Holy Sister (Spoiler Free) | REVIEW + sometimes reviewing is hard
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- Опубликовано: 27 июл 2024
- In which I discuss my spoiler-free thoughts on Holy Sister by Mark Lawrence..
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I hate it when this happens! Honestly, this sort of thing happens when I am either a) not in the mood for the book and feel like I need to read it anyway or b) am about to spiral down into depression 😂. Fingers crossed you love it when you reread!
the first time i read holy sister i felt the same way. in my head, i knew i liked it bc i liked the rest of the series. but i didn't really feel it, or remembered it at all. but i reread it this week and now i remember everything and i love it
Yeah I just finished Holy Sister and felt the same way. I was really disoriented going into the book about where it picked up after the events of the second book and the jump between timelines really didn't work for me. Also in the audiobook sometimes I missed what some of their motivations were doing some of the things, so your disorientation with the series finale isn't just you!
sometimes with a series i love that i'm so anticipating the end i overthink myself out of love with it. like i hold it at arms length so i don't get hurt basically. and then i'm upset at myself for not allowing myself to love it, if that makes sense.
I have had this happen before and I can see where you're coming from with your statements.
I really like this book a high 4 star (highest rating in the trilogy as well), but I also don't remember everything.
I think I would feel the same if I'd have taken more time to read the book (and the series in a total). I binged the trilogy in a month as it wasn't even on my TBR before Holy Sister came out. I also felt a bit detached in book 3, but it didn't detract me from the story. I felt like an onlooker instead of being in the midst of the action part of the book, but to a certain extent, I like that. I like that kind of a more neutral angle sometimes. It makes my head feel more collected and like I see more of what's happening without it feeling chaotic. A bit like a bird's eye perspective.
I get your points, can see where you're coming from, but I didn't mind it as much since I still saw the characters and I liked the way they interacted and the way the concequences played out. The time jumps were something I needed to get into as well. Sometimes it wasn't directly cleat to me the time had jumped (I also read the audiobooks of the series).
This usually happens to me when I'm burned out or too stressed and trying to force myself to read because I feel like I should, and not because I really want to read.
agree with you on some things, but i still loved it.
and about the time jumps, in red sister we got a time jump exactly like that: nona and ara became best friends off screen. and in grey sister when nona had keot we miss her adaptation period. so not saying its not bad, just saying it isnt new
sofia and her books you’re right! Those didn’t feel as much like something was missing though. Idk..
The feeling you have is totally relatable and feeling disconnected from a read is super frustrating and then trying to do a review feels impossible and on top of that sucks even more when it is one of your favorite series. I totally felt this for the last two Falling Kingdoms books, although I know a lot of people also felt the same about those
I was more invested than ever in the characters and the plot in this instalment, it’s interesting how different people can experience the same book. I do agree with the dual timeline not being my favourite though but I personally gave it 5 stars, such a shame it didn’t work for you.
I felt the EXACT same way. I was so excited when this finally came out. I started reading it and just couldn't get into it properly. So I put it down, read other stuff, and finally finished it today. Nearly a year after I first started reading it. And like you, I think it was the time jumping. Which doesn't usually bother me. I suspect it was because I was actually really invested in both timelines that it was disorienting to be thrown from one to the other and back. If I ever re-read this series, I might try it chronologically (all the "Escape" chapters first and then the "Holy Class" chapters) and see if that helps any.
There will be another series in this universe. I called Mark Lawrence out on Twitter about still needing answers (not being a brat) and he replied something along "no worries, there is!" And a link to the goodreads page for one of his future books
Yey I'm not alone
I feel your pain. I had this exact same experience with Winter of the Witch by Katherine Arden. Loved her first two books, and I definitely enjoyed the third one, but it was executed in a way that wasn't as perfect as the first two books, which left me feeling kind of deflated.
I had this with other books and I can never tell if it's me or the book (probably a combo). That said I was getting a feeling toward the end of Grey Sister that I was starting to get that not caring feeling. I could see how much there was to cover time wise and that it wasn't going to be done and then there was so much I wanted to know more about, and for the characters to know more about (the moon, the hearts, the history, the science) and I knew there was no way to get to it all in one book. I feel like maybe this confirms a lot of that which is a shame.
This has happened to me before and it's fairly frequent (a few time a year). The most memorable book atm is the abhorsen series. Great books, nothing I could pinpoint as being wrong but they did not impact me.
I felt the exact same, thought it was just me feeling so disconnected from it compared to the rest of the series.
I haven't read (audiobook) this yet because I wanted to read The Bound first. I did reread the first two and the second time around the second book I felt what you did, a disconnect to the characters. But that could be because I knew what was going on. I'm disappointed that we won't get more of the world and what those hints of history but maybe it will be good going in knowing that. High fantasy audiobooks might not be for me after this series.
