Victoria Aveyard

I wasn’t always sold on Mare living the Silver-lifestyle or the romance (there may’ve been reasons for that, but it wasn’t bad), but I thoroughly enjoyed reading this. Many well-placed twists and turns kept my interest. The war, the Scarlet Guard, and the drama were some of the best parts. I like how everything isn’t black and white because even evil personified has someone to love. The way Mare describes some things in her narrative is fun as well.

3.5

also, kudos for the main character having lightning powers. That's original for these types of stories.

please mare, stop trying to save kilorn! he's almost grown! he can take care of his doggone-self.

I’m a bit disappointed that most of the Scarlet Guard were still alive. When I thought Farley, Kilorn, Shade, and the others were dead, the consequences had more weight. Still, I might have to read the sequel just to see where this is heading. So... is the new love triangle going to be between Cal and Kilorn? Too soon? Okay. Or, is Mare really not going to pursue a romantic subplot with either?… (mer)

Oh, the many many things to say about this book...but it will also be a bit hard to say a lot of them without spoilers because some of it is plot based. I actually like the ending and kind of saw it coming. I like it because I think, as I said, it was just bound to happen and has been threatening to happen all along and has been a major tension point. If it hadn't of happened it would have been much too anticlimactic after all that build up. And just to clarify, I am strictly talking about the very last scene of the book.

I am Interested in the ideas shown in this book in particular about how much of people is shaped from how they were raised to be and how difficult it can be to navigate that field of how much of yourself comes from which people or what circumstances. There were a couple other themes throughout the book I thought were cool, like, as indicated by the title, the differences between freedom and captivity and how sometimes even when you think you are living your life your own way, you come to find yourself still in a cage in the sense that you aren't free to control your image/actions while others are manipulating you for their own gain.

Something that doesn't make much sense to me across the series is why Mare seems so utterly convinced that the Scarlett Guard is the answer to the issue and backs their cause like it is the dearest thing to her. I know she wants change-- and has plenty of reason to want it --but to replace those prejudiced people in power with other people prejudiced against THOSE people doesn't make much sense as being an answer or being true justice for everyone. I would think that reds and silvers having equal representation in their country would be the option that would end the cycle going back and forth between reds in power with silvers being mistreated or silvers in power with reds being mistreated. I'm not going to go all political or whatever, I'm just saying that from what is presented of this world that seems like it could make things a lot better. But who knows, there is another book, maybe it has been working that way the whole time. Or maybe there is some other answer which will shock everyone and make them all ashamed of feeling superior, red or silver or whoever.

As far as characters go, I am at both ends of the spectrum. I am actually not very fond of Mare, which can get pretty annoying considering she is the main character. I feel like her character just isn't very complex or developed and it's like most of the time her character is just used as a narrative voice more than having actual character. She seems too reactive and singularly driven and the single thing that drives her could flip flop in an instant. I can understand a character not being able to make up their mind (I am in that boat a lot myself) but, when the main character just goes back and forth thinking one way and then another it can get kind of confusing as to what they actually think at all. That being said, I LOVE Maven's character. And no, not in the "I love the bad boy character type" kind of way. I love Maven's character because I feel like he is very developed and very complex and I am eager to learn every piece of new information about him because there is so much to learn and his character seems so much more human to me. His parts are all my favorite parts. Do I LIKE him? Not really. Do I think he and Mare need to be together? Not really. But I love his characterization. And it's so good that I even have to keep doubting myself over whether or not it's really true that I don't like him. I mean I don't. But...maybe, I can understand him. And that's more than I can do with Mare haha.

Don't get me started on Cal. Don't like him. True, he may not be as bad as his half brother, but again-- Maven gets all the best characterization. I feel like I barely even know who Cal is. He almost feels like a stock character to me. But there are times when I think, well maybe he is pretty good since he did that but then he just ends up feeling sketchy and overall I can't get a good enough image of his character.

I loved the Evangeline chapters in this installment, her character is a bit more complex like Maven's and I feel like her character has a much stronger voice with much more solid beliefs and thoughts. Cameron's were also interesting and seeing how she feels about her powers though I didn't enjoy them quit as much as Evangeline's but maybe that's just because Cameron is younger and seems more angsty and I'm just in the wrong age group to really identify with that anymore.

I also noticed there are several parts where the wording is kind of weird and particularly that the same words get used repeatedly a lot which distracted from the story to a certain extent. BUT, I still give this one 4 stars because of the good character development in those like Maven and Evangeline, because of the intriguing themes, because I am still excited to read the next book, and because I do feel like Victoria Aveyard is good at plot twists and that there are many more to come (and I love twisting plots).… (mer)

So I was pretty much able to read the first three books of The Red Queen series around the same time, which was fantastic. But then I had to wait for a year to read War Storm. And still, I was able to remember the most important pieces and held on to my excitement for this last installment. First and foremost, I was so happy to see how long this book was since it would be the last. And with a title like War Storm , I felt sure this would be a very climatic ending.

