#no hate to whoever liked the book

[musingsifyouwill]

A Dark Rise review

I just love the taste of nothing.

I picked up the book, recommendation of BookTok, and by chapter 4 I knew I was lied to. Honestly that’s on me because this was the 4th BookTok recommendation I’ve read and every single one of them has been a let down. 

The only thing I knew before reading was that there where queer characters and high fantasy elements, of course that caught my attention. The book delivered on those two fronts but everything else fell short. 

I could’t go into heavy detail since there are none, the whole premise of the book is good vs evil and while other authors create metaphors and tales around the two concepts, this author just decides to skip the trouble of coming up with clever ideas and just straight up call it Darkness and Light which feels lazy. 

That’s how I would describe the whole book, lazy storytelling. Things just happen because they need to happen, there’s no justification to the plot. The whole book feels like situations happening and happening and happening, there’s little correlation between them, if any. 

Apparently somewhere in the plot there’s the knowledge that there was a world where magic existed and it slowly banished, now the only ones that remember the ancient times are the Stewards who at some point where betrayed by the Kings. It's one of those situations where the author lets you know a word is important by using capital letters at the start of the name (Ex. Kings, Stewards, Lions, Darkness, Lady) which again feels lazy, because those are normal words, they just “modify” the meaning and hope that’s enough to cheat us into believing this magical world. 

Chapter after chapter feels like the author is just feeding us gibberish, an empty promise of some actual lore but nothing ever gets explained. We are constantly being presented with the facade of deep meaningful high magic, the stakes are high but we are never explained why or how. There are many moments where the plot could thicken but there’s always a quick coverup or a quick solution to it. 

You have the “classic” hero’s journey poorly executed. Out MC is Will who’s being chased down by the man who killed his mother, he does not have a personality whatsoever. Things just happen to him and he never actually reacts to anything. He gets a best friend, a mentor and a rival in the first 4 chapters, again all feeling rushed. His mentor dies a couple of chapters later, and while he mourns the loss we as the audience never really see them bond to care enough, which is a shame because along with the mentor pretty much everyone who is a Stewart (good guys) die and that means there are only about 4 characters that can save the world. It is important to know that 3 of these 4 characters knew nothing about the magical world they live in at the start of the book. 

I’d say that there are in total about 3 important characters: Will, Violet and James. In total there must be around 10 or so characters that we follow and know across the book but no one else really matters, they are just plot points, and very boring ones I’d say. 

For example we have Simon who’s the “baddie” of the book, he never shows up, everyone mentions him but we see him only once and it's at the end of the book. (Spoiler alert: he dies instantly). We are suppose to fear him but the only thing that we are constantly being told about him is that he is the Dark Lord descendant, other than that he sounds like a pretty normal man. 

You also have the background characters like Cyprian who’s the Stewarts golden child. He immediately hates Will when he arrives and that’s his whole thing. He never speaks unless its to hate on Will.

The only character that actually has a personality is Violet, the MC’s best friend. She goes through a major character arc and it actually is interesting enough, the sad part its that the author treats it like background so again we don’t go into depth with her. 

Now with my main problem with the book: 

There’s a huge plot twist in the story right at the end, one that feels that has some kind of sense but in going with that logic the whole book falls apart. All of the important sacrifices that happen in the story are for nothing. So not only does the author falls short on making us care about stuff that happens but at the end this feels like a slap on the face. As if they were telling us “Remember everything I told you mattered? Well I begged you to care for it but I lied” 

There are many other flaws that I didn’t mentioned, and the whole book feels like its right on the edge of something worth reading, maybe I’m asking too much of a YA fantasy novel. Book 2 its on the way and I can’t say too I’m excited for it. 

[sideprince]

I resent getting dragged into the discourse but it's wild to me that there are people out there who read the HP books and laud Harry for being brave and having a big heart and redeeming the wizarding world with his unusually great ability to love, yet can't comprehend how he could learn to appreciate Snape's sacrifice.

I'm very specifically thinking of the fact that Harry watches Snape die. Snape, who is lying on the floor, gripping Harry's robes, and whose eyes Harry is looking into and seeing the life leave. I don't understand how people can humanize some fictional characters and treat them as if they were real and completely dehumanize another. Not even for Snape's sake, but for Harry's sake, do these people not understand what it is to watch someone die? What's the expectation, that the Capacity For Love Posterchild protagonist steps out of character and doesn't care about the guy he watches bleed out and die suffering because you, as a reader, don't like him?

Which is it? Does Harry have a huge capacity to love or not? Pick a lane. Either you value this character trait in Harry or you don't. But you have to take or leave everything it comes with, otherwise you're a hypocrite. Or maybe illiterate.

I just don't GET it.

[valkyrieres]

Does anyone have a better pic of this page/art? Got this pic from TaoBao, and none of my books have this art in it...

And I don't wanna wait for 2-3 months to get the book myself bsjsjsjsjsnsn

But it has this chaotic-evil-ahh Maru in it so I'm currently contemplating if I should buy it—

[i-am-church-the-cat]

Okay no one talk to me bc I haven’t watched the race yet but I just finished Nightbane by Alex Aster and am currently Losing It. I need the third book rn.

