Zoya, Mykaela and Princess Inessa are also cool characters. It's just not fair. Hopefully its a rumour. I love the Asian culture added into this book, The azi and the other creatures even made it more awesome. Shadowglass here I come.
I just don't know why this book is underrated, its awesome. View 2 comments. Ack I've deffo left it too long to write any semblance of what passes for a "coherent review" from me I really loved seeing all the characters relationships build and blossom as events unfold. Lol'ing at my "love geometry" commemt when Ack I've deffo left it too long to write any semblance of what passes for a "coherent review" from me Lol'ing at my "love geometry" commemt when reviewing book1. I was trying to be snarky about a hinted at triangle but I did not see the actual shape coming and even weirder I'm not remotely mad at it!
The namesake of the title is a gem and the merry band of misfits were such a fab group with how they interact with one another. I must also give a shout out to the Daeva - I NEED to finish this series so I can safely look up some fanart as these sound so interesting! The characters ages still trip me a little as if I'm remembering correctly Tea is 17 in the "current" timeline.
Massive thanks to the lovely bunch of booksta peeps who shared this group read and all the fun chats we had around this one. View all 10 comments. Mar 09, Erin rated it it was ok Shelves: netgalley , kindle , series. Thanks to NetGalley for an advanced ebook in exchange for an honest review. The sequel to The Bone Witch, a fantasy series that I started last year but that I had obviously forgotten that I struggled with the storyline.
We have the future Tea telling her tale to the Bard and the past story in each chapter. I must confess that Thanks to NetGalley for an advanced ebook in exchange for an honest review. I must confess that by chapter 9 I started skipping the future because it was making the story weighed down The last few chapters was where all the action ended up being because most was taken up by Tea trying to figure out her feelings while also trying to control the darkness taking over.
The one shining spot of this series does remain the gorgeous cover illustrations, definitely decor for a personal library. Just not my cup of "tea. I received a copy from the author in exchange for an honest review. This sequel is a huge step up from The Bone Witch in terms of the pacing, the characters, the plot and the world building. Tea Pahlavi's journey along with her friends was action-packed and thrilling. I'm invested with all the events happened here and you'll feel the war brewing.
Truly atmospheric and the characters stood out individually without overshadowing our main protagonist, Tea Pahlavi. Tea is a remarkable anti-heroine. S I received a copy from the author in exchange for an honest review. She's getting more powerful and I love her determination in this mission.
Her love interest I'm a sucker for broody heroes! Tea and Fox's sibling relationship is one of the best ones I've encountered. They're so genuine and they'll protect each other no matter what.
I adore the secondary characters especially Khalad -- The Heart Forger's apprentice. I ship him with Likh my precious!! He's close to my second favorite. Anyways, I'm reading The Shadow Glass and you better pray for my soul because I have both good and bad feeling about it.
View all 5 comments. Mar 14, Shealea rated it it was amazing Shelves: highest-recommendation. Update 14 Nov : My third time reading this book and here I am, broken and still crying over the same scenes. My initial review already nicely summarizes how much I loved The Heart Forger. This book is straight up perfection, really. However, I think it's worth noting that I never expected to love the romantic development in this sequel so mu Update 14 Nov : My third time reading this book and here I am, broken and still crying over the same scenes.
However, I think it's worth noting that I never expected to love the romantic development in this sequel so much? Tea and her love interest I won't be dropping names, as it spoils the first book are so adorable together! I've never swooned so hard for a pairing in a YA fantasy before, and I think that's really saying something. Undoubtedly still a five-star read for me. With the intricacies of the world-building already firmly established in the first book, The Heart Forger was given a lot of allowance to place more weight in its plot — a plot that is very faintly reminiscent to numerous dark fantasy novels, but without compromising the integrity and ingenuity of its original premise.
