Challenge #46 ~ “A book with a (mostly) black cover.”
★ ☆ ☆ ☆ ☆
My opinion in three sentences:
I’ve been meaning to read this for a long while – I bought it years back when I’d finished Nix’s Kings to the Kingdom series, started it,but never got far for some reason. From an intriguing start with a strong plot,however, the work disintegrated with poor world-building, excessively numerous and lackluster characters, and rapid perspective changes that added to the confusion. For a supposed middle-grade book, I found myself getting very lost,confused and quickly lost interest – not really ideal from any book, let alone one for younger readers!
(Without spoiling anything) the best bit:
The premise and plan of the plot are great – who doesn’t want to read of an adventure in another land to save a sibling on the result of a guilt-trip? In its vague sense, it’s a regularly done trope, but Nix added his own twists at first to entice the reader – it’s certainly not a new idea for me, but I was intrigued by Nix’s ideas. If only it was backed up by some adequate literary craft!
A warning for the book:
At the heart of it, it’s pretty poorly written and so requires some strong determination to get through. For a 200-odd page middle-grade book, it shouldn’t have taken nearly half a year to read, but there was no attraction to pick up the book, which simply promised a confusing world with unmemorable characters and rapid perspective changes to further lose the reader.
Dreaming With Your Eyes Wide Open 