Author: Rory Power
Publisher: Del Rey Books
Published Date: April 5, 2022
Genre: Fantasy
Rating: ★★★☆☆
REVIEW
This is Rory Powers adult debut, being popularly known as the author of the 2019 YA darling Wilder Girls which I did not enjoy. However, I tend to like epic fantasy a lot more than other genres, and this book sounded like it would provide a really cool magic system. Political intrigue in fantasy only makes the story better in my opinion, so this book sounded right up my alley.
SYNOPSIS
"Rhea and her twin brother, Lexos, have spent an eternity helping their father rule their small, unstable country, using their control over the seasons, tides, and stars to keep the people in line. For a hundred years, they've been each other's only ally, defending each other and their younger siblings against their father's increasingly unpredictable anger.
Now, with an independence movement gaining ground and their father's rule weakening, the twins must take matters into their own hands to keep their family—and their entire world—from crashing down around them. But other nations are jockeying for power, ready to cross and double cross, and if Rhea and Lexos aren't careful, they'll end up facing each other across the battlefield."
MY THOUGHTS
I have very mixed thoughts about this book. This book promised some complicated politics and it didn't let me down in that regard. I think including some form of politics in fantasy really helps to create a world that I can get sucked into. I love some good worldbuilding and I think Power did a really great job creating this world when it came to the inner-workings and relationships between the siblings and different countries. What I think she could have done better was describe the actual countries more. There was no map so I didn't really have a reference as to where the characters were travelling. Also, there wasn't really any distinguishing characteristics of the different areas other than "this place is cold", "this place wears red to funerals", and "they crossed the ocean to get there". It didn't seem like a well thought out world in that way, rather, most of the focus was spent on relationships and character arcs, which I think is a downfall of a lot of fantasy books.
The characters were also not consistent. I thought the main characters were great. Not in a they're-great-people kind of way, but that they felt fully recognized. Even though there were a lot of siblings, they all had their own personalities that worked with their specific magical gift. However, the side characters were not as well created. Aside from the occasional one, they all seemed like they could have been interchanged.
I also have mixed feelings about the magic system. I thought the magic was fairly unique as it wasn't permanent and came with a title rather than with a person born with it. From what I understand, a ritual had to be performed to transfer the magic from one person to another, and it also makes the person in possession of it nearly immortal. However, it was almost too complicated because I don't think it was explained as well as it should have been. Why did Rhea have to kill someone to change the seasons? I felt completely lost when they kept mentioning that. If you understood that please let me know.
The pacing definitely improved in the second half of the book but the twist, which came in the last few chapters, felt too little too late. I did like certain aspects of it though. Most of the time is spent with Rhea who is actually uncovering the truth which was rather interesting, but for me, the main three things in fantasy are 1. worldbuilding, 2. good character arcs, and 3. if there is a hard magic system the rules must be well explained. As I felt this book struggled with all three of these, I am unsure if I'll continue with this series when the next one is published.
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