Dima El-Boghdady

Not buying Skyshade. The title of the book refers to something insignificant—a drink that helps kill pain while also killing you in the process. The characters don’t even talk about it much or drink it. I didn’t have any interest in continuing to read this book. I skimmed through the last couple of chapters because finishing this book felt more like a burden. Honestly, I felt like I was losing my interest in books, but then I read two dark romance books with spice (which I rarely do and don’t even read often) in just two days without getting bored out of my mind. This book should have been written in first person. It makes poor use of its third-person POV. Unless the world-building, story, characters, and mystery are so well-done that it doesn’t matter—a good example being Caraval—then stick to first person. I rated Caraval and the whole trilogy an 8/10. Writing in third person just makes it feel like you’re writing a children’s story most of the time, not one directed at teenagers.

I’m disappointed—really disappointed. I won’t say I hated this book like most people did, but I expected something more. I will admit the last quarter of the book was great, and there were good and funny moments, especially the plot twist of finding out that Isla’s dad was actually a Nightshade—that was awesome. However, the plot twist with Celeste, while good, wasn’t great. It was too predictable. The part where we find out she was actually the lover of Oro’s brother was shocking, but the rest was just lackluster. There are some good ideas here, but overall, the book felt lame. This was far from the exciting climax I had hoped for. I was really looking forward to a full-blown fight between Isla and the other rulers. I’ll still read Nightbane and buy Skyshade just for the sake of it, though. Also, there were multiple grammatical errors in this book.)