Shadow and Bone

A Sun Summoner is discovered! Ravka is saved! And Alina, our Sun Summoner, (they are as rare there as an honest politician here) is whisked away from everything she has ever known. Sounds familiar? It is. Once in Os Alta, (where the Grisha live) she is taught by Botkin and Baghra to harness her powers, which is apparently beyond belief. And then there's her new mate, Genya, a Tailor. (I fell for Genya. By the end, I wanted to kill her and make out with her. But not necessarily in that order.) Alina misses her best friend Mal, but she's starting to fancy the Darkling. But while the Darkling and Alina are off having sexy times, Mal is biting his nails off and worrying himself stiff. Let me break down the Darkling, Alina and Mal. Alina: If someone in Ravka is called the Darkling, then I imagine Alina would be called the Weakling. A Sun Summoner sounds too...lively...to be her. If anyone was expecting a paragon of chick spunk, Alina isn't it. She's a nobody. She is the “nothing special” disenchanted creature personified. Not your typical kick ass heroine at all. She seemed a little on the kiss ass side, to tell you the truth. And here's the two men in this luurve triangle. (This one's relatively scalene.)Mal: He is so goddamned perfect and thoroughly sexy in his drunk on kvas and his girl tumbling ways, I wanted his flawless head on a stick right away. Fellow orphan turned best friend, He Who Leaves Swooning Grisha In His Wake (okay, not really.) But I'll have to confess that it was the sexed-up Darkling that I wanted, not the beddable Mal. Darkling: The Darkling, really? (Will he ignite into flames in the sun? Does he bleed mystery and smell like brimstone? He sounds like he rides on the Nazgûl's Hell Hawks and has a few of them Horcruxes stashed away somewhere.) But more ad rem, is he dark and does he brood? Yes. Is he clichéd? YES. So much yes. Will you still fall for him helplessly? Sadly, yes.(And the end felt too slapdash and lackadaisical and slipshod. No, those are not words I've just made up right now.) “The stag had been showing me my strength-not just the price of mercy but the power it bestowed. And mercy was something the Darkling would never understand.” Alina seems to have a very Dumblebore-ian appreciation of mercy here. It really is a decent book though, and to be honest I feel quite guilty for not liking it better. I think the Hype Bunny killed it for me. Millions of [b:Divergent 8306857 Divergent (Divergent, #1) Veronica Roth http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1327873996s/8306857.jpg 13155899] fans fell for it, too. To have someone like Veronica Roth say, “Unlike anything I've ever read.” for your book! I expected more. Alina Starkov(a) couldn't be lesser like Tris. She wasn't even Tris Lite. And Mal isn't the first or the last best friend some girl falls in love with. As for the Darkling, he's just a Sapling of true evil. (See what I did there? -ling? No?)All in all, not haunting, but not spiritless either.