Hendrik answers “I didn't like The Way of Shadows because I...”

Yilda asked this question about The Black Prism (Lightbringer, #1):

I didn't like The Way of Shadows because I felt the writing was immature and the plot badly developed. Do you think that I will like this book? Does Weeks show improvement between this series and the Night Angel Trilogy?

Hendrik I find it very interesting that a lot of you seem to like the Lightbringer series quite a bit more than the Nightangel series. I've read only The Blac…moreI find it very interesting that a lot of you seem to like the Lightbringer series quite a bit more than the Nightangel series. I've read only The Black Prism from the Lightbringer series but the whole Nightangel series and I have to say I prefer the latter. I enjoyed the dark and unforgiving world of the Nightangel series way more than the - in my mind - pretty bland one of the Lightbringer. I feel the Nightangel is - for the most part - more mature than the Lightbringer. I'll give you a few examples: the constant commenting on how fat Kip is, Kip is 15 years old and behaving like one - eg. constantly staring at women's breasts, the depiction of Kerris's period, the elite warrior Kerris fighting the final battle in a silk dress through which you can see her nipples, violence seems to have no consequence at all - for example on Kip who sees his entire village slaughtered. All of this really bothered me, I didn't feel like the book was even written by the same author. I think is was actually a step back from the Nightangel series. I'll admit of course that the Nightangel series is not perfect either (eg. the depiction of women like Elene and Vi; a lot of aspects of the world eg. geography, history, political structure are never really explained; as is common in fantasy works towards the end the inner logic of the world suffers because the power structure of the magic system spirals out of control because the power of all characters has to rise throughout the series) and the Lightbringer series has some things going for it (eg. the color magic system has some interesting aspects to it), but over all I found writing, world and plot of the Nightangel series more intriguing and convincing.(less)

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