K.N. Salustro's Blog, page 7

Review – Binti: The Night Masquerade

[image error]The final installment of the Binti trilogy, this book rang a bit more firmly with the echoes of the first one that I loved so much. The themes of family, heritage, and acceptance all run through the trilogy, but pick up the pace in this one.

It’s been a joy seeing Binti’s growth in the wake of everything that happened to her in the first book, although there were a couple of things in this last book that felt a little convenient in their resolution. The stakes were high, certainly, and never...

Review – The Blue Sword

[image error]4 stars on Goodreads, 3.5 in my mind

A companion novel to The Hero and the Crown, I have to say that I think I liked the other book much better, but this one does have its own merits.

Mainly following Harry, a willful young woman who never quite fits in with society or knows what to do about her restless spirit, this book is a compelling story of Harry’s growth as she learns more about herself, her heritage, and the land and people she falls in love with. There’s a bit of a hang up here where there are...

Review – Binti: Home

[image error]The direct sequel to the absolutely fabulous novella Binti, I think this one maybe falls into the pit of a middle book. It sets up a lot more than it resolves, bringing in new elements and challenges that have yet to be overcome, until (I expect) the next installment.

That said, the author’s writing remains beautiful and captivating, and while the prose didn’t strike me quite as tight this time around, I was never bored or felt like any details were wasted. We learn far more about Binti’s home life on Earth he...

Review – The Black Tides of Heaven

[image error]4 stars on goodreads, 3.5 in my mind

I really loved this novella… right up until I didn’t.

The beginning and most of the middle is fantastic, exploring the developing personalities and roles of twins Akeha and Mokoya, who find themselves bound by birth and love but separated by conflicting  personalities and desires, and ultimately their own decisions. The novella leaps across the years of the twins’ lives, going from infants to six year olds, to seventeen year olds,...

Review – Storm of Locusts

[image error]I’m so glad I found this series, because it is just good reading no matter which way you cut it. Full of badass characters who are both strong and vulnerable and have to learn to trust each other to survive, the overarching story is fun, dark, engrossing, and sometimes disturbing all at once.

For this book specifically, I actually think it was even better than the first one. The characters felt stronger, having been built off of the foundations laid in Trai...

Review – Children of Time

[image error]I’ll be honest. When I started reading this book, I thought I was going to hate it. There was so much emphasis on the main character’s arrogance, so much droning on about how full of herself she was, how brilliant she was compared to everyone else, that I was prepared for this to end up on the DNF shelf. And then a terrorist blows up the ship, everything goes to hell, and then it just GOES.

I’ve never been so thrilled to have been so completely wrong.

Turns out, Children of Time is a fascinat...

Review – The Seventh Bride

[image error]I really enjoyed this book. It’s a fast, neat story about a young girl forced into an engagement with a sorcerer, and there are so many dark things that the man has kept hidden.

It’s a story of female friendships forming and empowering each other, of small defiances having big impacts, of finding the courage to rebel against injustice.

In short, it’s just good.

There are a few moments when main character Rhea’s internal ramblings can get a bit long-winded, but I took that as a sign of her bei...

Review – Jade War

[image error]My god. What a book.

In some cases, this book feels slower than Jade City was, but the narration is more deliberate this time around as this is an intricate game of power dominance between two giant forces, plus the little people that manage to get into the gears and screw everything up. Jade War is easily just as powerful as the first book, if not more so, and I was legitimately on the edge of my seat during several parts, they were so suspenseful and intense.

I am soooooo excited to read t...

Review – Daughter of Destiny

[image error]I liked the book a lot. It was really cool to see early stories and legends of Guinevere and King Arthur told through Guinevere’s own eyes, and the book manages to balance her maturity and astuteness with her innocence and mischievousness as a teenager.

The world building is solid here, with plenty drawn from both real world locations and accounts from legends and stories. The characters all have their own distinct personalities, and Isolde in particular is a force to be reckoned with. It was...

Review – The Priory of the Orange Tree

[image error]4 stars on goodreads, 3.5 in my mind

This is a solid book with so much going for it, but I found myself growing a bit bored around the 75% mark and ultimately left unsatisfied.

I loved the character Tane from the start, but was highly disappointed that her story was overshadowed by Niclays Roos’s, who was pretty despicable and ended up taking way more of the spotlight than I expected. Tane’s story also felt very underdeveloped compared to the depth and breadth of Ead’s part of the tale, which...