Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsJust Okay
Reviewed in Canada on March 23, 2024
This is an enjoyable read with gut-wrenching character drama and an intriguing fantasy backdrop. It is light and enjoyable, but this is also its greatest shortcoming.
The prose is juicy, the world is lush -- Maas' writing shines in environmental description. I can appreciate how these florid tangents made it feel more immersive, but they would have been much better had a greater effort been made to impart more meaningful symbolism.
I felt it dragging a bit as the worldbuilding gave way to the love story, which was moving if predictable. The male romantic protagonist is underdeveloped, but I appreciated the author's restraint in allowing his body type to be imagined to the reader's preference. It's definitely not as steamy as the publisher makes it out to be, and the animal motifs were restrained in this regard which felt like a sorely missed opportunity.
There is one chapter towards the end which was unforgivably clumsy, for being an exposition dump where the plot is explained all at once. It felt like information was jammed in to meet a publishing deadline. It should have been breadcrumbed and paced out.
The main reason I don't like this book and wouldn't revisit Maas is it feels too escapist. While many characters are scarred by slavery, war, torture, and hierarchy, these are presented in extremes without drawing attention to subtler forms through which they proliferate in the real world. Someone with objectionable social values would enjoy this book without being prompted to self-reflect. It's not challenging enough.