“No one is born evil, just like no one is born alone. They become that way, through choice and circumstance.”
-Victoria Aveyard, Glass Sword
Mare is part of a new generation, a generation of Red bloods with Silver abilities. After the betrayal of Maven, now the new king, Mare is on the run with the rebellion–the rebellion that has a lot more reach than Mare could have ever imagined. Now, she had to help gather all the new bloods before Maven gets to them, before the darkness overcomes them.
This installment lacks the energy that the first book had, in my opinion. The action was slow moving for the most part, and didn’t feel like it was going anywhere to me, personally. Much of this book felt like it could have been cut out, perhaps combined with the following one (which is up next for me to read). So far, the story doesn’t feel as cohesive as it possibly could have been.
The second half of the book is better than the first, pepper with extreme violence at points. I appreciate the rebellion story line, but do think it could have been better thought out; there are pieces of it that felt too much like The Hunger Games to me. Like Mare discovering exactly how far the rebellion reaches, how many resources they have at their disposal. I’m not quite sure where the story is going, and what will happen in the next two books, but despite its flaws, I’m curious to find out.
To me, Mare becomes increasingly annoying as the series goes on, complaining about having to do everything alone, blah, blah, blah. In comparison to other rebellion-driven narratives, her complaints don’t seem to be driven by selflessness; for example, Katniss and Harry both feel like they have to do things alone because they don’t want to put anyone they love in danger. The same doesn’t seem to be true of Mare, though I’m not sure if this will change in upcoming books. Mare doesn’t seem to know what she’s doing, causing her characterization to be a bit all over the place.
Overall, the cliff hanger at the end of the book does make me want to read the next one, so I’ll see if the series does indeed get any better. Once the last book comes out in May, we’ll see how I feel about the whole series.
3/5 stars