On its own, The Heart Forger is an incredibly well-thought, phenomenally written fantasy told in hauntingly compelling narratives at a thrillingly suspenseful pace. The eventfulness of the plot never compromised the complexity or the development of the characters, especially Tea. The faster pacing never took away any depth — be it in terms of character relationships, themes, or impact. The deepening of a romantic relationship that was only hinted at in The Bone Witch was effective without overshadowing any of the other crucial elements.
Basically, this sequel was everything I could hope for and more: excellently placed tension, subtle social commentary, meaningful and relevant themes, surprising reveals from both main and supporting character roles, engrossing and effective writing, and more insight to tons of unanswered questions while still leaving hopelessly obsessed readers, such as myself, wanting more and more and more. Book 3, I cannot wait to get my hands on you! Disclosure: I received a digital copy of The Heart Forger as part of my participation in a blog tour.
This neither affects my opinion nor the content of my review. Thank you very much to the blog tour organizers The Fantastic Flying Book Club and the publisher for the opportunity! I really tried. The first book seemed like an introduction but it continues into this one.
I just don't care enough to continue and it wasted enough of my time. Such a shame, I thought I finally found a decent witch book. The Bone Witch Series 1. I was reading over the synopsis on Goodreads just now and feel like it really doesn't hold a flame to the events in this novel. Yet here I sit.. So let's just cut to the chase--If you are reading this review, then you have more than likely already read The Bone Witch.
You know the clifhanger. You know where the story is headed. You know the reasons you are p The Bone Witch Series 1. You know the reasons you are picking up a second installment So let's not waste any time and just get down to the nuts and bolts of my review It was wordy and frilly and descriptive and..
I will be flat out honest with you.. The Heart Forger was everything and more that I wanted out of The Bone Witch and I would recommend this series just for the fact that the second novel is so fantastic. I think that one of the biggest players in the enjoyment of this installment is that there are, for the most part, very little new characters or locations or terminology introduced.
The first novel in this series bombarded me with so much world-building, information about the magic system, and so many characters so quickly that I had a difficult time keeping up with them. Fabulous writing. I don't know where all these feelings were in the first title.. There are multiple romantic relationships that blossom in The Heart Forger and I adored every single one of them.
Obviously not a spoiler if you read The Bone Witch, as we know in the end that she has raised him from the dead and is her lover-- but Tea's relationship with Kalen was one of the things I loved the most about this novel.
I adore Kalen's character Trust me, you need to hop on over to your favorite book retailer and pre-order this one right now or go to your local Target.. I hear they had a little mix up about release dates! Thank you to the author and publisher for providing me with an ARC of this title in exchange for an honest review! View 1 comment. Sep 11, Meaghan rated it it was amazing Shelves: This sequel contains everything I loved about book 1, and even more. Both the present and past plots deal a lot more with direct actions and consequences, and the tension between the characters increasing as well.
It all leads to a much more intense and exciting book. Specifically in terms of characters, Rin continues to do such a fantastic job of creating fleshed out and real characters. Our main character, Tea, both in past and present, holds so much conflict within her, and her navigation of the truth and lies within her society is such an interesting path to follow. The supporting cast all also stands on their own, with almost all characters developing their own stories and backgrounds further.
The plot was also quite intriguing, though I still found myself more interested in the present than the past portions of the chapter. However, even with this, Rin was able to fully capture me in her tale and world, and I was as fully in love with this book as I was with book 1. The world was also just as gorgeous as when I was introduced to it in book 1, even now that we begin to see more and more of the shadows of the beauty.
We gain more depth in this book, as well as knowledge into other kingdoms, specifically in terms of why some of the authorities in this book do what they do as well as the stark differences between the mindsets of the different members of the world. Additionally, since this book carries more moments of tensions, and actions that bring across consequences, we see more of the world in how they deal with these situations of tension.
The Heart Forger is so much more than the sum of its parts, and something needs to be said for how well it immerses the reader, and how at home I begin to feel in the world and heads of these characters. There is something so compelling and enchanting about the way Rin writes and builds her world that keeps a reader enraptured, even during the less intense, thrilling parts of the book. The Bone Witch world seems to be a world I can revisit and love at any time, and is a book that, to me, can be read at any pace.
