it did for the Allies, goes to sh*t very quickly at every possible moment there is conflict.
Rodry: Godwin’s eldest son; has less than half a brain cell the whole book;
Everyone looks up to the crown prince as the embodiment of perfection. Buuuuuut I saw his character as a Gaston/Avenant embodiment with a 10 year old brain
Lenore: Godwin’s eldest daughter. Sansa 2.0 with more pride than Ayra.
Found her POV chapters to be a chore to read through
Master Grey: an old sorcerer everyone thinks is the bee’s knees
This old cricket is only in maybe 5% of the book and never given a POV. His voice is constantly compared to paper and I don’t understand why!
Queen Illia: Late wife of Godwin, mother of Godwin’s eldest 3 children and sons
She had blonde hair and died when she burst her head open after falling off a horse. That’s literally all we get to know about her.
Queen Aethe: current wife of Godwin; mother of Godwin’s youngest 3 children and daughters
Literally forgot she existed because she does nothing
Devin: The ordinary commoner boy™ and supposedly the chosen one MC of the book.
Only holds about 10% of the total POV chapters. I literally forgot who he was during one of the last of his POV chapters. He has powers that are as useless as they are “mysterious”. His POVs are used as a way to introduce people outside of the inner circle of the royal family.
Vars: Godwin’s second son; a real Theon Greyjoy of a character (no seriously his first POV chapter is ODDLY similar to Greyjoy’s first POV in A Clash of Kings)
King Ravin: King of the southern kingdom. Plagiarism incarnate
Literally a carbon copy of King Maegor Targaryen from GOT:
- He has multiple concubines like Maegor did wives
- He hired a bunch of people to build his castle and killed them afterwards, just like how Maegor organized the construction of the Red Keep
- He is an evil and selfish king that went to war at the drop of a hat; just. like. Maegor the Cruel.
The only thing that differentiates him is that he is written so overly dramatic.
His sword is named Heart Splinter. It sounds more like a widow's dagger than the name of a great sword but ok.
His whole aesthetic reminds me of Monty Python and the Holy Grail. This fact alone made his POV chapter a bit more durable.
Nerra: Godwin’s youngest child and was born with basically the Scaling Sickness™ (another borderline plagiarism check)
The only thing remarkable she does this whole book is find a dragon egg. Too bad she does nothing with it.
Erin: Godwin’s second eldest daughter who dreams of being a knight.
Literally has half a brain cell for most of the book but at least it's more than her brother Rodry and she's good with a spear. I kept forgetting she existed until her POV chapters came along.
Greave: Godwin’s youngest son; a negative nancy that looks like his late mother
Godwin hates his guts because he looks the most like his dead wife. Greave does absolutely nothing for most of the book besides fall for a girl
Aurelle: a random girl Greave falls head of heels for on sight
Odd: a former knight turned monk trying to forget his bloody past
The most interesting and badass character in this book. The only reason I would ever continue with the series. War Monk for the win!
Bern: a random dude that makes a living threatening people with information and picking fights
Renard: a Robin Hood character that has two POV chapters and a story that goes nowhere
Audiobook Notes 🎧
The narrator put in the bare minimum like he was getting paid below the minimum wage of his state. Small mistakes he made could have been cut out during editing, but since there wasn’t editing for the book why would there be any for the audiobook, I guess??? One interesting thing I did find was the way he specifically says the word “whoomph” sounds like he was taking a bite out of a Whopper burger and I couldn’t unhear it. xD
Recommendation đź‘Ž
Don’t even bother with this one. There are other fun Rice books out there. I’m sure Faith can recommend a few of her own guilty pleasure ones, but this one is just plain bad and forgettable.
