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Wicked Lovely (by Melissa Marr)series book 2 and 3 reviews
Ink Exchange
Half a year ago I found Fragile Eternity, the book 3 of Melissa Marr's Wicked Lovely series in public library, the book isn't quite impressive, but I still sent a book-request to the library so they might consider buying the rest of the Wicked Lovely series. Yup, asking the library to buy books is my method of getting books that I don't particularly want to buy, and it's quite effective. Just recently they did complete buying the first four books of the series, so I borrowed them to read them one by one.
Even since Fragile Eternity I realized that I don't care about Aislinn so I decided to read the second book, Ink Exchange first to avoid reading about her or Seth in Wicked Lovely.
The main character Leslie came from a broken family and her utter bastard for a brother had done horrible, horrible things to her. Being unhappy with her life Leslie longed to change herself and find strength to face difficulties. She did it by choosing herself a tattoo, something she thought could bring her changes. Changes did come but not as Leslie wished it. The tattoo she chose as her own actually linked her to the fairy King of the Dark Court, Irial. The Dark King gained power by feeding humans' emotions through his Ink Exchange bond (namely the tattoo) with Leslie, at first Irial only wanted to use Leslie as a tool but latter the bond between him and the human girl started to affect him . Meanwhile, Irial's friend, the Summer Court fairy Niall also got deeply involved with Leslie, who knew nothing about his or Irial's fairy origin. Love triangle ensured.
As in Fragile Eternity, the author came up with a handful of richly creative ideas about fairies in the modern world, the description of the Dark Court being similar with gangs and criminal organizations is a good touch. Leslie's struggle with her nightmarish past, Irial's own dilemma of fulfilling his duty as King or following his own wishes both looks quite realistic and believable.
What falls flat is Niall and Leslie's supposed romance.
Even though I can understand why Leslie would fall for a man like Niall, still I found Niall's affection for the girl poorly explained and kind of 'coming-out-of-nowhere'. The only thing that came close to an explanation is: Since Irial's ink exchange with Leslie was completed, the humans' emotions funneled trough her to Irial also made her highly attractive to the fairies in the Dark Court, and Niall was actually one of the Dark fairies (though he chose to serve the Summer Court).
Beside that one, there's only one good scene with Niall spending time with Leslie in a museum serves to be a good development for their love, still Niall's strong affection toward Leslie looks rather...forced.
The lukewarm romance aside, the book isn't quite a bad one, Ink Exchange is okay for time killing and easy reading. Plus it does not have the typical happy ever after ending, for that I'm thankful. Though I really dislike Irial's 'Sometime loving someone means setting her free' statement in the very end, it is just overly done. Miss Marr, I hope you know that your readers aren't that much of an idiot not to get the point when it's almost thrown in our faces!
Fragile Eternity
After reading Holly Black's Modern Fairies Tale series I decided to have another try on fairy tales. And I read about the Wicked Lovely series on amazon.com and it's supposed to be a good one, so I borrowed by then the only book from the series which is available in public library: Book 3 Fragile Eternity. The story focused on the love triangle between the heroine Aislinn, a human girl who had recently been transformed into a fairy and crowned Summer Queen, her human boyfriend Seth and Keenan, the Summer King who is now Ash's partner for eternity. Ash loves Seth dearly but the gap between them only seems to grow after Ash is no longer human, so Seth is desperate to find a way to become a fairy in order to be with her forever. Meanwhile Ash is struggling with her duty as the Summer Queen and her growing affection toward Keenan, and Keenan is mooning over his ex-lover Donia, the Winter Queen.
Well, the idea of the story is an interesting, imaginative one. The mention of the evil Dark Court and its new King is also exciting, and I do enjoy reading about the mysterious High Court and its Queen, Sorcha.
But the main problem of Fragile Eternity is that nothing much happens! Seth is angst over the fact that he is not a fairy and eventually turns himself into one, Ash whines about the situation she had found herself in, Keenan turns out to be an ass, Donia hardens her heart for her court's sake, and the War Fairy plots on and on to provoke war and chaos between the fairy courts. And nothing else happens!!!! No complex, plot twist and excitement. And Seth, why did he love Ash so much to a point that he's willing to change species for her, after
being with her in just a few months time? What did he see in that girl anyway? We haven't been given a hint!
To sum up, it's a book with too much build-ups but not enough action and plots going anywhere. We also are told that some of the secondary characters are supposed to be 'such and such' but we never get to see those characters acting up to their reputation. The biggest example is Bananach, the War Fairy. She's supposedly a terrible, insane version of War personified, but through out the whole book I can hardly recall reading about her seriously doing anything cruel or terrifying. What a turn off.
