Bitterblue (Graceling Realm, #3) in Ultimate Popsugar Reading Challenge

Nov 11, 2009 stephanie rated it it was amazing

Shelves: series, 2012, young-adult, fantasy, would-rec, re-read, history-memory

[Re-read January 2021]

Here is world that has been traumatized by a tyrant, mind raped so that no one knows what is a memory, what is the truth, what actually happened. And the horrors they may have committed are unknown as to why - were they manipulated? Did they actually want to do parts of it? Is the distinction important?

Of course this brings to mind the Nuremberg Trials and post-war Germany. Those that were
"just following orders" - are they any less culpable than those that didn't? When yo ...more

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Apr 10, 2020 Hannah added it

Shelves: high-fantasy, ya, 2020

I liked Graceling fine enough and I thought Fire was cool, but damn if this isn't the most impressive book of the series, not to mention just a really fucking impressive book in the grand landscape of books. And I don't even like high fantasy! Like, at all. I don't care about military shit and I don't care about European-inspired shit and I don't really care for made-up politics when our own real life sociopolitics are so complex, but this book has all of that and more and I am fucking here for I liked Graceling fine enough and I thought Fire was cool, but damn if this isn't the most impressive book of the series, not to mention just a really fucking impressive book in the grand landscape of books. And I don't even like high fantasy! Like, at all. I don't care about military shit and I don't care about European-inspired shit and I don't really care for made-up politics when our own real life sociopolitics are so complex, but this book has all of that and more and I am fucking here for it. It absolutely hurts to read, but in a good way, and what could be very hackneyed worldbuilding and political intrigue is actually really, really fascinating given Cashore's light touch with magic and the incredibly troubling but incredibly well-rendered legacy of torture, trauma, and abuse left by Leck. It's been 328957023985 years since I read Graceling, so I can't actually tell you if I felt whether that horror was adequately portrayed, but you feel the shit out of it in this book, and I honestly don't feel that I need to have read/remembered book 1 (though having read Fire is, I think, essential in a way you don't fully appreciate until the last forty or so pages of the book) to have gotten a really incredible reading experience in this one. The reason it's hard to give a shit about a lot of characters in a lot of high fantasy is because who cares about rich people and their problems? But Bitterblue here is a character who actually has the presence of mind to be questioning monarchy and taking on a lot more responsibility than anyone her age should have to in processing her own trauma and that of all of her people (in the immediate sense and in the sense of her population), plus trying to enact and instate new programs and systems that will in some way rectify the damages done by her father. At times I still got a little bored or lost with all the mazes and huge cast of characters and more tedious and generic fantasy plot elements like arranged marriages and overcomplicated Council arrangements, but all in all this was a very impressive story. I really fucking hate sequels and series, so I love that this is truly a standalone that fits within the universe, not Book 3 in the usual sense. I wish I could give you the reason I picked it up, but I can't, but I am really, really glad I did because I never would have left to my own devices. This is really affecting and hits me in all the right places as a reader, as a scholar, and as a writer. Impressive af; read it whatever your reading tastes are. ...more

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Nov 08, 2009 Lydia Presley rated it it was ok

Shelves: 2012, fantasy, young-adult, fiction

I feel like crying. Seriously, people. Crying. Not in a good way. Why?

I've been waiting for this book it seems like FOREVER. I'd look at the date on my pre-order and wail inside at the thought of waiting all those months to get my hands on the gorgeous cover and coveted insides of Bitterblue, that sequel to Graceling and companion to Fire. (Well, not so much anxious for it for the Fire part, I was actually disappointed in that one, but oh how I loved Graceling.)

So imagine my disappointment when ...more

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Aug 21, 2012 Christina rated it really liked it

Shelves: fantasy

I think I actually liked this book the best of the three. It wasn't perfect - there were characters I didn't think were as well-done as others, and it was a frustrating slog in the middle - but I think it was the best overall.
The bad stuff first: Saf was a weak point. I completely failed to find anything appealing about him. He was such a brat most of the time! Giddon, meanwhile, was suddenly a sympathetic, interesting character I wanted more of. This is all good, except that he, too, was a huge ...more

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