At the Table of Wolves

The worldbuilding and the characterisation also have their own issues. The concept behind the emergence of Talents, in particular, gives me pause. The idea is that the bloom occurred because World War I was so violent and traumatic that it basically forced an emergence of Talents in an entire generation of people. The logic here is that if an event is sufficiently violent, tragic, and traumatic enough, it can cause Talents to come out in people who were involved in it. Which now raises an interesting question: why are Talents only discussed after World War I? If all that is needed is a violent, traumatic event, then surely many people ought to have Talents already. Should not colonised countries like the Central American countries, India, and many others across the world be teeming with Talented people, given how violent colonisation efforts were in those places? What about the American Civil War? Surely that was tragic and violent enough to cause the necessary trauma needed for the emergence of Talents, so why doesn???t Kim, who lived in the United States for a while, make mention of any Talented people there? This strikes me as a rather large hole in the worldbuilding, one that needs to be filled in as quickly as possible ??? preferably in the next book of the series.

Unfortunately, the above situation means that the novel is not able to explore themes like colonialism and racism. While tackling Nazism is all well and good, especially in today???s cultural and political climate, the world could have been given so much more depth ??? and a much stronger thematic scaffolding ??? if the worldbuilding had been more carefully constructed.

Full review here: https://wp.me/p21txV-Gh