Words can not even begin to describe the amount of relief I feel now that I am done with this book. I procrastinated on this for too long. Even when I was not to the end, the book still made me so anxious because it was so much. Now I can continue with my life and be free from this meaningless stress and get back to the real stuff that is supposed to be stressed, like other homework. This was great, but I hated it. That ending was great! Yes, I did cry. I hated that. I wish that you could just skip to the end and read from there because that is the only good part. YAY MAGIC AND FAMILY AND FRIENDS AND LOVE AND LIFE!!!!!!!!
Even this image does not show how I feel
I don’t know how to write this. Too much happened, yet not enough. It left on a cliffhanger because there is a second book (Which I am not reading ((at least for a while))). There is a theme of the family at the end with the magic in the blood and how they came to her to help her. This also shows the generations that were hurt by this. Again with the king too and how Amari killed him and was thinking of all the people he hurt. I loved that it was her too because it shows how much she has grown and changed from wanting to be like him and impress him.
They wish they could have a good family like this!
I just finished reading and my brain is dying because so much happened and yet nothing happened. It was all so fast. I’m getting whiplash or something. I’m so distraught right now. I can’t even. I am so glad that I am done. I don’t know what happened to Inan, but he got stabbed so I hope he bled out and died. I know that sounds bad, but it is deserved. He betrayed them and got her father killed and managed to kill the scroll that would have killed the magic all for his dad who then turned around and tried to kill him!! Can you see why I hated this book? Can you see how he is dumb? I hated him so much. I like the pickpocket so much better, even if he acts like a creep. Roen is his name, he is a crazy killer who kind of has a goodish reason for being crazy but is still a bit creepy.
I just found this on Google, so funny and exactly what I want to happen to Inan!!
This book was my life for the time I was reading it. It sucked. Everything sucks. Everyone wants you dead and will go out of their way to make it happen. War leads to nothing but death and retaliation. You can’t control and hurt people and expect that everything will be ok. They will fight back, one way or another, it is only a matter of time. They are coming to take back what is theirs. With their blood, they are connected. The blood magic is the strongest because it is what connects people and is their way to pass themselves on. The gods always have a plan, one way or another. Things are bad so they can get better. Which is dumb because that stuff didn’t actually have to happen, the gods are just mean and wanted the people to earn it. Whatever, the book is done and I can finally have peace. Except for the fact that I need to do the presentation, other than that I’m free!!! FINALLY FREE!!!!!!!
I hate this book. It made me cry. I really don’t want to talk about it. Everything is going downhill and they are all going to die. They keep changing their minds about what they will do and their ideas about the magic. There was love, then thoughts of betrayal, then no betrayal, then more thoughts of betrayal, then love and no betrayal, and then BETRAYAL!!!! This is so annoying!!! I HATE THIS!!!! WHY WOULD YOU EVEN DO THAT BECAUSE YOU KNOW YOUR DAD IS BAD AND THAT YOU LOVE THESE PEOPLE AND YET YOU ARE STILL HURTING THEM AND STAYING ON YOUR DAD’S SIDE!!!!!
Me reading this book
I just can’t even. I am SO GLAD that I will be done with this book soon. It is so bad. But I am stuck in this now and need to keep reading and thinking about this book for a little longer to do the presentation and essay. So one theme I see in the book is culture and how they die. The people who know the culture can get killed off or can be forced to stop their ways leading to a loss of people’s heritage. This all seems reminiscent of what happened, and what is happening, to the Native Americans and their traditions. This is all very sad. In the book they tried to have a celebration of their religion, but that ended in death and fire and kidnapping. All because of a misinterpretation and the actions of their ancestors. This sucks.
What their festival might have looked like (Based on West African festival) So fun!!