This is how I felt reading the final book in the Dorothy must die series, i loved the first three with every fiber of my being but the last one was slow, boring and took me months just to finish it, it suck when our favorite sagas disappoint us
I felt like there were too many mysteries left unanswered. Who were The Missing? Who were the original tribes? How did they arrive? What exactly were the shiphearts. An author like Sanderson would've answered every single thread thrown out in a satisfactory manner by the end. This book failed to do that... And the grudge of the Tacsis lord towrds Nona felt a bit overblown, perhaps because his motivations weren't ever too clear.
That being said, the last part of the book was gutwrenching and at least I really felt it even when the characters dying were the ones I didn't like... So that's a bonus point, I suppose.
It's not you. I felt the same way. I am still a massive fan of the trilogy, but this one just didn't hit me like the first two. I LOVED being back with the characters tho.
WELL. this is interesting because this has been pretty much my entire experience reading the series. I think I’m probably gonna wait to pick this one up next year for booktube sff
I felt exactly the same, and I'm not sure why either. 😅 Maybe it really was the lack of character development with Nona or that I didn't care enough about most of the side characters. Also, I think that the whole thing with the author summarizing the past two books in the beginning is not for me. I'm too forgetful, I need my hand held when going back into a world and into a plot in order to care about it.
Im 40 seconds in and already agreeing with you
I had a similar experience with this series. I really enjoyed the first two books, but Holy Sister left me feeling cold. Lawrence's choice of dual timeline I think was supposed to add a sense of mystery and intrigue, but ended up making the entire thing feel fragmentary and unsatisfactory. I think the upscaling of the scope of the story was another thing that led to that sense of detachment. Most of the books previous actions scenes have been relatively small scale and I felt drew me in more than the more epic big battle scenes in Holy Sister.
It's not you! I felt this so much. It was so much less.... powerful than the first two. And I really feel like there was a switch of tone. This was hugely moralistic - and while that didn't come totally out of left field (Nona prizes loyalty and friendship above all) but the ending so circles on moral issues and that was not the trajectory I felt the first two books were headed.
I had feelings like this for Dreams of Gods and Monsters. The whole thing about it being the future not the past didn't go well with me. Like we were building up to something and then.... it just didn't deliver.
That might be it - there were promises made that didn't feel like they were delivered upon. And for me, that was how we switched from angst and anger and passion to moralism.
You're not alone. I devoured Red Sister and enjoyed Grey Sister almost as much, but Holy Sister felt rushed. There's room enough to fit an entire book (or two) between this book's two timelines.
A lot of the supporting characters (Jula, Ruli, Ghena, et cetera) were underdeveloped. Nona's devotion to her friends, is central to her character, but most of her friends are barely defined beyond how each is most helpful to Nona. I want to see them struggle through Nona's eyes. I want to see Nona's attempts (and occasional failures) to help them. I wanted Nona to earn their trust in her.
Even more developed characters like Zole and Clera feel shorted. They are each in need of that one heart-shattering scene. e.g. I might have liked a flashback in book two, to Clera's goodbye from the convent (after Nona persuaded Glass not to have Clera drowned).
Cutting back and forth between two timelines definitely worked against us here. The events of the threes-years-ago timeline take place over a much shorter period of time, but are drawn out across most of the book. Only three scenes in the three-years-ago timeline that advance the plot, and they are divvied out across several chapters. The opposite is true of the the present timeline: Major events have no room to breath. The occasional surprises are robbed of their impact by rushed, muddled pacing.
I actually felt this way about Red Sister. I didn't think it was a bad book at all and I would recommend it to other fantasy readers, but I didn't connect with it as much as others have. I think my problem was I had read Nevernight right before and they're very similar.
This was very much how I felt about the entire Prince of Thorns trilogy
😬💜
I felt almost completely detached from the entire series which really disappointed me because I loved Mark Lawrence’s other series’. I went from almost crying at the end of Emperor of Thorns to not giving the slightest damn about the characters in this series.
I found the storyline a little convoluted. The way the story flashes back and forth got time frames confused.
I was shocked & offended when I saw this was the final book because I mean four classes/stages in becoming a Sister = four books. Obviously. I’ve been too chicken to read this since it came out (I probably will now since you set my heart at ease that it isn’t BAD) and part of that is just that I feel it’ll be rushed. This series could’ve easily had a book in between grey and holy. Like, where?!?! is my copy of Mystic Sister? It should have been four books and I’m so annoyed that it wasn’t.
TheMutualEnemy AGREED COMPLETELY I WAS SHOCKED
This book was too oooh, she can do anything. I went from believing in the whole world to not really believing or caring. Gutted.
I've been putting off reading this one because I'm not sure what I'll think of the time switch storytelling device! I really enjoyed the first two books and want the trilogy to end on a strong note.