Posted on by bookreviews628

Knowledge is Carnage: Reviewing The Atlas Six by Olivie Blake

Hello everyone! It is a beautiful day to stay inside and read some book that the internet told you to read. While I’m happy to have access to such wonderful recommendations, I also feel that “Book Tok” is getting out of hand. Recently, I purchased a book that had a “Seen on Book Tok” (or something like that) sticker on it and I honestly wanted to gag. Ok, that’s the end of my tangent. Let’s get into The Atlas Six.

The Society only recruits the most powerful magic users into its mysterious and elite depths. Every decade, six of the most talented individuals are selected to join the Society. In order to do so, they must pass a series of tests to prove that they are worthy. The six newest recruits quickly find themselves making allies, or enemies, in order to get to the top. The stakes are even higher when they realize that one among them will not survive the initiation into the Society.

I went in wanting to like this book as I was given the impression it was like The Secret History but with magic. Despite Olivie Blake having a fully fleshed out magical world, there really wasn’t a lot of magic actually being done in the book. If I’m being honest, I was rather bored at times as there were long stretches of the book that were just characters having drawn out conversations, or having long internal monologues. As much as I enjoy introspection, when you promise me magic then I want some magic. I am not going to tell anyone to not read this book. I will be nice and say that I did enjoy the characters quite a bit. I also liked how well Blake captures the spirit of dark academia in the book. There is still plenty to like, but it just didn’t transcend my expectations or thrill me in the way other magic – based novels have.

Posted on by bookreviews628 · 2 Comments

All the ghosts were home too: Reviewing Nothing but Blackened Teeth by Cassandra Khaw

Hi everyone! I hope you are all doing well. The weather is finally nice and seem to realize how much more productive I feel during the warmer times of the year. Why do I open up my posts with comments about the weather? I’m bad at conversation, even on the internet. But I don’t let the warm weather stop me from enjoying the thrills and chills that come with a good horror novel. I do have some reviews for longer books in the near future, but I thought I would give you this novella review in the meanwhile. With that being said, let’s talk about Nothing but Blackened Teeth.

A group of young, thrill – seeking friends decided to stay the night at a crumbling Japanese manor. The manor is haunted by a ghost bride and girls sacrificed to keep her company. It’s the perfect place for a wedding. After a night of drinking and eating, nightmarish figures begin to appear, including the ghost bride and she is tired of. being alone…

This was a fairly short novel with just over one hundred pages, but that doesn’t make it any less creepy. Khaw doesn’t hold back on any of the gruesome details that comes with the traditional Japanese folklore in this novella. There is a self – reflective element of this novel that I particularly appreciate when it comes to the horror genre. I do have a particular love for Japanese folklore and wish I could properly pronounce everything in this novel. Even if you don’t know anything about Japanese horror, there are plenty of this in this novel to research. If you are looking for a quick, biting, and exciting horror novel, then I will go ahead and give you my recommendation for this delightfully nightmarish read.

Posted on by bookreviews628

Do you want to drown the world in blood?: Reviewing The Tower of Swallows (Book Four of the Witcher Series) by Andrzej Sapkowski

Hi everyone! I hope you are all doing well. I’ve fallen a little behind in my TBR but you can blame that on a sudden windfall of good streaming content. Does anyone else notice that there are either a ton of good shows out or there’s absolutely nothing good out? Maybe I just watch too many shows, but that is beside the point. I am still determined to read this whole series and my committment has not been shaken. So, let’s talk about the fourth book in The Witcher series.

Despite Geralt’s best efforts, Ciri has seemingly completely vanished. Unbeknowst to Geralt, though, Ciri continues to hone her strength and finds several odd allies along the way. With his own group of allies, Geralt continues to search for Ciri but has his own threats following close behind. He must travel through the Tower of Swallows, where he finds that the fate of the world hangs in the balance.

The problem with high fantasy novels, in my opinion, is that sometimes the world in the novel just gets too weighed down by an excess of characters. That was my main issue with this particular book in the series. When the book was focused on Geralt, Ciri, or Yennefer, it was at its strongest. I do enjoy how Sapkowski crafts these strong action sequences. The world building is truly interesting, but like I said, the pacing is pretty slow at points. So far, this is not my favorite book in The Witcher series but I am still going to dilligently finish this series for my followers.