[femmeleatherface]

no context spoilers for the phantom of manhattan

this book is fucking TERRIBLE

[thewingedwolf]

i love a program that makes me feel like my job has meaning

[leoleolovesdc]

I’m so sorry but will never ever ever ever ever be able to shut up about gregory maguire’s wicked. Like, sometimes you’re having fun talking with the fandom online, then you see a musical fan’s take that physically hurts you and you just wanna punch so hard through your computer you’ll reach whoever posted this shit’s shoulders and shake them back n forth while yelling “YOU JUST DON’T GET IT”

[powderrblue]

grimdark is actually the most dnd ass made up word i think has been created by people oversimplifying and misunderstanding media so far

[dipperscavern]

dippy you’re so based… i was just rewatching the harry potter movies i’m afraid youre right abt the weasley twins i was just thinking abt them the other day aswell as sirius black who is my favourite british boytoy :/// all asoiaf fans had humble fantasy crush beginnings (mine the lord of the rings and im afraid i will never escape the lotr nerd allegations, once a freak always a freak). THE FEMININE NEED FOR A WHIMSICAL MAN!

but this begs the question,,, what other fandoms are you in… who are your other fictional crushes im so intrigued like do you have a type??? or is it just vibes

- pondering anon

hiii pondering anon!!! thank you for saying i’m based i’m truly honored (i’m sorry for this long ass reply u got me yapping)

i really wanna rewatch the movies sometime soon (saw them once years ago), but i reread the books like once a year once i’ve forgotten everything 😭😭i love everyone’s book personalities… and yeah. i’m afraid i need the weasley twins (cough fred cough), AND U CALLING SIRIUS A BOYTOY KMFAO. he was so cunth in the moocies

my humble fantasy beginnings was narnia’!! i wanna watch lotr but since hotd came out it kinda hit me like a tidal wave i fear. THE FEMININE NEED FOR A WHIMSICAL MAN!

i’m not sure if i consider myself to be in fandoms… like asoiaf was really the first time i’m like deep in the fandom yk? but i’ll share my stuff CAUSE WHY NOT!!! i like gravity falls, narnia, harry potter, percy jackson, the maze runner, the walking dead, the hunger games, greys anatomy, atla, the last of us, avatar the blue peopel, potc, criminal minds, shameless, and nobody shoot me scooby doo specifically the mystery incorporated version. FIGHT ME RHAT SHOW HAS SUCH GOOD LORD IDGAF!!!!! and in answer to my crushes question i give u, a text i sent my friend months ago:

“me with sandor clegane, jon snow, daemon targaryen, simon riley, finnick odair, steve harrington, lip gallagher, daryl dixon, rick grimes, robb stark, fred weasley, john mactavish, marcus lopez, jj maybank, alex karev, occasional mark sloan if i’m blackout drunk, peter parker, wayne mccullough, bill and charlie weasley when i’m ovulating, thomas in tmr movies & minho in the books, ellie williams, spencer reid, jake sully, jack sparrow, (unfortunately) feyd-rautha, the pope, and george washington”

and that’s just the text. i’ll remember more in a year when i’m like OMG WAIT HES SO FINE I FORGOT I HAVE A SHRINE OF HIM IN MG CLOSEt!!

[eastofedean]

8i've been thinking about the last asks i got today. and i think it's better for me to take a step back from this account. i know the anon didn't mean anything by it, but i still feel like i am being a negative presence on here and weirding people out with who i am is nothing i want. so, i am not deleting or anything. i am just gonna be less present with sharing personal things or leaving tags. I'll probably be more active on my second account where i don't have that many followers :)

[hyp3rfixation-h3ll]

burgertron HATE ged prep . burgertron PILEDRIVE WHOEVER MADE IT SO THAT YOU HAVE TO TAKE 4 SEPARATE TESTS TO GET A PIECE OF PAPER THAT SAYS YOU DID IT into THE FUCKING DIRT!!!!!!!

[enlichened]

they really made the corvo and jessamine romance explicit in the same game that they made it canon he met her when she was 12 and he was 18

[fixing-canva-book-covers]

Another fix, this time for Elena Armas’ The American Roommate Experiment.

There are several frustrating things at play in this one for me: the lack of a defined colour palette, the inconsistent style of artwork, the faceless people and overly realistic shadowing on clothes (indicating that the people in these drawings were originally just photos, traced over and filled with basic colour), the randomly cluttered in assortments of motifs and vectors… it gives it a confused, cluttered feel.

I tried to follow the good old rule of thirds here while also establishing a more structured colour palette, giving the author’s bottom third a little cityscape to provide setting context. I removed the pizza and the gramophone entirely, replacing them as a feature with the little brass apartment key and adding the paper manuscript sheets for the lead’s romance book as a more obvious and compelling motif. I shifted the text down and filled the top third with the legs of the two character vectors (to avoid having to try and make the faces look less empty and slender man-esque) and I switched out the colour of the lady’s pants to draw the same pink through the cover art and lead the viewer’s eye down the page.

What do we think?

[skatiet]

rip bridget jones you would’ve loved foolish one by taylor swift

[mara-and-its-the-same]

there is no one

NO ONE

i hate more than whoever had my copy of beowulf before me

[robocops-a-christ-allegory]

There was this tweet I saw like. Way too long ago. And it was shortly after another vaguely twitter big comic book fan posted about how Peacemaker was originally going to remember Crisis in the Never Materalized Keith Giffen Peacemaker mini/solo/oneshot (I forget which) so I think they got it from that but it was another vaguely twitter big comic book fan saying that if the DCEU gets rebooted Peacemaker should remember because "hes crazy" and I think about this so often. I think about it too much. He should remember because hes crazy. I fucking hate comic book fans dude we are horrible