The writing style in the book is very cool with the changing of perspectives in almost every chapter. Sometimes they double up but no more than that. This brings a whole other insight on what is happening and when a group splits up, you can see what is going on between the two. It is also cool to see the thoughts of others because they have very different backgrounds, opinions, and teachings. They also sometimes do things that you would think are less rational if you did not see what they were thinking and or what they experienced. Like the betrayals, you can see that the character is lying because they say it in their thoughts, if you did not know that, then their actions would make no sense and you would not know this was happening until it happened. Which can sometimes ruin the surprise, but then you get to see all the steps that it took to get to them betraying the others, in this case, the guy thinks what he is doing is for the best because he wants everyone to be safe when in reality what he is doing will get them all killed. Boys are dumb.
What I feel like when they are not actually talking
I really don’t want to write much more on this section because, wow. This one got to me. I could have lived without reading this part. This stains my brain. It is awful. The image I got in my head, just terrible. Life sucks. These people in the book suck. Oh, and the one character that I started liking, yeah they’re dead now. Was a terribly gruesome and sad death too. I would honestly not be surprised if the book has a bad ending or even a terrible cliffhanger. This book sucks. But it will make a great presentation because of all the things it has and how much there is to talk about.
This book is hard to read. Every time it gets a little happy, they kill it all with STUPID UNESESAERY DRAMA!!! They don’t need to mention how much they hate their life whenever something finally goes good. Also, they just need to get along and not fight in this stupid world that constantly fights them. They don’t need to become like their enemy by always fighting with everyone. It hurts every time I read it, even when it is happy, because most of the time, they are not supposed to be doing what they are doing!! This book scares me to read because I get so invested in everything that is going on, but it all sucks. I hate reading it because it makes me sad, but I am forced to for this. The book lingers and infests my thoughts, even when I am nowhere near it, I always think of it. I can’t wait to be relieved of this stress in my life because oh my gods, I’m going to die.
Me at the most random times of the day remembering what happened in the book
They should also not fall in love. It is so forced THAT EVEN THE CHARACTERS THEMSELVES SAY THEY SHOULD NOT DO THIS!!! It feels so rushed. One moment they are trying to convince the rest of the group to trust the one that they only stopped trying to kill a day ago. To now kissing them in the woods alone where they are not supposed to be. Then the brother comes and warns her to not fall in love because the guy does not really love her. But then in the heat of the argument he called her a bad word and she flips out and hurts him then feels bad for it and cries. This part was so dumb and escalated way too fast. This should have happened later on when they really know each other more because right now he only knows everything about her and she only really knows him as a bad guy. SO MAYBE YOU WOULD THINK THAT SHE WOULD NOT WANT TO KISS HIM BUT YOU WOULD BE WRONG!!!! It is so dumb and forced into the book that I would have rather wished to see another character die than have this be the conflict in the group. They are so dumb. Just stop. Ew.
How I feel reading this part: AWKWARD
They meet this little girl who is the leader of a lot of other magic people and she is very sweet. She jumps around and gets all excited about stuff and she is just so cute! She is also supposed to join all of them to go to the temple which will be exciting to finally have a character that I like. She is such a breath of fresh air in this smog-filled book. She was the first of them to get magic which is why everyone followed her, but I think that is a kind of dumb way to go about things, especially since other older people also have magic. Magic as a whole is weird and all they really have left in their population is kids so I see why they would follow her. She is also a great leader of them. I love her. Now that I say that she is probably going to end up dying now. I really miss my old book that I was reading before this. It was all mushy and had no death in it and had some form of magic. I can’t wait for this one to be done so I can go back to that one (P.S. I mainly put this in to get my link in which is to the description of my other book, but all of what I said is true).
