One wouldn’t think a book about the walking dead, ghosts, and bones would be fun, but I certainly think Nicki Pau Preto’s BONESMITH is exactly that. Wren is a fabulous character, and I enjoyed nothing more than her bluffing and strutting her way through every situation. Everyone should have that level of confidence! And yet, Ms. Presto allows us to see the soft, gooey heart at her core, the one that craves love and acceptance and who has been damaged by her father’s and grandmother’s distance. While BONESMITH did not hold many surprises, I enjoyed every reveal as it happened. I love a good magic mystery and a character discovering unknown powers, and BONESMITH delivers that and more. ( )

The beginning was incredibly slow and info-dumpy, I only pushed through because I own a fancy edition. At 80 pages in it finally started to become entertaining.
The magic system is interesting albeit a bit convoluted. There were some predictable betrayals and reveals in the end and although it was ok overall I won’t be continuing the series. ( )

This has all the elements I crave in YA dark fantasy, deception, magic, creepy entities, romance, intriguing characters, and a well created world. Mix them in with plenty of action and you have a most satisfying tale. I'm extremely eager to see what happens in the sequel. ( )

I loved the characters; they have so much depth and there's so much history surrounding them, the magic system is so fun, unique, and well thought-out, and don't even get me started on the world-building, it's absolutely breathtaking!

Full review soon~!
( )

Series Info/Source: This is the first book in the House of the Dead duology. I got an eGalley of this book to review through NetGalley

Thoughts: I stopped reading this about 25% of the way in. I enjoyed the first chapter, but things got very slow and hard to follow after that. The author is constantly stopping the story to explain random world elements in detail and it really stops the flow of the story and makes it hard to stay engaged. I also thought this was going to be more of an action-packed fantasy based on the description but things get incredibly slow after the first chapter.

This book follows Wren, a bonesmith who fails her qualifying trial to become a valkyr and gets sent to the Border Wall to serve in disgrace instead. While the first chapter is fun, the story quickly devolves into long explanations of smithing and politics of a huge world that we don't really care about yet. Then we get to watch Wren wander listlessly about the Border Wall complex and get excited about a visit from the House of Gold prince...here is where I stopped reading.

I really struggled with the way this was written. It was hard for me to read and follow and I kept having to go back and re-read portions of the book because I realized that none of what I had read had really been processed. This is partly because mid story the authors sinks into these detailed descriptions of magics, things, and politics that haven't been introduced into the story in any way that matters. So, I would start reading and be like, why do I care about this right now? And then the story would restart and I still wouldn't know why that diversion had been made.

I also did not like the characters or plot at all. None of these characters are likable; they are cruel and one-dimensional. I pretty much despised them all. I enjoyed the action in the first chapter but was also perplexed about why the plot played out the way it did. Wren is top in her class and when she is sabotaged in the trial the judge doesn't listen at all and is just like "You're out of here". Ummm...I mean okay. Seems kind of crazy to me and more like just a convenient way to get Wren to the Border Wall than any sort of actual plausible story.

My Summary (3/5): Overall I did not like this. The writing was hard to read and there was so much exposition about weird world details that jarred you out of the story. I found the characters intensely irritating and the plot implausible. I stopped reading at 25% in and gave this 3 stars because when I DNF a book that early I give it the benefit of the doubt that it must get better. This book is getting a lot of high reviews and I guess I just disagree; this was not for me...at all. ( )