Leigh Bardugo takes us once more into the intriguing world of Ravka, the Grishas and darkness. Goosebumps-triggering, great arc of suspense and a brilliancy of world-building, fantasy and thrill.
“Tell him you see me when he takes you in his arms.”
Title: Siege and Storm
Series: Shadow and Bone Trilogy (#2)
Genre: YA Fantasy
Author: Leigh Bardugo
Publish Date: 4th June 2013
Pages: 435
Personal Rating: 7/10
I want them, I thought. All that light, all that power. I want it all.
One of the things in Leigh Bardugo’s series that is great above many things are the powerful quotes. Heaven, hell, I could recite quite an army of quotes and passages here because so many of them are simply goosebumps triggering, potent and amazing. Keep in mind that whatever quote you’ll read in this review was chosen under difficult and hard circumstances because there are so many of them!
Once again that great woman, Leigh Bardugo, did such an amazing job in what she does best. Her writing is simply unique. In this novel you dive deeper into the world of the Grisha based on the Russian culture and folklore, with new venues, new characters and poignant character development to name a few.
Hunted across the True Sea, haunted by the lives she took on the Fold, Alina must try to make a life with Mal in an unfamiliar land. She finds starting new is not easy while keeping her identity as the Sun Summoner a secret. She can’t outrun her past or her destiny for long.
The Darkling has emerged from the Shadow Fold with a terrifying new power and a dangerous plan that will test the very boundaries of the natural world. With the help of a notorious privateer, Alina returns to the country she abandoned, determined to fight the forces gathering against Ravka. But as her power grows, Alina slips deeper into the Darkling’s game of forbidden magic, and farther away from Mal. Somehow, she will have to choose between her country, her power, and the love she always thought would guide her--or risk losing everything to the oncoming storm.
I finished the book just the other night and thinking about it still causes goosebumps spreading over my arms. The second installment of the Shadow and Bone Trilogy definitely was a great one and I liked it more than the first.
And of course there is no book review without my three reasons why you should read it.
That ending
The Darkling
The new character
The second book picks up one week or so after the ending of the first one, and at the beginning a new place on the map is introduce. Just like in the first installment there isn’t much stalling before the action hits and since this part of the review is completely spoiler free I can tell you like absolutely nothing about what happens in the first chapters, only that it’s fast-paced, intense and thrilling. Might be because of the appearance of a certain person but it’s just a rumour.
Among all the great things that Siege and Storm provides there is one major thing that is quite bugging. After an exciting and great opening it’s like the weather after a heavy storm. *bam* *boom* *shrieks oh my God**yassss* *nooo!* - lull, like a complete lull. That’s the major problem in this book. From page 100 to 350, aka the central part, there is like nothing there. I really wondered what the meaning of that middle part was. Like what? Please, enlighten me. Talk about a procrastination, my ass. That large bundle of pages is enveloped in a great opening and divine and poignant ending but the middle part is an ehhh from me. Of course something happens there. Everything is great and stuff, but I didn’t ask for a Keeping up with the Kardashians in Grisha style, did I? No, I clearly didn’t.
Aside from that there is the good news that a new, sassy and cunning character shows up and he’s great. More of that below the divider that severs the non-spoiler-free part from the rest of the review. Another good news for all the Mal and Alina shippers (which I am so not, I can’t stand Mal at freaking all, help!), there will be a lot about the trouble couple. Yikes!
Aside from certain points I’ll discuss below the divider in the non-spoiler-free section Leigh Bardugo’s book can definitely flaunt. If only I didn’t have to act at least civilized and approximately normal, I’d definitely buy a fan kefta, run down the streets at night and play Grisha. Those lads and gals are amazing, the world Bardugo created is gripping, marvelous and vivid, and the Darkling. Man, the Darkling. I don’t think I’ll ever get over him like in never ever. I’ll die first than getting over him.
Well, now it’s time for all the unspoilt wannabes to leave unless they want to be spoilt. Then go ahead (also because below the divider is fun, epic and roasting written in capital letters).