There was also this guy in the crowd of people who bumped into the girl and flirted with her. I was so caught off guard by this; that I was stunned. Then he tried to leave, but the other guy who she ended up kissing later came over and grabbed his wrist. I was preparing for some secondhand embarrassment for the upcoming words of “Hands off what isn’t yours!” or “Back off she’s mine!” or even “Don’t touch my girl!” All would have been awful, but instead, he just made him give back what he stole because the guy was a pit pocket! I was so surprised! He was saying all of that just to take her stuff, he is a phony! Then the dumb love boy was all like, “If I knew all it took to distract you was a charming smile, I would’ve tried that ages ago.” (Literally word for word out of the book what he said/ he was trying to kill her like a day ago and thought she was a monster and should die) And I was like, bro chill. Just stop trying to be cool. You are ew. She brushed that off and said that the real reason that he memorized her was because he was from a different land and she had never seen someone like him before. So like, there are more lands with people out there!!?? I mean I should have guessed that there were more, but this book was so secluded that if the book said that the whole world was just the one island, I would have believed it. But no, there is at least one more out there! This begs the question, is magic gone from there too? Do they have different magic? What kind of tyrants do they have there? Do they have completely different gods? I need to know more! They have to have magic, right? This has opened a whole other can of worms.
Here is the map of Orisha
What else is out there?
This book is a lot. One theme I see going on is about family and how you were raised can affect how you respond and react to certain things. This is shown through the siblings and how they do anything for each other, and how they all seem very violent except for Amari because of the way that her father forced her to fight. On the contrary, Zelie was always watching violence and was taught to protect herself and others which is why she is more violent and protective, because that is what she knows. Anyway, I want to be done with this book and be happy again. But I also want to see so much more out of this book.
This section has been such a roller coaster of emotions it’s not even funny. Too much happened in this section and it makes me sad. They were going to die, then everything was great, and now they are kidnapped!! And here I thought that it was going to be hard to get 6 days in these last two sections, but I see now they are really going to milk these last days and stretch them out for way too long. This is all crazy! I would have NEVER seen this coming at all! It’s hard to even remember what happened because so much went on it is hard to keep track.
Me when I read this book
This all just happened so fast. We changed perspectives so much, literally, some of the chapters were barely two pages long before we switched. In the moment of reading it was easy to keep up with, but looking back it’s hard for me to even comprehend what happened. They were going to die on a ship, That part alone was a lot. Then they won and had everything they needed to fix everything. They were all happy and were on their way to save the magic, BUT THEN they were ambushed by STUPID INAN! They started fighting and then these hooded figures came out of nowhere and kidnapped half of them and now they are all upset and scared. Now Inan is teaming up with them and is supposed to have this change of heart that HE IS STILL REFUSING TO DO!!!
My brain thinking about this book but specifically this section
Inan is so dumb. His character is too rushed and yet stretched out. He gets no time to fully have his character development and change of heart; it just happens. But on the same token, he had plenty of opportunities to change but EVERY TIME he would dismiss the THOUGHT of even changing. If he were to see how the bad things were happening and over that time start to have thoughts about changing, and not just shutting them done, then this change to help Zelie get back her brother and Amaria would be more accepted and would make more sense. But OH NO. All he needed was to FILLALY SEE that Zelie is a HUMAN with FEELINGS and that her MOM DIED because of his dad’s soldiers which is why she hates him! Like come on!? How could you not get this before!? You are an IDIOT!!! She is never going to EVER like you, EVER!!! He could have been so good as a character. It would have been great. But no, he is dumb and I hate him. He will never get redeemed or forgiven in my eyes.
Me to Inan
I love this book but hate it so much. You switch your objective too much. You go from needing to go home to needing to go to the temple to needing the sunstone to need to go to the other temple and now you need to save your friends before the 6 days are up. It is so much, but it is slightly needed because it keeps you hooked and entertained while reading. You never know what is going to happen next which makes you want to read more, but on the other hand, you get to a really sad part and then you don’t want to continue. This book is hard for me to read, which makes me mad, but also happy because it is good and bad. This is bonkers. I can’t wait for this book to be over. But I never want the story to end.
My gods this book might be too much for me! Everyone is dead and is trying to kill each other and it is all falling apart! The one character I was starting to like got brutally murdered and was a very important character in the story, but not anymore! It throws me threw so many loops! One moment they think about how they were little kids causing mayhem and then cut to how he hurt her and now she fears and hates him. It all just sucks. People suck. Boo kings, boo brothers, boo magic, boo enslavement, boo the guards, boo it all!
