The Iron Sword by Julie Kagawa
My rating: 2 of 5 stars
Thank you to the publisher, Inkyard Press, for providing me with an ARC of The Iron Sword in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
The Gist
Well, I think I need to admit to myself that I may have joined the Iron Fey and Evenfall series too late to fully appreciate it.
I feel too old and, perhaps, too impatient for this type of story. It is very YA and I have been spending a lot of time lately reading contemporary fiction and mysteries and thrillers, so doing the jump from murders and unhappy adults to faeries fighting monsters is a little extreme.
The Details
I also noticed a lot of repetition The Iron Sword right from the beginning, as in, the first 3% of the book. That’s not a good start.
Combine the glaring repetition with the many descriptions that told more than showed what was happening and I was beginning to lose interest quickly.
The decision to throw the reader right back into the “Between” to have another repeat plot that reminded me very much of the travelling troupe trope is questionable.
I saw other reviews that gushed over the fact that The Iron Sword is from Ash’s point of view, but for me it took a lot of the reading pleasure out of it.
Characters were kept at arm’s length. It just felt stiff and not very fun.
With Puck, the reader got at least some snarky, sarcastic comments that offset the heavily laden emotional revelations and descriptions. This time around, there was no foil. Nothing.
The writing is still good and very easy to follow. It’s clean and crisp, but can’t really make up for the shortcomings of the narrative.
The Verdict
This is a rather short review. I’m not sure what else I could elaborate on.
Overall, I think I have to make a few difficult decisions regarding my reading preferences, because they have changed over the last year.
I would suggest The Iron Sword to die hard fans of both series by Kagawa.
