The romance really didn't work for me in this book, which is too bad because it's the only thing that's happening for a lot of the book. It wasn't so much the insta-love itself, but the way it flattened the relationship between the two leads, Talon and Darling. It's supposedly an enemies-to-lovers situation, but the transition was too fast and too complete to be interesting to me. There was little complexity to their feelings and relationship and the fact that they were former (and maybe even still) enemies didn't do much to inform them. Talon went from thinking about how he kind of wanted to kiss this girl who was trying to kill him to trusting her to protect his beloved brother in about 0.2 seconds flat. I didn't mind the first part, but the latter had me wondering how he survived this long as the War Prince doing things like this. I could see hints of how they might warm to each other and find some common ground, so it was especially disappointing how the story basically skipped over any development to their relationship.
In addition to Talon's and Darling's romance, the pacing felt off in other aspects of the story as well. The plot was plodding and only picked up in the last couple chapters. I was left surprised that the book was ending because it felt like the plot had barely started moving. At the same time, however, the visits our main characters make to the other Houses felt rushed. The world and magic of Chaos and Flame intrigued me and I was excited that the tour of Houses plot would provide a chance to show off different cultures and myths within it and see what interesting characters populate this world. If the plot had been slow, but an exploration of the world was interesting enough I would have been satisfied; too bad it also felt shallow.
The first chapter, showing Caspian's boon was great and there were aspects of the worldbuilding and the characters that were done well enough, but overall I wasn't very impressed or entertained by it.
In addition to Talon's and Darling's romance, the pacing felt off in other aspects of the story as well. The plot was plodding and only picked up in the last couple chapters. I was left surprised that the book was ending because it felt like the plot had barely started moving. At the same time, however, the visits our main characters make to the other Houses felt rushed. The world and magic of Chaos and Flame intrigued me and I was excited that the tour of Houses plot would provide a chance to show off different cultures and myths within it and see what interesting characters populate this world. If the plot had been slow, but an exploration of the world was interesting enough I would have been satisfied; too bad it also felt shallow.
The first chapter, showing Caspian's boon was great and there were aspects of the worldbuilding and the characters that were done well enough, but overall I wasn't very impressed or entertained by it.