Review: Battle of the Bands

Battle of the Bands by Lauren Gibaldi
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I was provided an audio ARC via Netgalley, all opinions expressed are my own.

This was a really great complation of stories. I really enjoyed some of them and while all of them are well written, I don't think I am the target audience for this particular set of stories. Sometimes I had a hard time connecting with the characters and I think that is because my high school days are long past. I do wish I had books like this 20+ years ago, and I know this will be a smash hit with today's young readers.

I highly recommend this for young readers (older middle grade, teens, and young adults), especially those who are still figuring out who they are. As a music lover myself, I really loved how the battle of the bands connected all of the stories together in some way and some of them had overlapping characters. I also appreciated that this had a really diverse cast of characters, which is why I think this is really suited for a younger audience.

Each story is written by a different author and narrated by a different narrator. I liked that after each story there was a rock jingle to signal the start of the next story in the collection. Each narrator did a wonderful job narrating the stories and giving them life. I really enjoyed this compilation and highly recommend it!

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Review: Inkmistress by Audrey Coulthurst

Inkmistress by Audrey Coulthurst
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I received an ARC of this book from the publisher via Edelweiss+ in exchange for an honest review.  This book will be released on March 6th, and is a companion to Of Fire and Stars.  I haven't read Of Fire and Stars, but from what I understand it takes place a few hundred years beforehand and in a neighboring kingdom.

I loved the mythology and magic elements in Inkmistress. The people within the world can manifest when they come of age, meaning they can take the form of an animal. The animal they can manifest into ties them to one of the gods the people worship. It is rare that a person cannot manifest, but it does happen. Our main character, Asra is a demigod, and she has unique powers. She is a bloodscribe, and has been hidden away in a mountain town to study as a healer where she will be safe. Her blood holds her true power, but using her powers can kill her. She uses her blood to enchant healing tinctures and aid the townsfolk.

When tragedy strikes the town she has protected, Asra uses her powers to aid the girl she thinks she loves to find her manifest before her time. But we all know by now that magic comes with a price, and Asra's magic doesn't work out as she planned. Ina, Asra's love, manifests into a fierce dragon fueled by revenge for her loved ones. Ina strikes out to revenge the town, and Asra is left feeling guilty that her magic didn't work out the way she'd hoped. Asra follow's Ina to explain what she's done and to stop her from her revenge mission. Along the way, Asra meets Hal another demigod who vows to help Asra. Hal and Asra grow close and they eventually team up to fight Ina on her revenge mission. Asra is betrayed throughout the course of her mission to change the past and fix what she felt she did wrong.

I felt like the pace of the story was really slow and parts of it dragged for me. There is a ton of time spent building up to the various milestone events in the story, but I found them anticlimactic when they finally did happen. There were some plot twists I didn't see coming especially when it came to the numerous betrayals that happen in the story, but there were so many they eventually lost their impact on me. Asra seemed to never learn her lesson after being betrayed over and over again. Her misplaced sense of loyalty and lack of self-preservation got to be a bit much, I'm glad she found her strength and backbone toward the end. I just felt she was portrayed as weak and naive for much of the story, and it took too long for her to find her inner strength. I did like the diversity of the characters, Asra and Ina both appear to be bisexual, but I think Ina might have a preference for women over men if I read the clues correctly. The romance doesn't overpower the story, and it does teach a good lesson to not let your feeling cloud your judgement.

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Review: Heart of Iron by Ashley Poston

Heart of Iron by Ashley Poston
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I received an ARC of this book from the publisher via Edelweiss+ in exchange for an honest review.  This book will be released on February 27th.  If you like YA, Sci-Fi, pirates in space, and a little bit of romance I'd go check this out.

This is an interesting take on the typical YA Sci-Fi. I enjoyed it. It had decent romance, but it wasn't overbearing, which sometimes can be the case in YA. It has good action, and strong female characters. It also has good LGBTQA+ rep. There is even a human and AI romance.

This isn't sold to us as an Anastasia retelling, but it has that vibe. Long lost princess is found after she is thought to have been dead for many years. I like that she's been raised by pirates and she's strong, rough around the edges, and a thief. She is everything the future empress should not be, and when her heritage is uncovered, she doesn't embrace the gentle lifestyle of the royals. She continues to be the space pirate she was raised as. Joining Ana on her hijinx is her best friend and faithful companion D09 aka Di. Di is an AI or a metal, who was created to help heal humans during a great plague. Something went wrong with the metals and there was an uprising causing Ana's family to be killed and Ana to be lost in the first place. Di has been with Ana as her friend and protector since her escape from the metal uprising, but neither remembers what happened. Ana and Di are on a mission to find the Tsarina, the long lost ship that holds answers to Ana's past and parts to fix Di's glitching memory core. They run into Robb, a noble, who is kind of an outcast in his family who is also looking for the Tsarina to find out what happened to his father. Robb ends up travelling with Ana and Di to find the ship. We also follow the perspective of Jax, pilot of the Dossier, the ship Ana has grown up on. Jax is an interesting character, but I won't spoil him here. As the four main characters try to uncover what really happened with the metal revolt, the truth of Ana's past, and avoid current plots against them much is revealed and they all are tested. Friends are lost, love is found, enemies are confronted, and an empress must decide to run and hide or fight for her kingdom.

The pace started out a bit slow for me, but it does pick up towards the end. I think part of that was the switching between perspectives. We follow Ana, D09/Di, Robb, Jax, and toward the end a 5th perspective. I'm not a fan of multi-perspective books in general. I can do two, but any more than two and I have a hard time engaging. That is a personal preference not a problem with the writing or the plot. I do think the whole Ironblood thing could have been explained better. It is the defining trait of the rich and the poor, but how people came to have iron in their blood is never really explained and it really doesn't give anyone any special powers just privilege.

Overall, I did enjoy the story and I look forward to the next installment. I enjoyed the originality Ashley Poston brought to the storyline.

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