I read that last year, and I all I remembered was that it was enjoyable but not all that memorable. I enjoyed this book much more than TBW; I was totally engrossed in it, staying up past 3am because I just had to know what would happen next. It got me thinking that maybe I just wasn't in the right mood when I r I'll be honest, I didn't remember much about The Bone Witch when I started reading this. The most interesting part of this series is the magic system. I loved reading about all the ashas and Deathseekers, the daevas and bone witches.
Everything in this book is such an Aesthetic. Gimme all the necromancy and witches raising people from the dead while clothed in elaborate dresses. It's awesome. Tea is such an intriguing character. The distinction between Tea from the past and the Tea who is telling the story is very striking; I found myself desperate to discover how she went from a naive, headstrong but well-intentioned girl to a hardened, bitter, powerful witch seeking revenge. The other characters were great as well - the two that particularly stuck out to me were Kalen and Khalad.
I also liked Zoya - she's basically like a nicer version of Zoya from the Grisha trilogy. Likh is my precious son and Inessa is awesome too. The romance between Tea and Kalen is one of the best I've read in a while.
I was beginning to despair of romance in YA fantasy, and this book restored my faith in it. This romance is slow-burn and mature, growing from mutual respect and real reciprocated love, rather than instant infatuation and silly crushes. It was so refreshing to read a romance in a YA fantasy that didn't completely take over the plot or make me cringe at all; it was mature, sexy and not overwhelming at any point.
This is how I like my romances in YA: taking its time to develop organically and beautifully, without detracting from the bigger plot. I would really recommend this to any lovers of dark fantasy and morally grey characters, and people who, like me, are lovers of romance but prefer their romances on the slow side and prefer it as more of a B-plot than the major driving force of the story.
Feb 15, Alice rated it did not like it Recommends it for: nobody. Shelves: potential-but-bad-execution , no-thanks , fake-woke , reviewed. This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Honestly , I have to ask who hurt you for the world-building to be so blatantly set on characerizing Daanoris Bone Witch pseudo-China and Drycht Bone Witch pseudo-Middle East as backwards sexists and bigots.
The writing is too puerile to depict them as anything else than sexists who are wrong wrong wrong in everything they do. Tea commit 1 star Faster-paced than the previous installment, but somehow still finds new and novel ways to disappoint me in ways I've never been disappointed in before.
Tea commits so many political faux pas, I'm surprised she got through asha training in this state. She literally cannot open her mouth without having to comment about how backwards Daanoris and its emperor are There are literally no women besides Princess Yansheo who is basically an NPC with a name in Daanoris who could even be present to provide their take on the inner workings of their own damn country.
Instead, we have to listen to Tea give her hottakes about a country she's never been too while demanding the natives to be tolerant of her not understanding their ways because she's a foreigner AND being offended when they say how strange her country's ways are. Girl, it has to go both ways. I honestly worry about the next book because in this book, Tea and company invade Daanoris; so naturally, we should progress to invading Drycht as suggested in the end of the Heart Forger.
The way Drycht was depicted in the Bone Witch was pretty Islamophobic. I don't want a repeat of Tea's hottakes about all that in book 3. We can't just have an evil guy who might be a good father. NO, he has to be an evil guy and a homophobe too. It's not the same. I understand how silver-heartsglass bearers could be considered to be on the fringe of society, but I honestly do not see the in-world justification for why they are discriminated against when they do important work???
I honestly I want to say this book is fake woke, though I'm sure that's not the author's intention. I feel the way this writing calls out sexism is very shallow - only calling out the blatant sexist attitudes and not choosing to explore how pervasive sexism in a society can be.
