Glass Sword – Victoria Aveyard

★

Rarely, (and I mean rarely) do I abhor a book to its very core. 

In an effort to give some structure to my upcoming rant, I will limit myself to the things I disliked the most: The title, the writing and (of course) how our heroine is actually aterrible, horrible person.

The Title

I literally cannotget over this title. So much over-the-top symbolism… but not in the way the author wanted.

All I took away from it was, my God. How useless. 

Anything is better than a glass sword. A wooden one, a plastic one, heck…even a french bread one provides nourishment.

One swing of the stupid glass thing and the sword’s gone and splintered itself. Then you’re left stepping on glass shards for the next few weeks…which is what it felt like to read this book. 

Actually, I guess the title works. Glass swords – cumbersome, annoying, useless…just like Mare.

The Writing

For the life of me, I honestly can’t say what this book was about. It was so bland and repetitive that I tuned out for great portions…yet, I don’t think I missed a thing.

The author would either A) say the same thing threetimes per sentenceor B) copy-paste the inane catchphrases (Red Dawn, Little Lightening Girl, Rise Red as the Dawn, etc).

I wanted to shake her – I GET IT THE DAWN IS RED AND MARE HAS LIGHTENING POWERS. And yet, in another three paragraphs, we are reminded just how red that dawn was and how Mare still had lightening powers.

The sheer laziness of the writing really annoyed the living daylights out of me.

Whenever things get the least bit tough, Mare convenientlyfinds just the perfect person with the exact right powers to achieve (insert plot point here). Then side-character dies. Rinse and Repeat.

How our heroine is actually a terrible, horrible person

We follow Mare and her rag-tag group of middle-aged superheros ran here and there as a giant X-men recruitment fest.

She’s so full of righteous anger and rebellious spirit that she never once thinks about the implications and consequencesof her actions.

Honestly, I couldn’t be the only one who noticed how there must have been generations of powered Reds living out their lives in secrecy.

Well, until Mare showed up and pressed them into her army…only to either A) ruin their lives or B) get them killed (depending on which was more convenient for the plot)

To top it all, she has no feelings towards the dying people other than an initial shock/squeal of outrage. You think I’m kidding? Even the other characters noticed it.

“You [Mare] feel no remorse for the dead…you can’t control yourself.”

and yet, everyone in the book admires her bravery and strength.

They literally fawn over her like she’s this amazing, self-sacrificing, pure-to-the-bone heroine. How (honestly, I want to know) does no one notice that all she does is A)murder people or B) force them into her army.

In short, this is a half-star book. The half is because of the sheer effort it took to come up with over 400 pages starring Mare…I don’t know how the author did it.