“Makhi Kir-Taban, born of heaven, was a queen from a long line of queens.”
First line in Rule of Wolves by Leigh Bardugo
Hi, guys. I hope you’re all doing well. WWW Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Sam @ Taking on a World of Words, and it’s meant to give you all a little insight into my reading this week. I’ll answer the 3 questions:
- What are you currently reading?
- What did you recently finish?
- What do you think you’ll read next
What did you recently finish?
Rule of Wolves by Leigh Bardugo, which I can’t give more than 2.5 stars. Wow what a mess! I think this book was so busy setting up plots for future Grishaverse books that it forgot to have a plot of its own. In the beginning, I just thought it had difficulties deciding whether to focus on characters or plot until I realized it’s trying to do everything at once and therefore nothing in the book gets the attention it deserves. And I’m also personally disappointed because the duology pitched as the “Nikolai duology” had awfully little Nikolai in it. He plays such an insignificant role and how can you waste such a good character?!? However, my overall feeling when reading this was just boredom. It wasn’t until the end that I got angry and maybe a little frustrated because Bardugo has made sure that you must read this duology if you intend to read future books in the Grishaverse. She could at least have made it good then.
What are you currently reading?
Since my copy of The Kingdoms is taking its sweet time getting here, I started another book I was very excited about: The Kingdom of Copper by S. A. Chakraborty, which I’m a third of the way through. It’s the sequel to The City of Brass, and I’m absolutely loving it! It is taking so much of what worked in book one and making them even better, especially concerning the characters. My favorite character isn’t doing all that great, which is painful but I kinda love him even more for it (yeah, that’s me). There were also a few surprising minor plot twists in the beginning which worked really well to grab my attention. It totally went against what I thought this book was going to be.
What do you think you’ll read next?
Well, guess I’m putting The Kingdoms by Natasha Pulley in this section again. I’ll probably also be starting Winter’s Orbit by Everina Maxwell, and yes, that is me reading sci-fi. Both books include queer character so they’re perfect for Pride month.
First Line Reader 
Ahhh, that’s so frustrating about Rule of Wolves. I’ve been putting off reading it cause I struggle with sequels, but now I feel a little vindicated haha…I’m reading Winter’s Orbit now…hope you like it! 🪐
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Well, I didn’t have high expectations for Rule of Wolves because I didn’t love King of Scars. I just needed to get it over with so I definitely don’t blame you for putting it off. Still, hoping your experience with it will be better than mine.
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Your thoughts on Rule of Wolves seem to be confirming all my worst fears 😅 Now I feel even less like reading it, but I do want to know what happens to all my beloved characters, so I kind of have to! And besides, I already hated the ending to King of Scars so much that I have extremely low expectations – which probably means it won’t take that much to surpass them, which is probably good, right? 😂
On the bright side, though, I’m thrilled you’re enjoying The Kingdom of Copper! That one is definitely my favorite in the series 🥰
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I also had very low expectations for Rule of Wolves, but yeah, here we are 😅 I actually suspect you’re going to hate the ending to King of Scars even more after Rule of Wolves (because I did!), but I also know you love some of the characters more than I do, so maybe that will redeem it for you in a way it didn’t for me. But I would also love a rant from you about this 😄
I do have a soft spot for second books in trilogies and The Kingdom of Copper is just doing everything right so far. I can’t believe how perfect it is and hearing it’s your favorite makes me confident it’s going to continue.
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Okay, that has made me even more apprehensive 😅 But now I’m actually kind of excited to read it again because I’m dying to know how the ending could possibly be worse than the one to King of Scars! I suppose I’ll have to get to it soon after all 😂
And it’s funny what you said about second books – I think for me, it really depends. In really well-written trilogies that I end up loving, the second book also tends to be my favorite. But then there’s also the typical second book slump, where you end up getting no plot at all except a bunch of preparation for the finale 🙄
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Enjoy your reading!
I´m currently reading the third Wheel of Time book and Untamed Shore!
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Glad to hear you’re continuing with Wheel of Time. Looking forward to your thoughts on it! 😊
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I love the cover of ‘The Kingdoms’ – it really draws you in. My WWW post is here: https://wordywitterings.com/2021/06/09/www-wednesday-wednesday-9th-june-2021/comment-page-1/#comment-616
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