Ink Exchange
Half a year ago I found Fragile Eternity, the book 3 of Melissa Marr's Wicked Lovely series in public library, the book isn't quite impressive, but I still sent a book-request to the library so they might consider buying the rest of the Wicked Lovely series. Yup, asking the library to buy books is my method of getting books that I don't particularly want to buy, and it's quite effective. Just recently they did complete buying the first four books of the series, so I borrowed them to read them one by one.
Even since Fragile Eternity I realized that I don't care about Aislinn so I decided to read the second book, Ink Exchange first to avoid reading about her or Seth in Wicked Lovely.
The main character Leslie came from a broken family and her utter bastard for a brother had done horrible, horrible things to her. Being unhappy with her life Leslie longed to change herself and find strength to face difficulties. She did it by choosing herself a tattoo, something she thought could bring her changes. Changes did come but not as Leslie wished it. The tattoo she chose as her own actually linked her to the fairy King of the Dark Court, Irial. The Dark King gained power by feeding humans' emotions through his Ink Exchange bond (namely the tattoo) with Leslie, at first Irial only wanted to use Leslie as a tool but latter the bond between him and the human girl started to affect him . Meanwhile, Irial's friend, the Summer Court fairy Niall also got deeply involved with Leslie, who knew nothing about his or Irial's fairy origin. Love triangle ensured.
As in Fragile Eternity, the author came up with a handful of richly creative ideas about fairies in the modern world, the description of the Dark Court being similar with gangs and criminal organizations is a good touch. Leslie's struggle with her nightmarish past, Irial's own dilemma of fulfilling his duty as King or following his own wishes both looks quite realistic and believable.
What falls flat is Niall and Leslie's supposed romance.
Even though I can understand why Leslie would fall for a man like Niall, still I found Niall's affection for the girl poorly explained and kind of 'coming-out-of-nowhere'. The only thing that came close to an explanation is: Since Irial's ink exchange with Leslie was completed, the humans' emotions funneled trough her to Irial also made her highly attractive to the fairies in the Dark Court, and Niall was actually one of the Dark fairies (though he chose to serve the Summer Court).
Beside that one, there's only one good scene with Niall spending time with Leslie in a museum serves to be a good development for their love, still Niall's strong affection toward Leslie looks rather...forced.
The lukewarm romance aside, the book isn't quite a bad one, Ink Exchange is okay for time killing and easy reading. Plus it does not have the typical happy ever after ending, for that I'm thankful. Though I really dislike Irial's 'Sometime loving someone means setting her free' statement in the very end, it is just overly done. Miss Marr, I hope you know that your readers aren't that much of an idiot not to get the point when it's almost thrown in our faces!
Fragile Eternity
After reading Holly Black's Modern Fairies Tale series I decided to have another try on fairy tales. And I read about the Wicked Lovely series on amazon.com and it's supposed to be a good one, so I borrowed by then the only book from the series which is available in public library: Book 3 Fragile Eternity. The story focused on the love triangle between the heroine Aislinn, a human girl who had recently been transformed into a fairy and crowned Summer Queen, her human boyfriend Seth and Keenan, the Summer King who is now Ash's partner for eternity. Ash loves Seth dearly but the gap between them only seems to grow after Ash is no longer human, so Seth is desperate to find a way to become a fairy in order to be with her forever. Meanwhile Ash is struggling with her duty as the Summer Queen and her growing affection toward Keenan, and Keenan is mooning over his ex-lover Donia, the Winter Queen.
Well, the idea of the story is an interesting, imaginative one. The mention of the evil Dark Court and its new King is also exciting, and I do enjoy reading about the mysterious High Court and its Queen, Sorcha.
But the main problem of Fragile Eternity is that nothing much happens! Seth is angst over the fact that he is not a fairy and eventually turns himself into one, Ash whines about the situation she had found herself in, Keenan turns out to be an ass, Donia hardens her heart for her court's sake, and the War Fairy plots on and on to provoke war and chaos between the fairy courts. And nothing else happens!!!! No complex, plot twist and excitement. And Seth, why did he love Ash so much to a point that he's willing to change species for her, after
being with her in just a few months time? What did he see in that girl anyway? We haven't been given a hint!
To sum up, it's a book with too much build-ups but not enough action and plots going anywhere. We also are told that some of the secondary characters are supposed to be 'such and such' but we never get to see those characters acting up to their reputation. The biggest example is Bananach, the War Fairy. She's supposedly a terrible, insane version of War personified, but through out the whole book I can hardly recall reading about her seriously doing anything cruel or terrifying. What a turn off.
Comments4
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Whew, the two books seem to have nothing to do with each other... I guess this series is one of those "a series of stories set in the same universe, but not necessarily continuous"? Does this mean that not reading the first one makes no difference?