Love This!!!

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kaylee Avatar

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“Only the most powerful and honorable semidioses get chosen. I’m just a Jade. I’m not a real hero.”

If you haven't read this yet, go read it. I believe I am one of the few that has read this before reading The Cemetery Boys so I came into this completely blind. And boy did it pay off! I loved this book. It is basically The Hunger Games meets Percy Jackson but with Mexican mythology which makes it all the better!

I love the mythology and all of the characters. The worldbuilding was just so vivid and beautiful, and I loved learning about each city and what the trials would be. Before reading this, I was not super familiar with this mythology, but as a lover of all mythologies I really enjoyed seeing this coming to life and learning about all the different myths. It truly felt like I was there. Not only is there a great plot, but this book is filled with humor and lighthearted fun. The characters are all great and it's the perfect story about coming into yourself surrounded by those you love. Also the diversity? Wow! This book is filled with diverse characters without pointing it out. In my experience, a lot of books kinda make a point of explaining how a character is different but in The Sunbearer Trials it is just a fact of life and is treated as such in subtle ways and I really appreciated that.

Two of the main characters are trans, with several of the side characters part of the LGBTQ+ community and we get to watch a kind of mentorship between the two in their journeys which was really amazing to read. Teo really takes Xio under his wing (pun intended) and their big bro/little bro relationship is so cute! All of the characters grow so much and in such a natural way.

Niya was definitely my favorite character. She was so open and unapologetic about herself plus she was a hilarious character. Also any scenes with the birds is bound to make you laugh. They are just so cute!

But that ENDING! I will warn you, this ends on a cliffhanger I did NOT see coming. Like WHAT?!!! The BETRAYAL!!! I need the second book as soon as possible!!!!! Anyway thank you for coming to my rant and if you haven't added this to your TBR, you should do so right away.