Review: Days of Blood and Starlight (Daughter of Smoke and Bone #2) by Laini Taylor

Posted February 19, 2013 by Lola in Fantasy, Review / 3 Comments

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Days of Blood and Starlight (Daughter of Smoke and Bone #2)
by Laini Taylor

Blurb:
Once upon a time, an angel and a devil fell in love and dared to imagine a new way of living – one without massacres and torn throats and bonfires of the fallen, without revenants or bastard armies or children ripped from their mothers’ arms to take their turn in the killing and dying.

Once, the lovers lay entwined in the moon’s secret temple and dreamed of a world that was a like a jewel-box without a jewel – a paradise waiting for them to find it and fill it with their happiness.

This was not that world.

My review:
This book was really enjoyable, but at the same time I was a bit disapointed because it wasn’t as good as the first book. This book starts off pretty soon after book 1 and as the title suggest it is about days of blood and starlight. Lots of it.

The story starts off really slow, It really took me some time to get into this book. And when I was reading I didn’t want to put it down, but the pace was still slow and it just wasn’t as good as the first book. In the first book we meet karou and learn more about the fantasy world. In this book we learn more about the war in this fantasy world and I didn’t like all of it. There are some horrible things that happen, some things that just don’t make sense and at other moments it was really good too. Most of the book I had this sense it was building onto something, just more days and more of the same until at the last 30-20% it got really good and I finally got to know what it was this whole book was building towards.

So most of the book was slow going, but I still enjoyed it. I love Laini Taylors writing style and I think that is one of the factors that kept me reading on even though the slow pace.

This book is again told from multiple point of views and you get to see both sides of the story and then some more. I think there were a bit too much different point of views and some did add a different views, but weren’t really nessecary for the story. i did like learning more about Akiva and his brother and sister, they didn’t had a big part in the first book, but they do in this book. I also liked getting to see a few of the new pov’s, but also wondered what happened to them, because at a certain moment it focusses only on 2 pov’s and I wondered what happened with some of the other characters.

I did like karou less than in the first book, she seemed to have lost some of her power and fire. Sometimes she came across as a bit weak at times, although later in the book she did regain some of her strenght. I did like Akiva and getting to know his brother and sister more, all are interesting characters and it was nice to see their side of the story. I did got annoyed at the character a few times, for not taking more action. Also there are still a few characters that I don’t udnerstand at all and I am still quessing to their motives. There did was too less romance in this book for my taste.

There is some more world building in this book, mainly because now a huge part of the story takes place in Eretz. Although I still am a bit confused at how many different species of chimearas there are and what they entail. I did liked getting to know more about the world, but I still would’ve preferred more. There are also some hints at things to come in the next book, so i guess some of my questions will be answered then.

To conclude: I was a bit disapointed by the fact that this book wasn’t as good as the first book, but it is still an enjoyable read. The beginning was a bit slow and it seemed like everything was building towards the events that happened in the last 20% of the book. We learn more about the world and the ending is surprising enough that I am wondering what will happen in the last book.

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3 responses to “Review: Days of Blood and Starlight (Daughter of Smoke and Bone #2) by Laini Taylor

    • Well I totally loved book 1, so maybe my expectations were a bit too high. I do have the feeling it is a middle book problem indeed, because from the end of this book I am quessing the third book will be better. You really should read book one, it is amazing!

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