Book Review: Ruin and Rising by Leigh Bardugo

Ruin and Rising by Leigh Bardugo

Book title: Ruin and Rising
Author: Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Young Adult fantasy
Published: June 17, 2014
350 pages
My rating: 3/5

“He’d seemed confident, strong, as if he belonged in that palace and on that throne. I know things about power that you can barely guess at. I gave myself a shake. I might not be a threat, but I could become one. I wouldn’t let him beat me before I’d had a chance to give him the fight he deserved.”

The Sun Summoner Alina Starkov and the remnants of the once-great Grisha army are forced into hiding as the Darkling has claimed the throne of Ravka. She must find the elusive firebird if she wants to have a chance to defeat him. But as she learns more about her power, she has to choose whether claiming it will truly be worth it.

Yeah, no. Just no.

November Wrap-Up and December Goals

November reads

November Wrap-Up

• Finished: 4
• Started but not finished: 2
• Total pages read: 1,791
• Average rating: 4

I didn’t read a lot of books in November as I was focusing on writing a modern retelling of Pride and Prejudice, but the books I did read were pretty good. I finished three fiction novels and one non-fiction book. Two of them were the first two books of Shadow and Bone trilogy by Leigh Bardugo, Shadow and Bone (4.5/5 stars) and Siege and Storm (also 4.5/5 stars). Click the links to read longer reviews and to find out what I thought about them.

The non-fiction book I read was in Finnish. Sinut on nähty by Anu Silfverberg is an autobiographical essay on gender and gaze.

Book Review: Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo

Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo

Book title: Siege and Storm (*Amazon affiliate link)
Author: Leigh Bardugo
Genre: Young Adult fantasy
Published: June 4, 2013
386 pages
My rating: 4.5/5

“My life would be allegiance instead of love, fealty instead of friendship. I would weigh each decision, consider every action, trust no one. It would be life observed from a distance.”

The Sun Summoner Alina Starkov is on the run from the Darkling. But she and her best friend Mal can’t outrun her destiny for long. With the help of a notorious privateer, she returns to Ravka, determined to lead the Grisha army to a fight against Ravka’s enemies.

This was a weird read because on the one hand, this was better than Shadow and Bone, and at the same time it… wasn’t? Let me try to explain.

I Finished My Modern Retelling of Pride and Prejudice (November Writing Challenge)

And we're done! I'm done with my modern retelling of Pride and Prejudice and the November writing Challenge. I lost a little bit of steam as we got closer to the end of the month, so the final word count is a little under 56K words (55,702 to be exact).

The whole manuscript needs a lot of attention and changes in the future, but right now I'm taking a little break from writing to read two writing guides. And then it's back to Project Prehistory in early January!

If you want to see how my last week of November Writing Challenge went, you can check you the vlog below: