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A review by luciej
Les Enchantements d'Ambremer by Pierre Pevel
Did not finish book. Stopped at 22%.
DNF @ 22%
I rarely do not finish books, especially fiction. And this SHOULD have been right up my alley -- a steam-punk novel set in Paris where the faery world seeps through and mixes with normal life. I mean, the Eiffel tower is from a white wood and at night it shines and sings. You can take a train to the faery world where they have a wonderful magical library. It really should've been my thing. So why did I dnf after only 82 pages?
The long-ass descriptions of things completely unrelated to the story were boring me to death and making me completely lost at what's going on. The storyline was super slow and constantly skipped in between people and events. After 82 pages, I still don't know what the main story is. I'm sure the scattered events will all link together at some point but the way it started was just making me confused and loose my interest with every paragraph.
I could also barely stand the characters. Louis Griffont, whom I assume to be the main character, was just so damn perfect. Always knowing what to do, what to say. In a fight, we suddenly learn he has a great knowledge of French boxing and fencing. He's described as "asking something innocently" when wanting something from his talking cat to highlight how smart he is to know how to manipulate the cat into doing what he wants. It's a pet peeve of mine, but I hate when people "ask something innocently" or "utter something innocently" as a tool to show how much smarter they are. Louis also belongs to the group of Azure mages who are only helping people in need and otherwise not interfering and as such being so much better than the Pink mages who take on political positions and incorporate with people, which is somehow described as that they have a need to interfere and be in control. All this perfection seeps in other protagonists as well. The good ones are really smart and overall perfect and the bad ones are... not. As such, the characters lack dimension and I was more and more aggravated by them.
The fact that I have the book in Czech translation probably didn't help either. I don't know what's up but this is the third Czech translation of a fantasy book in a row that I read and had such a hard time with. A Shiver of Snow and Sky was the worst one of them for sure. I felt like the translator used language that they thought young girls are using, with unnecessary amount of diminutives and weird unnatural phrases. Jane Doe and the Cradle of the Worlds was a bit better but still stiff as heck. And now this book. I bought them all on sale, maybe that should've been a warning sign...
I rarely do not finish books, especially fiction. And this SHOULD have been right up my alley -- a steam-punk novel set in Paris where the faery world seeps through and mixes with normal life. I mean, the Eiffel tower is from a white wood and at night it shines and sings. You can take a train to the faery world where they have a wonderful magical library. It really should've been my thing. So why did I dnf after only 82 pages?
The long-ass descriptions of things completely unrelated to the story were boring me to death and making me completely lost at what's going on. The storyline was super slow and constantly skipped in between people and events. After 82 pages, I still don't know what the main story is. I'm sure the scattered events will all link together at some point but the way it started was just making me confused and loose my interest with every paragraph.
I could also barely stand the characters. Louis Griffont, whom I assume to be the main character, was just so damn perfect. Always knowing what to do, what to say. In a fight, we suddenly learn he has a great knowledge of French boxing and fencing. He's described as "asking something innocently" when wanting something from his talking cat to highlight how smart he is to know how to manipulate the cat into doing what he wants. It's a pet peeve of mine, but I hate when people "ask something innocently" or "utter something innocently" as a tool to show how much smarter they are. Louis also belongs to the group of Azure mages who are only helping people in need and otherwise not interfering and as such being so much better than the Pink mages who take on political positions and incorporate with people, which is somehow described as that they have a need to interfere and be in control. All this perfection seeps in other protagonists as well. The good ones are really smart and overall perfect and the bad ones are... not. As such, the characters lack dimension and I was more and more aggravated by them.
The fact that I have the book in Czech translation probably didn't help either. I don't know what's up but this is the third Czech translation of a fantasy book in a row that I read and had such a hard time with. A Shiver of Snow and Sky was the worst one of them for sure. I felt like the translator used language that they thought young girls are using, with unnecessary amount of diminutives and weird unnatural phrases. Jane Doe and the Cradle of the Worlds was a bit better but still stiff as heck. And now this book. I bought them all on sale, maybe that should've been a warning sign...