A review by alilbitofmonica
A Monsoon Rising by Thea Guanzon

3.0

I don't really know how to feel about this book. I feel like there were moments where I was really liking it and other moments where I felt whiplash from things happening too quickly (or exhaustion from things not happening fast enough)

- I honestly just feel very EHH about this book, like the first one got 4 stars but the world building was nearly impossible to follow at times. In this one, I understood more of the world building, and then something would happen that makes whatever I just learned to no longer make sense.
- This book further explores the complicated dynamic between Talasyn and Alaric. Married but secretly planning to betray each other, hooking up but afraid of falling too hard for the other. This was basically just a merry go round of them getting together, regretting it, then hating each other for a day before hooking up again. It was tiring.
- That being said, I do love Talasyn and Alaric, both separately and together. I think they are interesting characters who are young and tasked with impossible responsibilities.
- The EVENTS of this book were pretty good and kept things moving - I love the idea of them working and training together to save their people from the Voidfell. This kept us on a timeline and the story moved. Like this storyline was definitely my favorite. But it also took forever.
-- The events and discoveries DURING the eclipse Voidfell were really interesting, although it feels a little out of nowhere. Also... its basically How to Train Your Dragon.
- The ENDING did nothing for me. I was expecting some big cliffhanger that would have me yelling "NO I NEED MORE" but instead I do not feel anything at all. Like the cliffhanger makes me just more confused?
- I feel like there are too many people with titles and names that are brought up fleetingly and then we are supposed to remember them 100 pages later and it really makes me feel detached from anyone who isn't in the circle of main characters.
- At the risk of sounding mean, this book feels like someone had a few mental images of scenes that would be cool, wrote them down, then pretended like they fit together and made sense in context. It felt fragmented and transitions between scenes was not smooth.