16 Nov 2022

REVIEW: CRIER'S WAR DUOLOGY by Nina Varela

CRIER'S WAR

Author: Nina Varela

Series: Crier's War #1
Source: Audio from Audible; eBook from Kindle
Publisher: HarperTeen
Publication Date: October 1, 2019
Overall Rating:
Diversity Rating:

Summary:

Impossible love between two girls —one human, one Made.

A love that could birth a revolution.

After the War of Kinds ravaged the kingdom of Rabu, the Automae, Designed to be the playthings of royals, took over the estates of their owners and bent the human race to their will.

Now, Ayla, a human servant rising the ranks at the House of the Sovereign, dreams of avenging the death of her family… by killing the Sovereign’s daughter, Lady Crier. Crier, who was Made to be beautiful, to be flawless. And to take over the work of her father.

Crier had been preparing to do just that—to inherit her father’s rule over the land. But that was before she was betrothed to Scyre Kinok, who seems to have a thousand secrets. That was before she discovered her father isn’t as benevolent as she thought. That was before she met Ayla.

Set in a richly-imagined fantasy world, Nina Varela’s debut novel is a sweepingly romantic tale of love, loss and revenge, that challenges what it really means to be human.

Purchase:

Amazon | Chapters | TBD

Content Warning: death, family death, gore, drug use

Crier's War

The romance in this was great and I loved so much of Crier and Ayla's love story. But literally everything else was meh. I got 20% into this before understanding anything that was going on. And this is classified as Fantasy, but I would say it's probably a bit more SciFi/Fantasy than anything else.

I also didn't know this was a series, so the cliffhanger at the end of this book was startling to me. But I bought the ebook right away and it was all good. I will say that having read both, this is what a duology is supposed to be!

If you liked Fullmetal Alchemist, you'll like this. But don't expect a whole lot of romance in this one (a lot of slow burn) or a whole lot of interesting plot - it's all filler and set up for the next book.

Iron Heart

This was... alright. I am glad this was an actual duology and conclusion to the series but there was just wayyyy too many plot points that neatly tied up for me. And every time there was a piece of conflict, or a story/piece of information that someone just <b>had</b> to share, it was always put off to extend the story or the reader's lack of knowledge of the situation.

The ending made like zero sense of how easy it was to get everything sorted and squared away. The entire last 25% was just a neat little bow of what could have been some good tension. I am glad that it didn't get dragged into a third book, but so much of it could have been explained while still moving the plot forward.

This was a pretty ... average fantasy novel and series.