Siege and Storm aka Lovers and Lovers
“I’ve seen what you truly are,” said the Darkling, “And I’ve never turned away. I never will. Can he say the same?”
Welcome to the spoiler part of my review. Here is what to expect.
Mal and Alina
The guy with the one hundred titles
The romance
Best lines and quotes
I’m just right going to jump into the cold water.
He didn’t understand. The dreams were the only place it was safe to use her power now, and she longed for them.
Mal and Alina. To all the hardcore fans who ship those two, please, bite the bullet, alright? The option of skipping is – of course – available but I’d rather not want you to miss that roast. It is no secret that my depraved and weird-ass heart roots for the Darkling. I mean people who know me would have smelt that rat from several miles away. To the disadvantage of my cravings, it pretty much looks like the heroine of this book is going to end up with that sorry-ass, aka Mal. Don’t get me wrong but when I read a book with a hot, black-haired, sharp cheekboned and twisted guy who can easily be one on the top of the hot-dark-haired-twisted-sharp-cheekboned-and-hard-on-the-eyes-dudes list then I have like zero interest in seeing the heroine of the book ending up with a MAL.
You know what was the most bewildering moment? On Goodreads I read the word “glorious” in the same sentence as Mal and Alina. My eyes almost fell out of the socket. It was almost time to ring SOS. I beg your pardon? I clearly misread something, didn’t I? I don’t know about you but where the fuck do people always pick up such garbage? I don’t have any fucking vision or have pipe dreams but that match does so not work for me. Call me romantic or unrealistic but a romance has to have suspense, power, understanding, tolerance and acceptance. Where exactly do I find that in Malina-town? Ah, yes, nowhere, right.
“I want her back,” he said roughly. “I can’t go back!” I screamed, not caring who heard me. “Even if you take away this collar and the sea whip’s scales, you can’t carve this power out of me.”
Alina, girl, no need to get loud. Mal is probably in need of a dictionary asap or he’s just a daft listener. I’d wish he cleared the way for the Darkling. But he’s persistent as fuck.
The guy with the one hundred titles. Quite literally. I’m really impressed that he still knows them all that well. I’d have stopped at the third title. I think he has about six or seven. Yeah… one hundred titles, my ass.
“Nikolai Lantsov, but please don’t make me recite my titles again. It’s no fun for anybody, and the only important ono is ‘prince’.” “And what about Sturmhond?” I asked. “I’m also Sturmhond, commander of the Volkvolny, scourge of the True Sea.”
The real question is, who is he not? My opinion on this guy, probably the most hilarious dude in this book, since Mal can’t help but pisses me off even when he only breathes and the Darkling isn’t quite the prankster either. Nikolai surely knows how to act in a severe situation, laugh it off, make a joke or two and basically says we’re going to die but we’ll be fine. I found him very refreshing and to me he was the real Sun Summoner (though he is no Grisha but he doesn’t need to) in some gloomy parts of the book.
“This is impossible.” Sturmhond whooped. “When people say impossible, they usually mean improbable.”
The romance. I suffered a lot in this one. Here I was thinking I had to battle with two lovers but, dang, there are three in fact. A prince decided to pop up out of fucking nowhere for the win. Intriguing and handsome Darkling, sorry-ass Mal and one hundred titles boy are all running nuts on Alina. What a crew she’s got there though to me the decision is clear. Hullo-oh, Darkling, duh? Every single time the Darkling. No one else.
But that’s not how Bardugo wants to treat my heart hence she sends the beautiful Darkling on vacation, allows him only to visit as vision and gives him limited running time at the beginning and at the end of the book. The hell, how are people supposed to get through the middle part of the book for fuck’s sake?
The other boy, the one with the one hundred titles, is new to the game though he lays behind but don’t worry I’m sure he’ll get a second kiss. I mean with that charm of his it would be world-shattering if he didn’t get a smooch at least.
And then we’ve got the third one in line, Mr. Sorry-ass. No comment. Bohhhhring. That does it.
