Reviews
3.75 of 5 stars ----- Oh, wow! That was one hell of a ride! So much has happened! I didn't think there was even a single time for the characters to take a break from all of that. It was very action-packed like, non-stop from beginning until the end, and that was what I liked the most about this. I was on the edge of my seat the whole way because of so much intensity. It felt like the whole book was a huge climax. But the battle part was what I've lived for! I literally cheered when the hordemaster Doroga made his appearance with Tavi and Fade in the middle of the hopeless battle. And Fade? I knew there was something more to him than he purposely let on. But I didn't guess what it was exactly until that scene! Though this has its own flaws, this was still undoubtedly a very solid first book in a series! This kind of gripping and exciting book was what I've been looking for in a fantasy. I can definitely saw myself finishing this series!
Welp, life exploded so that took me way longer than it should have to finish... I'm going to give this 3.5 stars... I liked it enough, but I didn't start to really enjoy it until about page 400... I hope the books get better as they go, otherwise I might rethink this whole "reading the whole series" idea.. Lol.
4.5 Just as good as I remember it. Kate Reading elevated the reading experience. It was a fantastic narration - although I was a bit wary in the beginning as I'm used to Kate Reading's narration of The Memoirs of Lady Trent Series by Marie Brennan - but Kate Reading does the characters so well.
4.5
Entertaining. Kind of predictable ending though.
It took me awhile, but I finally finished. The thing I love most about this novel is Jim Butcher's world-building. He takes some ideas (such as power of the elements) and makes them his own, creating a unique world that is easy to attach to. Tavi, Amara, Bernard and parts of the Marat are all exciting to follow as they try to stop the big bad evil (view spoiler)[ Fidelias (hide spoiler)]. (view spoiler)[ Fidelias. Ah. I feel as though it was unnecessary to follow his point of view and his POV actually made me take him much less seriously. He is so comically evil with his only reason for betraying Gaius and Amara being defeat is inevitable. I felt as though this is an insufficient motive for the amount of effort he puts into opposing the First Lord, attempting to destroy the Garrison and the surrounding steadholds. (hide spoiler)] Also, Isana's story is not the most interesting. She is constantly back and forth from decently powerful to completely helpless and reliant on random chances. As much as I didn't like these two POVs, I acknowledge that at least Isana's is essential to the story. Also, the bulk of the novel is taken up by Tavi and Amara, so it's just a little complaint.
As a huge Butcher and Dresden fan, I dont know why I waited so long to start this series. The characters are amazing and the story is well-constructed. Butcher once again creates an amazing world of magic, politics, and well-developed characters.
First of all, I just want to thank my English teacher for suggesting this book to my friend Isabella (you can follow her on Instagram @thewriterilamberson), and than her telling my about it! Now that that’s out of the way, let’s get to review! This was a fantastic read with a really interesting magic system that I absolutely devoured! It took me a few chapters to fully understand the magic system and how it worked, but once it clicked in my brain, it was truly magical. The one thing I really enjoyed about this book was the characters. Usually when I say this, I’m talking about all good characters that are supposed to save the world, but I really enjoyed the characters that were on the opposite side of the war! Odiana has to be one of my favorite characters in this book, and just from reading this book, you can tell she is a survivor in her own right. The other character that I really enjoyed reading about was Isana, and seeing her struggles and how she overcame the impossible. This was a fantastic read, and definitely one to keep you up all night! I really have nothing bad to say about this book! It was full of magic, suspense, plot twists, and action! You will never want to put it down, and will for sure be a book to remember! “Because a sound tree doesn't have bad roots, Amara. No enterprise of greatness begins with treachery, with lying to the people who trust and love you” Jim Butcher, Furies of Calderon (Codex Alera, #1) Final Rating: 5/5 Stars
