Tuesday, June 15, 2021

The Black Prism by Brent Weeks

The Black Prism (Lightbringer, #1)The Black Prism by Brent Weeks
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

Well I'm done. Thank god. And the ending was as unfulfilling as expected. But I'm hard-pressed to pin point why exactly I hated it. Main thing is I was just soooo not engaged!! :( Maybe coz I couldn't get behind any of the characters. Maybe coz it often felt like he was over-explaining things like why they'd lost their horses, or the unnecessarily complicated magic system. So it was such a chore to read it. A painful chore. But I loved Weeks' Night Angel series so much I wanted to at least finish this one book. To see if it got more enjoyable. It did not. sigh. :(

The magic system is fascinating, the use of all the colours of light was a great idea, especially with each colour having its own properties. But it felt really silly that they have all this power, yet can only craft objects with it that they then have to use mundanely, like physically throwing fireballs, and pedalling a magic boat!?

And then he spent way too much time explaining it! I don't need to learn how to draft light, just need to read about what happens! These books remind me of Tolkien... the author spent way too much time developing their world so they can't stop talking about it, at the expense of story!

And Kip's constant inner monologue of self-criticism was exhausting. And I hate to criticize that coz I have that going on in my head too. But I read books, especially scif/fantasy, to ESCAPE those thoughts!! Not read them on the page. :(

The Night Angel series definitely had the feel of a new writer, but it was fun, and the story was so great and engaging! This one the story is amazing, great complexity, characters, world, but the book was soooo not engaging. It's like he matured as a writer but only in some areas?! Anyways, I'm disappointed. :( I love you Brent Weeks but this series is not for me.

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