Three dudes, all of them unique in their own way (ahhh, my precious Darkling) and each one of them gets their share in kissing Alina. I think it’s legit to say that this love thing can no longer be called love-triangle. It’s a fucking mess. Alina kisses the Darkling, Mal and Nikolai. Mal kisses Zoya but he claims there is only one for him. Alina, coincidence, claims the same. In whose reality does that seem a decent and healthy relationship?
Best lines and quotes. There are plenty, trust me, and those make the book so good.
Behind them, shrouded in shadow, lounging in a rickety chair as if it were a throne, was the Darkling. (…) I couldn’t seem to stop staring at the Darkling’s hands – his long white fingers resting casually on the arms of the chair.
I squealed. Simple as that. I would never have imagined such a reunion in the first chapter of the book. But then again, poor Darkling had to leave for his vacation.
He paused studying me. “How are you finding life in hiding, Alina? You don’t look well.” “Neither do you,” I said. It wasn’t just the scars. Faire smudges showed beneath his eyes, and the hollow of his shark cheekbones cut a little deeper.
Cheekbones! Whoever came up with that word, I’d sing a hymn of praise for them.
Does the bird feel the weight of its wings?
He was silent for a moment and then said. “I… you really think I’m creepy?”
Appreciation post of Nikolai.
I walked to the side of the bed and smoothed my hand over the cool fabric of the pillow. It was good to know that some part of him was still human, that he laid his head down to rest at night like everyone else. But could I really sleep in his bed, beneath his roof?
The simple answer to that question is, hell yeah, you can and you will. Ohhh, how cute, Alina and the Darkling share a bed after all.
“Watch yourself, Nikolai,” Mal said softly. “Princes bleed just like other men.” Nikolai plucked an invisible piece of dust from his sleeve. “Yes,” he said. “They just do it in better clothes.”
He’s such a sassy bitch, my baby.
And now some Darkling appreciation passages.
“Is it Nikolai?” “What? No!” “Another otkazat’sya, Alina?” the Darkling mocked.
That’s a good one. The Darkling asking exactly what we all wonder ourselves.
“Why won’t you leave me alone?” I whispered one night as he hovered behind me while I tried to work at my desk. “Then I’d be alone, too,” he said, and he stayed the whole night through, till the lamps burned down to nothing.
Mal’s features melted into shadow and then formed again like a face from the mist. Pale, beautiful, that thick shock of black hair, the perfect sweep of jaw. The Darkling rested on gentle hand on my cheek. “Soon,” he whispered.
From somewhere in the distance, we heard a rolling crack of thunder. “He’s coming,” moaned one of the Inferni. “Oh, Saints, he’s coming.”
Am I the only one who cheered like a fangirl at that passage? Probably. And what does that say about my mental health? Probably. – I need help.
And to all those questionable boneheads who misinterpreted what glorious is. (Forget about the Mal and Alina trouble couple.) Here’s a sneak peek of what can truly be called glorious.
The chapel door blew to pieces. (…) The Darkling came borne on a tide of shadows, held aloft by monsters who set his feet upon the chapel floor with infinite care. Shot rang out. The nichevo’ya writhed and whirled around the Darkling, shifting and re-forming as the bullets struck their bodies, one taking the place of another in a seamless tide of shadow. He didn’t even break stride. (…) His dark hair gleamed in the lamplight of the chapel. Summoning his shadows had taken its toll. He was thinner, paler, but somehow the sharp angles of his face only become more beautiful. “Come with me now, and it all stops – the fear, the uncertainty, the bloodshed. Let it go, Alina. Let them all go.”
That’s glorious.
“We are alike,” he said, “as no one else is, as no one else will ever be.”
Before I recite the whole book let’s put an end to this.
Like calls to like.
In case anyone cares, for this book I listened like a creep to the following songs and to one of them I both sang and cried.
Mended – Vera Blue
Eyelids – PVRIS
Throw Me In The Water – WILD
“My power is yours,” I repeated. His arms tightened around me. “And yours is mine,” I whispered against his lips.
Read my 4-star review of Siege and Storm by Leigh Bardugo on Goodreads and follow me there to check out the books I've read and are on my to-do list.
Intriguing Darkling!
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