I thought this book was very cool - the idea of the magical world, the action, the characters... It really is, in my opinion, like Game of Thrones meets Pokemon - that is an easy way to described the complicated plot lines involved in this book that I am sure will continue throughout the series. That was fun for me and I enjoyed this reading experience. However, I did have some problems, both personal preference issues and issues with that book itself, and I will get into it. First of all, let's set up what the book is about. Because if I ever saw one unhelpful and completely boring synopsis was the one for this book. We have this world called Alera, and this lots of different races that live in it, but basically the Aleran are the dominant race in the society, much like the Roman empire was (since the book is also kind of based on Roman legions - or more precisely a Roman legion that disappeared). The Aleran are dominant because they are capable of doing magic, and the way to craft that magic is through furies which are beings made up of six different elements (fire, water, air, earth, wood, metal). Each element has a different set of skills it can work with and each crafter has their own set of special talents and limitations. As in, practicing the magic is a thing you have to train in and some people are better at it than others - that's something I thought was very cool. For example we have watercrafters, and they are capable of healing injured people, but some can heal much more serious wounds than others. Anyway, in amidst all that, we have Tavi who doesn't have any furies or magic or anything, but who is mostly a resourceful and clever fifteen year old. Mostly, because at the beginning of the book he does something really dumb to help a girl and ends up losing all of his uncle's sheep. In losing the sheep, when they go looking for it, they encounter the Marat who are a savage race who basically attack first and ask questions later. Because of that, Tavi and his uncle are thrown into a war between the First Lord's legionare (which is basically the army of the good guys and the guy who rules the realm) and the mercenaries and high lords who are working with the Marat to overthrow him and take his place. There are lot of other characters and story lines, but I don't want to describe the entire book here. So setting this up, I will talk about what I liked in this story, which was first of all the magic system and the world building which I thought worked really well and the development wasn't confusing or overwhelming and I feel like I get how it all works which is how you want to feel when encountering a new fantasy world. I also liked a lot of the characters, we get a lot of characters and different perspectives, so that can feel overwhelming sometimes, but I think most of them were developed well enough within the main story. My favorite characters were: Isana, Amara, Kitai, Bernard, Tavi and Odiana. At least one of these characters is kind of a villain. I also liked the writing style, it wasn't too flourished and just descriptive enough to give us a visual of what was happening but propel the story forward without dragging on details. The things I had a couple of issues with were the action/battle scenes, but that is one of those afore mentioned personal issues, because I just don't like to read or even watch battle scenes. I just find them boring. Since that book relies a lot more on big battles than on individual action scenes, I did have some less enjoyment on those parts, and kind of skimmed read a little bit which is something I very rarely do. I also thought some of the relationships in this book felt a little weird and rushed, but that didn't take away too much of my enjoyment. Also, briefly taking a feminist point of view here, I appreciated that this book had a lot of well developed female characters that got chances to shine on their own. Some male characters mistreat the females or take them for less than, but you can tell that is not the author's view. Overall, I will give this book 3.75 stars. For some reason I'm having a really hard time rating it. I enjoyed it and I intend to continue on with the series some time, but I don't think it was the greatest thing. I recommend if you're looking for an adult fantasy series that is a little bit easier to read than most (this is so not YA, btw). I always compare fantasy books I read with LoTR and you should know I find LoTR very boring to read. Bonus spoiler section: Do not read this if you don't want to be spoiled because it contains a theory that I have for the entire series . I have only read the first book, but I think I'm probably totally right and this might spoil everything. (view spoiler)[ So Fade is the Areris Valerian that everyone kept talking about, which a) reminded me of GoT the way they kept saying 'you're no Areris' and b) made me laugh so hard when Fade was all 'actually I am' just not with words. Along with that, we have Tavi who is probably actually Isana's son and not nephew the way they subtly (not) talk about that. And then bam, my major theory right now is that he is actually Gaius Octavius. Octavius. Because we have Gaius Sextus who is the First Lord, his Princeps Gaius Septimus who was murdered by the Marat, so who is to say we don't have a secret baby he had with Isana that was sent into hiding. I don't have a full theory on why he doesn't have magic - maybe Isana binded his furycrafting to protect him or something. Anyway, if you're reading this tell me what you think, but if you have read the rest of the series, don't actually tell me if I'm right or wrong! ;) (hide spoiler)]
