Skip to main content

Beastly, but No Dragons

My spate of Twilight nostalgia led me to read the first book in another series favored by my kid: Sarah J. Maas's A Court of Thorns and Roses. Kat actually left behind the books when she started traveling the world, so I didn't have to buy them. This series is also making the leap to television in the near future, so it stands to become even more famous than it already is.

Let's see, a few disclaimers are in order before I get to the write up: it's fairy fantasy, which is really not my thing (blame Laurell K. Hamilton and Tolkkien for ruining fairy fantasy for me.) It's YA, I think (or what passes as YA these days) which is likewise not something I enjoy reading. It did remind me a lot of Twilight, and I really did not like that series. Finally it's a spin on Beauty and the Beast, which frankly has been done to death in all ways shapes and forms, so nothing new here. Okay, I think that covers all my prejudices and biases upfront.

The story tells the saga of a poor human girl who inadvertantly kills a fairy while hunting food for her starving family. Fairies and humans are not in any way friends, so not a big deal for her. A fairy beast then comes to demand restitution, which requires the girl to go with him into fairy land and live out her days there. It's all pretty much more of the same beauty and the beastish stuff from there.

The writing is not bad. The author echoes herself a bit, and seems to want to describe everything as the utmost beautiful or terrible whatever ever but can't quite nail it. Otherwise she does a competent job. The dialogue is probably the best element. I liked the easiness with which the characters spoke with each other. Also, there are no dragons. You know how I feel about dragons.

Unfortunately the story plods. It reads like a pantser writing without a clue and trying to work it out on the page. Some readers like that kind of near-plotless rambler that crawls along like a snail under a mountain of fantastic characters that were no doubt fun to describe but really serve no purpose except for window dressing or crisis-spawner of the moment. Me, not so much. There's really no progression in the storyline for most of the novel. Also, if this is supposed a romance -- and I still have my doubts about that -- it is slower and duller than squeaky clean Christian romance fiction with discussions of bible verses in church on every page. Passion = nada. I might read the next book in the series, just to give it a fair go, but I'm not optimistic.

If you have nothing else to read, then A Court of Thorns and Roses might fill the void. Otherwise you might just wait for the Hulu series.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Other Stashes

Along with clearing out the spare bedroom and tidying my office and our guest bedroom, I decided to reorganize some of my stashes. This is all the yarn I have on hand, sorted by color. It looks like a lot, but lately I've been using up a minimum of half a bin every month, so this is approximately a year's supply. All of my solid color cotton perle thread. I go through a lot of this every year, too. I need a container in which I can fit all of it together, but I haven't found the right one yet. I won't show you all of my fabric -- I'm still reorganizing this stash -- but I went through everything and donated two bins of fabric I won't need to the local quilter's guild.

Goodwill Gamble #2 Arrives

My second Goodwill gamble arrived; this is one I paid ten bucks for last month. Just inside the lid was a big roll of plastic mesh that I think is for latchhook work. In the auction listing it looked like fabric to me, so that was unexpected. Someone at the seller's end was nice enough to put a note on this pinned fabric. I'll put on my gloves before I take it out to inspect it. The embroidered green fabric turned out to be 1-1/2 yards of sequinned and three-dimensional designer fabric. I'll guess this cost somewhere between $20.00 to $30.00 a yard, and it's in pristine condition. But here's a shot of everything in the lot, which is mostly crafty odds and ends with a small amount of cotton fabrics, a large amount of synethetic fabrics, and some other surprises. The original owner of these was probably a Catholic school teacher; these beads, crosses and medallions are the kind of rosary kits for kids to make at Sunday school or Bible camp (and s...

Love Means This

Invested in a couple of hand-dyed bundles from one of my favorite fabric artists. This one said "Make me into something for Valentine's Day." So I went for a quilted and embellished tote. I kept thinking about what love means to me as I worked on it. Here's the finished tote. Although I was tempted to embellish with beads and pins, I got sick and only felt well enough to do a little stitching every night. As I worked I thought about how often love seems disappointing to us, especially when it fails to live up to our expectations. But now that I've experienced love in many forms, I can say that it's made me a better person than I might have been without it. Love is a precious thing, and should be appreciated in all its forms. I am very grateful for the love of my guy, my child and my friends who have stuck with me all these years. That's you two, in case you're wondering. :) Also finally found something to do with a ve...