Fantasy Book Club discussion

I reached the midway point and am not engrossed in the story, but more observing the story for academic purposes. I made it known in other posts that I am not a fan of first person narratives, but I find her handling of the first person in this story to jolting to stay in the story. Kat Richardson I think handles the first person narrative very well in her Greywalker series, I have not felt cheated by her. I do feel cheated reading this book-see my other post in the first person narrative if you are curious why.

With that said, I can say I will finish the book, and not just out of an obligation to the Fantasy Book Club group, but because, despite the handling of PoV I am really enjoying learning about the gods and the world to some extent.

I like the political intrigue background, I have been on a George Martin kick lately, and it is nice to have a break and let the political background stay in the background. I particularly liked the manipulation of the system by Scimina to move against Darre. Do you feel the handling of the politics of the court has been done well?

At the midway point I am pretty excited about the handling of the gods. I think she is doing a good job of making them seem non-human with just enough of humanness in them to identify with them and believe they could have created humans. The way she handles the gods is the reason I will finish the story, I am curious to see what happens. What do you think of the gods?

One of the hooks in the book is the upcoming confrontation between Yeine, Relad, and Scimina over who the Heir will be, with the freedom of the gods handing in the balance. I think the author may have done a better job of not making Relad and Scimina so undesirable-I have yet to see a redeeming quality in either of them. That leaves Yeine's choice as a no-brainer, she has to pick herself and then free the gods. What do you think about the central conflict of the story?

Are there other points that have hooked you, or failed to hook you?

Jason wrote: "One of the hooks in the book is the upcoming confrontation between Yeine, Relad, and Scimina over who the Heir will be, with the freedom of the gods handing in the balance. I think the author may have done a better job of not making Relad and Scimina so undesirable-I have yet to see a redeeming quality in either of them...."

I'm on page 226 and I've yet to see any quality in them period - redeeming or otherwise. I understand that with 1st person narrative (which I enjoy) you are limited to what the main character sees and knows, but Yeine hasn't really tried to find out anything about her "rivals" and this is the main part of the book that I find to be lacking. Maybe she's too self centered to care about anyone but herself and her mother but you'd think she'd ask at least one or two questions about the rest of her family since her life seems to depend on it.

I made it through the whole book, and I enjoy first person narratives... but really really disliked this book. The "political intrigue" was a joke. Scimina and Relad were cardboard characters, and not even interesting ones.

Yeine was apparently on a quest to find her mother's killer, but she forgot this for chapters at a time (and it never really felt like a driving force to me). The resolution there was lacking.

I also thought the gods weren't very interesting. Naha had the best characterization, but I even found him (and Yeine's constant desire of him) boring.

I just read American Gods before this (which I also didn't particularly enjoy), so in theory I was in the frame of mind where I could really get into fallen gods. Even this wasn't enough to get me interested in this book. I ended up feeling like I was the person pointing out the emperor has no clothes... What did people enjoy about this book? From where is all the high praise coming?

Danielle wrote: "Yeine was apparently on a quest to find her mother's killer, but she forgot this for chapters at a time (and it never really felt like a driving force to me). The resolution there was lacking..."

I agree. She made a few attempts to find answers then when she hit a snag, just left it until something else came along. There didn't really seem to be any urgency in her for anything and she accepted defeat too easily. I would think that since she was a warrior she would not just accept that she was a sacrifice without a fight but instead she seemed to take it as a forgone conclusion. That didn't sit right with me. The only signs she showed of being a warrior were a few growls and some pathetic slashes with her knife. Not overly impressive. She was far too ineffectual at just about everything for me to buy into the fact that she was raised to be the leader of a matriarchal warrior tribe.

Although I wouldn't give this book high praise, I did enjoy it even with it's obvious flaws. It had some very unique ideas and the world that was described, even though incomplete, was very interesting. I would've liked more details but it's the first book in the series so I'm assuming there's more world building in the next book. I liked Sieh and Nahadoth and thought their interactions with Yeine to be fairly well done, for the most part anyway. The "romance" with Nahadoth left a lot to be desired, it wasn't really believable to me, but I felt Sieh's emotional neediness and Yeine's love for him rang true.

I won't rush out and get the second in the series but I will read it eventually to see what the author can do with this unusual world she has started to create with this book. Hopefully she is able to flesh things out a little more.