The first big difference I noticed with this book was the pacing. It passed much slower than the previous installments. A big reason it felt this way for me though was because the majority of this book revolves around the nuances of politics. And of course, the series is about politics- Queens, Kings, War, Inequality, Prejudices, Conscription, Titles, Marriages for Alliance, and more. But I felt that this book went headlong into the more dry back and forth of working out new policy and looking more into the characteristics of different types of government and how each might effect the social environment that currently existed in Norta and its surrounding countries. And when it comes to writing about politics, I think there’s a very thin line for me as to what feels more like a distant history lesson and what is still able to fascinate me and connect me to this story and it’s characters. Unfortunately, I felt that most of this book did not leave me feeling that connection. And it’s not that I don’t like politics in literature, but if we are going to go into it, then I’d rather really go into it and not re hash the same topics so repetitively. One of the better examples that comes to mind of very stimulating writing of politics into literature is Isaac Asimov’s The Foundation. I’d rather go into the theory of it than to listen to the people continuously squabbling over control from various view points.

It also doesn’t help that I have never really liked Mare as the main character or really, just in general. Thank goodness for Evangeline because she was the best part about this book for me. I also really enjoyed her parts in the last book and have seen a lot of people who also seemed to connect to her character the most in this book. Evangeline has a quick wit and owns her strengths, but she is also very introspective and knows her weaknesses. Between these last two books she has come to learn new truths about herself and has learned to stand strong for what she wants even in the face of everything she has ever known. Evangeline is wonderfully passionate in all things and this came across so well in her chapters. Mare, on the other hand, continued to annoy me. Though I will admit she has gone through many changes herself and is stronger for them. I admire the fact that her character was now able to choose to stick to her guns and not be as easily swayed as in the past. I still think she is a hot head and reacts too quickly to situations but she has shown a lot more restraint in this one. She still keeps going over all the same thoughts on repeat though, and too many of them for my taste have to do with “Tiberias” Calore.

Now when it comes to Cal, I respect some of the growth and decisions he made towards the end as well, though his change was the slowest burn of them all and one that I feel has really just begun as we leave this story. However, overall, for most of the book he was equally as annoying to me as he was the rest of the series. He is a very slow changer and naively stubborn which makes him very difficult for me to like.

Iris was a new perspective, and seeing as I am not very fond of Mare or Cal, it was a refreshing point of view. But then you throw in Maven’s point of view on top of everyone else’s and I just felt that there were too many point of views in this book. Don’t get me wrong, I like having more than one person’s perspective to connect with, but not really more than 3. And with Maven, though up until this book he had been my favorite character in the series, I really don’t think his chapters did him justice. A huge part of Maven’s character was how much of an enigma he was and particularly how his mind worked. Seeing him through the other characters and the unique impression he made on each of them was much preferable to me than to actually go into his head myself in his chapters. Suddenly it was like looking behind the curtain and seeing a much more deflated character than what had been building up before me. I was very sad with his portrayal in general in War Storm because I was so in love with King’s Cage and between that book and this one I just really feel that Maven went in a different direction.

I did appreciate that after The Scarlet Guard interacted more with Montfort it seemed like they came to more inclusive terms for all citizens of Norta in their plans. They were also able to come together with a firmer stance on what they wanted for their future. As a final note for how Mare’s character continued to annoy me, I don’t really understand why she needed all this space at the end of the book to figure out who she is. I know she has been living in War for a while now and she has had to play several different roles in the politics of the war and creating a new government, but I don’t see how removing herself from one person is going to make some huge difference. She doesn’t remove herself from anyone else, she doesn’t go into seclusion or on a pilgrimage or any such path of mediation or solitude. It seems to me she has done TOO MUCH thinking on this particular person to begin with, but what do I know? I don’t understand her either.

It took me much, much longer to get through this book than I initially thought it would. It never really had me on the edge of my seat, or wanting to stay up later than I very well should or sitting in my car after I arrived at my location just to listen to more of it (I listened to this one on audio). I didn’t dislike it. I didn’t find the ending unsatisfactory outside of Maven’s general character arc really. It was just very slow and very dry for me. It highly contrasted with the rest of the series in its pacing. And at the end of it all, I still never particularly liked the main character. So though this made me glad that there were other points of view, again I think it went a little overboard in this last book with how many people we got chapters for. So this one is 3 stars for me, and I still anticipate any future writing from Victoria Aveyard.
… (mer)

I enjoyed Coriane's story, though I found Farley's story a bit dry. Neither goes into much depth, of course I know they also aren't meant to be full novels. It was interesting to get a bit of back story on some of the characters from the series however. I listened to this book on CD and the transmission between characters of the Scarlet Guard was particularly dry this way but I could see it being better when being physically read.
Overall I love the main series much better and could have went without these two stories and just had a bit of it worked in with the main novels.… (mer)