Red Queen

The poverty stricken Reds are commoners, living under the rule of the Silvers, elite warriors with god-like powers. To Mare Barrow, a 17-year-old Red girl from The Stilts, it looks like nothing will ever change.

Mare finds herself working in the Silver Palace, at the centre of those she hates the most. She quickly discovers that, despite her red blood, she possesses a deadly power of her own. One that threatens to destroy Silver control.

But power is a dangerous game. And in this world divided by blood, who will win?

-https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/17878931-red-queen

I’ve been seeing many people read this book and say that it was amazing. I decided to give it a shot and besides, the cover looks pretty.

This book was sort of a let down. It wasn’t a bad book, but with all the hype it received, I was hoping for a little bit more.

Lets start with the plot, because it was the main part that I liked about this book. It did have pacing issues, yes. One moment is calm, next is crazy and the moments of calm is extended to the point that I wanted to give up reading it. However, I did pull through and by the end, you are thoroughly awarded of going through what I felt was 100+ pages of nothing.

Typically, I don’t mind these long periods of no action because the characters make up for it but in this case? I didn’t connect with the characters and that is what is most important to me. If I don’t feel with the character, I couldn’t care less for what happened. One of the main elements that I enjoy reading about isn’t in this book and that really ruined it for me.

If it weren’t for that, I would have loved the heck out of this book. The events happening would have had me screaming. I didn’t feel attached and therefore, I didn’t care.

I’m going to try to talk about the characters now. Mare is your typical YA female protagonist. Strong, complex and ‘the chosen one’. That I didn’t really mind as long as characters have well…character. It has been a while since I read this book (like 2 weeks) but I don’t remember her as particularly startling or anything.

Then there’s Cal and whatever his name is (it’s like Mave or something). When you can’t remember a characters name, you know they weren’t memorable. They are what I call the plainest character in my life. Sure, the things happen in the end and all but you aren’t really well associated with them so you don’t care.

And the love line is stupid. I don’t even care it is so undeveloped and useless I don’t know what else to say about it.

Overall, characters suck, plot doesn’t. This series has a lot of potential and I hope by the second book I’ll feel more for the characters.

2/5 stars