One thing that keeps coming up in the book is how most of the guards are depicted as drunk. They always smell like liquor, they wable like a drunk, and even have slurred speech. They have been to a lot of places now and all the guards have had some mention of beer. I don’t really know why the author decided this, maybe it is to say something about powerful, protecting people drowning themselves in alcohol to get through their struggles? How they are corrupted because of the way they are drunk, saying it without saying it? I’m not quite sure but it has something of significance because all the guards are drunk, everywhere, all the time.
All the guards partying it up
Another thing that keeps coming up is how magic feels like breathing for the first time. First Zelie was told by Mama Agba and now she has experienced it herself and agrees. Inan also keeps saying this when he uses his magic too. They compare it to being underwater for a long time and finally coming up for air, that breath saves your life which makes it feel all that much better. This makes it seem like the magic was always a part of them, one that they could not access until now. They said it once and I took note of it, but now they say it every other paragraph making it seem so repetitive, which must mean it is important.
Sounds scary when you think about it, always drowning
The imagery for this section was even better than the last one! Everything is so mystical and alluring, but then the people cut in with how sad their life is and ruin the whole moment for me, like come on this place is too pretty for you to be angsty and sad! The temple was cool with all the stone walls, and even better when they used their magic to light up the halls with images. I just wish there were fewer skulls all over the place.
The vibe the magic is giving off, amazing
Another thing that I found interesting was the gods and how they had lots of power. For example, Oya is the goddess of life and death. One would think that she would only be able to control either life or death but she gets both. They are also polar opposites of each other which makes it even more strange that she gets both and is not split with someone else. Ori is another god and he is the god of mind, spirit, and dreams. He controls so much! The dream and mind part I could see going hand and hand, but the spirit is too much. That power should be for Oya. It feels like the gods only get the power so the characters can use it to progress the story. The gods are too powerful with what they can do, they need to be restricted because their followers are now also too powerful (also the book managed to say its title in this section which I think is pretty cool).
I like the book and all the action and imagery, but it hits too hard! It has so much death and sadness to it, that I have to stop in between a few chapters to catch my thoughts and to try not to cry. I miss my happy books, this one is sooo deep and has so much death and torture, but the way it tells all the stories of the people with the magic makes it so cool! I both hate and love this book way too much. I don’t think I can say much else about this section without just complaining about the characters again or talking about death, which I don’t want to do. I can’t wait to dive back into the beauty of the magic world again, but I can wait to hear about the characters and how everyone is dying.
THIS BOOK!! It is so good, and yet so bad at the same time! The land and the imagery are amazing, the way words describe the surroundings makes it so easy to imagine and see. The places sound so pretty and amazing, that I have discovered is in West Africa due to the native flower, which is bromeliads! All the magic being done is described as light coming out of people’s hands making it sound so magical and mesmerizing! All the flowers around the area, the crystal clear water, the jungle with the wildlife and trees, I just want to be there right now! It all sounds amazing to see and experience, like all the fresh air and water, just sounds so good!
Who wouldn’t want to be there! So magical.
The only thing deterring me from going is the war and the characters. Don’t get me wrong, they are in the right here with fighting, but come on you could be at least a little nicer to each other! You know she has a dark past, just lighten up on her she is going through a lot right now. She just left her only home she knows, after her only friend died, and now she is stuck helping you and you treat her like this! If you say she is weak, then why are you so mean? If she can’t fight then why keep her! Leave the cute little girl alone and worry about saving your people together! Sorry, I just really like the one girl more than the other, and the one is really mean for no reason, like I get that you are mad at her dad but just let it go for one moment, please!
Me to that girl I hate.
