Teres

Really? I've been hearing people saying that it's a really good book. Now I'm starting to wonder if they were exaggerating. That, or the rest of fiction has gotten so bad that this one actually seems decent by comparison.

A lot of my friends think it's amazing too and I just don't have the heart to argue. Sadly it looks like they're responding to the surface level trappings: spunky heroine (read: an arrogant moron), sexy bad boy (read: violent psychopath with abs), dragons (savage monsters nobody in their right mind should want to ride), tattoos, dressing all in black and all the rest of that childish bullshit.

Plus it's presented as high fantasy yet this is how the characters talk:

He’s the most exquisite man I’ve ever seen. And living in the war college means I’ve seen a lot of men. Even the diagonal scar that bisects his left eyebrow and marks the top corner of his cheek only makes him hotter. Flaming hot. Scorching hot. Gets-you-into-trouble-and-you-like-it level of hot. Suddenly, I can’t remember exactly why Mira told me not to fuck around outside my year group.

This is the level of laziness we're dealing with here.

Oh, wow, I didn't know that! That's a pretty neat little fact, I have to admit. I never would have guessed it was anywhere near that old.

Me neither! Sometimes I get sidetracked and start researching random stuff. Being neurodiverse is a trip and a half sometimes.

Belial deserves better. He actually seems like a decent character that pulled the short straw and ended up in a really bad position in an even worse series.

Easily the nicest character in the trilogy. The only thing I can criticise him for other than not doing something about Axis' horrible behaviour beyond periodically criticising him and then withdrawing the criticism after Axis blows up at him and throws it back in his face is that he shacks up with and ultimately marries a teenage girl. And then apparently only because she looks like the adult woman who turned him down, poor kid.