Waiting on Wednesday: King's Cage

Waiting on Wednesday is hosted by Breaking the Spine

In the third book in the #1 New York Times bestselling Red Queen series, Mare is forced to play a psychological cat-and-mouse game with an old and deadly enemy, where the stakes are not only the future of the Red Rebellion but the sanctity of her own mind.

Why I'm Waiting

I really loved the first book in this series, but rather disliked the second one.  The way the second one ended I am rather excited for this one, though.  We'll see where this series goes.  I think this book could really save it all for me.

Related Reviews

Red Queen

 Glass Sword

King's Cage releases February 7th, 2017

Book Review: Glass Sword (Red Queen, #2)

Author: Victoria Aveyard

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Edition: Hardcover

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Related Reviews: Red Queen

Rating: 3 Stars

Mild SPOILERS below for Red Queen.

I read Red Queen earlier this year and absolutely loved it, so I was obviously more than excited for this one.  While it was still a decent book, I think I was expecting far more and was overly disappointed by this one. 

Glass Sword picks up where Red Queen left off and follows Mare and her allies as they search for the rest of the new bloods and hope to build an army able to do battle with the silvers.

My biggest problem was how much this book was trying to be.  There are at least three acts, but each act felt like it wanted to a novel and they didn't seem very well connected.  The beginning of the novel read like a tyrannical dystopian, the middle like a quest, and the end like the beginning of a series.  It wasn't hard to follow, but it was annoying to be tossed around so  much.  I understand that there was important world building being done, but there is such a thing as too much at once.  It was nearly impossible to keep track of all the new places and faces introduced.  And there are a lot of new characters!  I couldn't even make myself care about most of them.  They were easy to lose track of and the book lost weight as it tried to make every single one of them as important as the last and they just blended together.

Another problem I had was Mare herself.  I really liked her and her voice in the first book, but in this one it was very hard to read.  She's selfish and a little whiny.  There are still redeeming qualities for her, but overall I felt somewhat depressed reading from her point of view.  And the characters that would have really redeemed her POV for me were either not there or used so infrequently that I forgot about them.

The biggest saving grace of this book is the ending.  It actually has two endings, I suppose, and the first one was somewhat predictable (though, not completely) while the second one came out of nowhere and made me sit back and take it in.  The final scene is very potent and I'm not sure how I feel about it, but it's certainly gotten me to think.  It's a cliffhanger and, had I been more thrilled with the book as a whole, I think I'd be feeling the full affect of it.  As it stands, it does keep me interested for the next book but not pulling my hair out.

As always, the writing was gorgeous.  Aveyard really knows how to craft sentences and they're a pleasure to read.  I do hope the next book manages to redeem the series for me, but I also do plan on finishing the quartet regardless.

5 Star Book Review: Red Queen (Red Queen, #1)

Author: Victoria Aveyard

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Edition: Hardcover

Buy Links: Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Book Depository

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Rating: 5 Stars

Red Queen is one book I've recently seen the bookish-community really split about, with most either hating it or loving it.  I was worried going in that I would hate it, but I ended up being strongly on the latter side.  Even though I had been spoiled about the major twist at the ending, I didn't mind and it was still a fantastic read.

This book follows Mare Barrow, a Red (the lower, human class) who finds out she has the powers of a Silver (a higher, super-powered class) after a series of events literally have her in a life or death situation.  She's then under the public eye and must be hid in plain sight, masquerading as the long lost daughter of a silver.  Through this disguise, she becomes engaged to the second prince, Maven, and falls in love with the crown prince, Cal.

Basically, this book was perfect.  At least, for me.  Let me step back and explain why: it's the sort of story I someday want to tell.  Maybe not in the details, but in the way the twists play out and the events pull at your heart.  Every once in a while I will find a book that makes me motivated to write because it so mirrors what I'm going for without becoming too similar to the stories I've actually created, and this is one of those books.

The plot was fantastic!  From the first page it had me interested, the very first line catching my attention perfectly.  It only continued, never stalling out or getting caught in one place like I feared it might.  In fact, parts of it really reminded me of Shadow and Bone, another book I've really enjoyed lately.

The characters were also amazing.  I loved Mare, I loved Cal, I loved Maven, I loved Lucas, I loved Evangeline, I loved, loved, and loved some more every character pulled onto the page.  Similar to Red Rising (which this book is only slightly like, regardless of the similar names) I found the characters all morally complex and interesting, regardless of whether they were the "good guys" or "bad guys".

One thing I did notice as I was reading were small plot holes that I thought were only messy in the world-building aspect.  Until, suddenly, they weren't plot-holes anymore, but actually little clues left around for the reader to pick up.  They won't point you to exactly what's going on, but they aren't plot-holes, that's for sure.  I loved that everything served a purpose, and that this book wasn't afraid to steer from death and destruction that would happen in a natural way.

Overall, I really recommend you pick this book up!