The other person I am hating on is the sweet girl’s brother. He is just so dumb and weird. I thought we were going to have a little romance in the book but now I am just thinking that I read that part wrong because he has said nothing nice about the girl since I read those two instances. He has even become more determined than ever to kill the girl! I thought they were in love for a second, that must just have been some magic mumbo-jumbo going on. I am not complaining, that romance was going to be dumb if that was how it started. Now if the writer wanted them to fall in love, they can now make a better start to the progression of romance between them.
With that same guy, he now has some magic in him that came WAY out of left field. I would have never predicted that was going to happen when I was first introduced to the character. I like that he does have magic and the conflict that brings inside of him, how he is now a part of what he is trying to destroy, but he is just being a baby about it. He is all scared by it and is protective about no one seeing it and it makes him more boring. I am also mad that it was not explained how this happened or why yet. It came so out of nowhere, why would the gods even want him to have magic, especially one of the most powerful ones out there. Maybe it is because he can’t end magic without ending himself which could lead to him giving up on hurting the magic? Maybe he got it from a different mom that we don’t know about, like his father had an affair which is something we hear that he is doing now, so why couldn’t it have happened in the past? I don’t have all the answers yet but what I do know is that he is dumb and bad and I hate him.
You know who else I hate, the king and his guards! They are the scum of the earth, and they suck. They are so mean and have no remorse for the people they kill or hurt. The king forced his kids to fight with swords when they were young ending with the one having a ginormous scare on their back. Like dude, what are you doing! They are just kids and need to live if you want your lineage to live on. Stop being mean and start being a good parent already! He is having an affair with the one guard, whom his kids both know, and that guard is off with his son killing people. I hate her so much! She seems so creepy and gross and how could you do that to the queen, and then go off with the son and kill people and not make it awkward! I get that you are trying to replace his mom but come on women stop being so weird! If you could not tell, I hate MOST of the characters, not all. I have good reason to hate them! And that is because they suck.
Character rating: 2/10
Book rating: 8/10
I love the book, sometimes. Other times I hate it sooo much and just want it to be done with already. It is a long book with a lot in it, so much so that it already feels like I have read a whole book, and I am not even halfway through it! I can’t wait to see how the story progresses and how the stupid boy’s powers grow. They just sound so cool with how he can see those spirits, but he does not deserve those powers at all. Gods I just want this to be done, but I never want it to end!
My god’s, this book is a lot. There is so much destruction and craziness going on, and the plot is moving so fast because they have to set everything up, and in all this, they throw in a ROMANCE!? It feels so forced, which makes it hard to like. I mean, you are trying to kill each other and you are telling me that you like her because you saw she had pretty eyes… WHAT! This was so soon to, they literaly only just saw each other and boom, in love. Like I love me some romance in a book but come on, you could do better than that.
I like to read romances, but this is too forced in for me.
In the book, there is a king who is trying to kill all the magic people because he is paranoid that they will rise up and kill everyone. The king is just a terrible person to everyone, he is very strong and therefore hurtful, and he even hurts his own kids. Like dude, they are next in line after you don’t you want them alive to carry your lineage? He also killed some sweet little girl in a horrific way which after that chapter made me have to put down the book for a bit. Also, I am pretty sure the king is having an affair with one of the generals, and his daughter knows about it. Awkward. Anyway, this king is evil and the worst.
Me when I first heard about the king in the story.
Something that I think is important in the book is the mention of moons and the skies. The magic people got their magic from gods, so when they swear they say gods. There are also the not magic people who don’t believe in the gods so when they swear, they say skies (which implies that they know the gods but don’t want to admit it). This helps to distinguish between the magic people and the non-magic people by the way they swear, which I think is a pretty cool way to do that. Both people do however talk about moons. I think moons refer to days or moon cycles because of the way they are referred to as a passing of time. I think it was cool to make it more fantasy with moons rather than just saying days.
I think this is what they mean by moons?
I kind of hate all of the characters, but also like them? It’s weird I know, but they all do dumb things and then feel bad but keep doing dumb things and it just so bad. They are all so dumb but cool and nice but what they do is idiotic and just AHHH!! They are cool and have nice backgrounds, and by that I mean they all have childhood trauma that they like to bring up all the time. That can be a good thing though because it gives them motivation for what they do and how they act, but did you really have to be so sad all your life! Anyways, I can’t wait to read more, but I totally could if I needed to.
