Format: Hardcover

Much like Darrow facing impossible odds against the forces of the Sovereign, Morning Star had the daunting task of concluding an epic that is monstrous in scale. Breaking the chains and political hierarchy introduced in Red Rising then replacing it with a fair society in a 500+ page book is a tall order but Pierce Brown’s decision to extend the originally announced trilogy to a saga (albeit announced after Morning Star was published) smartly avoids a rushed or worse, contrived conclusion. Disclosure upfront, Darrow does not fix the political system in place (that is continued over the next four books) but does attempt to overthrow the powers that be within Morning Star. As a side note, this review will be spoiler free but I will lightly detail a few specific plot arcs that do not take away anything from the read. If you want to go in completely blind I would recommend not reading my review past this paragraph. Summarizing the rest of the review, t I thought the 2nd half of the novel was great and very much a continuation of the general feel and action of Golden Son. The 1st half is an entirely different being that’s introspective,…

If Red Rising was the hook to get me interested, Golden Son delivered the full goods and sold me on this series. While I found Red Rising to be ambitious and an exciting read, it had some pretty notable drawbacks that took me out of the story at times. Does it matter that a random reader with no following like myself has critiques and notes for a book published a decade ago? Absolutely not but regardless, I found Golden Son to carryover all of the elements Red Rising got right and improve on every aspect I found initially lacking. The main elements that I found to be weak in Red Rising were primarily the sheer number of characters involved that are largely shallow and undeveloped, story arcs that were inconsistent in interest for me personally, and Darrow’s character voice being tiresome and being hyper masculine honor-based. While I’m still not a huge fan of Darrow’s personality, his growth and maturity in Golden Son is exponential which made him far more tolerable to me. With the narrative growing increasingly complex and politically-driven, it was a relief that he develops more emotional and strategic intelligence. With a smarter and more rational character…

I was very close to dropping this in the first part but stuck with it as I heard the story picks up quickly. Furthermore many fans often consider Red Rising to be one of the weaker books in the series and thematically different due to its culling game-focus. I’m glad I stuck with it though as I thought Red Rising was ultimately great (with a few reservations), a 3 that progressed to a 4.5 rounded up. A mesh of different genres and styles, Pierce Brown is a certified fantasy sci-fi action nerd irl and it shows in his work. The writing style is no-nonsense laced with some advance vocabulary while the plot is fast-paced and furious. The book often takes pleasure in going where the reader wants/or doesn’t want it to go. Case and point if someone commits a terrible act, the book will gleefully and gruesomely execute some sort of twisted judgement on them. But if there’s a character who you are getting attached to and seems to be thriving, you know they’re going to meet an unfortunate end. There are elements in the narrative that are familiar and comfortable to fans of the genre such as the focal…

I’m stuck trying to figure out if I’m getting fatigue from reading three Emily Henry novels in just over a month or if it’s the novel’s character drama that wasn’t for me, but this one didn’t grab my interest and continued to stumble the further it progressed. Focusing a core trio of gal pals consisting of Harriet, Cleo and Sabrina with their plus one’s added over the years, Happy Place takes the fake dating trope and meshes it with a second chance at love at a small town, summer vacation retreat. I suspect it has to do with the plot and concept of the novel, but I found myself inherently less invested in this tight-nit friend group compared to Emily Henry’s other novels that I read which are Book Lovers and Beach Read. Maybe it’s the lack of literary book elements that I loved or the girl-group friends for life theme that doesn’t appeal to me, but I felt like I was quite far from the target demographics of this book. Fake dating is a common and tired trope but Henry is well aware of this and fully commits to putting Harriet and her ex-fiancé Wyn through the ringer which…

At long last I’ve finally read a mystery novel in 2023 with an actually compelling mystery full of surprises, who knew that the bar would be so low after so many contemporary novels in the genre fail to deliver on their basic premise. Home Before Dark is a quality mystery horror novel that follows a similar premise of the Haunting of Hill House refreshed through it’s unique split presentation told from Maggie’s Holt perspective in the present and her father Ewan Holt from 25 years ago via his published nonfiction book House of Horrors. It’s this split perspective narrative that helps separate Home Before Dark from the countless other “family moves into a house with history, bad things happen” storyline as you’re never quite sure how much authenticity House of Horror portrays as an unpredictable unreliable narrator. The two perspectives also contrast each other by their distinctive tones and beliefs with House of Horrors firmly portraying a haunted house with malevolent spirits vs Maggie’s perspective as a skeptic who just wants to know what actually happened in the house 25 years ago. The two split perspectives are done well and not only drop clues relevant to each other, but focus on…