The Paper Gardens

This book starts off incredibly slow. You don't even really get to know the main character, Thalia, until around chapter three or four. After that, the story picks up the pace. If you're one of those people who needs a bit of closure, this probably isn't the book for you. More questions get brought up than they get answered. By the end, you're left trying to figure out what exactly is going on.

Don't get me wrong. It wasn't a bad book. It just didn't feel...finished. In any sense.

You don't really get to know anyone in this book. You're introduced to characters, but very little about their motives or histories are explained. The main character has amnesia. Joss is just thrown into the story, without much of an introduction. Are his parents still alive? They're never mentioned. He travels with his godfather. Come to think of it, I'm pretty sure Darren is the most fully formed character in this book. And he's only there for all of two and a half chapters.

You've got a few more side characters in the Citadel staff and the Adepts. The only other student ever named is...you know, I can't even remember her name. Starts with an S. Cirrus' niece. The mean one. Her.

Faraway was interesting. I thought it was cute how he got his name, and it actually fit him rather well. I was very glad he wasn't named Cinnamon, or Snow, or some other stereotypical fantasy horse name. He was a rather well-written character. It says something about this book that the best written characters are barely there at all...and a horse.

Kael was just confusing. He's clearly an assassin-type character, which instantly makes me like him...but nothing about him gets explained. At all. He's one of those parts of the book where you're just left with more questions than you started with. That was incredibly frustrating. I really, really wanted to like him as a character...but I wasn't given a chance to learn anything about him.

The strange love...rectangle?...between Thalia, Joss, Kael, and Garit was obnoxious. It's annoying when writers do that. It does not add romance or suspense to the story in any way. We know what will happen. Lord, it's Vampire Dairies all over again.

For all my complaints, it really wasn't such a bad book. Just a bit frustrating. The next book is already out, so I guess I'll get around to reading it. Who knows? Maybe the next one will actually answer some questions.