Oh boy, this book is something. My book is Children of Blood and Bone, and I picked it because El and I agreed on it, and it was fantasy. El and I are reading this together, which is good because I need someone else to motivate me to read a sad book. When we picked it, I did not realize how sad things were going to be, and now that I have started the first couple of pages, I can see that things will not get better. I can’t do sad books because I get too invested in the book, and I get too sorry for the characters.
When something sad, and or hazardous happens it scares me from reading the book because I don’t want more bad things to happen. I am also a very visual reader in that I see what the words are saying, like the setting and people’s appearances. It’s more like watching a movie rather than just seeing words. This can be good when the book is interesting with its setting and plot, but if the book is not good at writing about the setting, then I can’t enjoy what is going on because I can see it in my head. But when the book is sad, I can see all the sad things that make it worse, and then I need to take a break but then come back and continue reading because this is graded, and El would be upset! Basically, I am going to need El to motivate me to read the book more; otherwise, I will drop it. Overall, I can’t wait to read the book!
Abigail is motivated by jealousy to kill Goody Proctor. She is jealous of her because she is married to Proctor and Abigail wants to be with him instead (23). Because of this jealousy, she uses the power she gains to try and kill Goody Proctor by accusing her of being a witch (60).
Mary Warren is motivated by fear when she decides to switch sides back to being with Abigail. Mary does not want to go to court with Proctor because she is scared Abigail will turn on her and get her killed (80). When Abigail does eventually turn on her she switches to her side because otherwise she would have been accused as a witch and could have been hanged (118-119).
Proctor is motivated by love to go into the court to save his wife Elizabeth. He loves her dearly and tells her he wishes to please her even if he has not in the past (50). Later when she is accused he tries everything he can to get them to not take her and when he fails he pledges to get her out, even if that meant ruining his own reputation (80).
Parris is motivated by anger when he is accusing Proctor and trying to get Danforth not to believe him. Parris tries first to say that Proctor is untrustworthy because he is trying to overthrow the court (92). He accuses him because of their past and how they don’t like each other and he is mad that Proctor still has some power. Parris also later tries to accuse Proctor of blackening his name and trying to make Parris look bad to strengthen Proctor’s own name (105).
Bartolome de las Casas and Red Cloud changed the views of their audience through imagery, emotion, and connections to have them switch to their side. De las Casas shows the Spaniards’ atrocities through images of his encounters like how it is, “heartbreaking for anyone with a vestige of piety, the famished state they are in, fainting and falling down, weak from hunger” (de las Casas 90). He inadvertently directs the audience and makes them feel bad for what is happening to the Natives and how they need to stand up for change. The way he describes the Natives paints a picture of depressing people and he only strengthens his point with the heartbreak and calls the audience out for how they are bad if they don’t feel anything for these people. Red Cloud uses these same techniques in his speech about saving the Natives with his storytelling and his connections to all people. He makes comparisons between his people and white people with the Great Spirit making them the same but with slight differences. That helps the audience relate with him and makes them more intertwined with the stories he tells which makes it have a bigger impact on them. He tells of the people who come down to see them and how “They taught us to wear clothes and use tobacco and ammunition. But by and by, the Great Father sent out a different kind of men, … men who were so bad the Great Father could not keep them at home and so sent them out there” (Red Cloud 3). How he said they were kicked out of the house shows what kinds of men they were dealing with and gives people a better image. With the comparisons with the people before it is easier to think about being in their shoes because everyone is one in the same. He shows emotion through the badness of the men and how they could not be left at home and he makes the people more connected by talking about their god kicking those men out. It is easier to convince people to join another side when they can get connected to the problems and also given vivid imagery and big emotions about what they should fight to change like how Bartolome de las Casas and Red Cloud did in their pieces.