Yes this is YA and there is no obligation to do it, but there are definitely YA books that don't shy away from that subject matter. This book also needed at least one more round of edits. The amount of errors I found with the puntuation and grammar was unprofessional. Whoever was editing needs to pay attention to the manuscript and learn the proper usage of a semicolon and just get reacquainted with general sentence structure. Seeing as this book contains less descriptions of hua and poetic stylization, there's no excuse for having an unpolished final product.
Simple fixes like Characters - Like I kept saying, Khalad is the character that feels most like an acutal person, but he is overshadowed by Tea's heinous narration and lack of proper characterization.
I would have liked for Khalad and Narel's relationship to be explored more. In a book called the Heart Forger, they don't really focus much on the heart forgers. They do moreso than in the Bone Witch, but that wasn't much to begin with. Kalen is actually alright in this book. I feel like he is a spiritual successor to the idea of an endgame Chaol in many ways.
He actually goes against Kance and baby, I was proud. I didn't hate Tea in the Bone Witch, but lord did she test my patience here. The Fox and Inessa drama was so boring Simple solutions, my friends. Simple solutions.
Plot - Stuff actually happens in this book! The 1st book was definitely a glorified prologue to this one. I think the story suffers from lack of disctinction between the faceless villains. A lot of the time I didn't know the difference between Druj and Usij. Who are these dudes?
I didn't even know Usij was a Faceless We are just told they are EVIL and not given any complex motivation besides wanting immortiality. There are some reveals that I admit not to catching on until they happen.
The cartoony dialogue between the hero and the villains brought that enjoyment down because it was cliche af. The story still suffers the constant switching between past and present versions of Tea. I saw another reviewer say they skipped the Bard chapters, so I tried that too and the book was a much faster read.
I went back to read them every few chapters to catch up, but the flow was much better if you had a large chunk of chapters in one time frame. Worldbuilding - God, I can't stand how it's done here. I still have similar problems with the world building as I did in book 1 - such as linguistic inconsistencies within the individual nations and reliance on real world stereotypes for Drycht and Daanoris. On a positive note, I do have to say at least the Daanorian emperor had a yellow dragon as an emblem and at least on the surface you can be sure this is based off imperial China.
Not sure what era it was supposed to be, but mentioning it went through a period of isolation was a nice touch, though the political structures of most of the nations in the Bone Witch world don't feel very anchored.
Perhaps this is because there's a lack of a depiction of the 'commoners' living their lives and interacting with whatever government they live with. We largely follow characters from high society. The lack of information from this disparity of representation can create a feeling of immenseness for some because there's always more to learn, but to me it conveyed a feeling of vacancy.
Overall , I would say this is an improvement from the 1st book for those who like a more fast-paced story. There are more plot developments here and the Tea-Kalen romance was not the worst thing by a long shot more by Kalen's strenght as a character compared to the rest, if anything.
However, the storytelling falls into similar problems as seen in the Bone Witch in addition to the lack of complexity in portraying the different nations and their people; the queer-coding of Khalad and Likh because they have silver hearts-glasses and are not Deathseekers somehow wanting to not be in the traditional male occupation automatically means they are both queer?
The lack of characterization, concrete world-building in terms of the society and magic, and the tell-not-show nature of the narration takes away from the potential of this series. But if you can look past those things and treat this as a fluff read, I think it'll be a quick read.
Otherwise skip it or check it out from your library if you are still curious. EDIT: Upon some reflection I thought my statements about Likh and his gender expression sounded gate-keepery because it kind of sounded like I didn't think gender-fluidity or genderqueer or what-have-you was queer they are! I have no intention of acting as a gate-keeper they can gtfo , so I think I should clarify what I meant - my point was that gender expression and gender and sexuality aren't the same.
I appreciate that Rin wanted to include this. I just didn't think it was done in the best way. I'm still kind of unsure what specifically she was going for I just wish this was done better. It'd be hypocritical for me to say you should only call out Western colonialist-based fictional lands.
I'm not sure how many books there are in the series, but I'll follow through till the end because I've gotten this far. View all 8 comments. Mar 03, Raquel Flockhart rated it really liked it Shelves: own-voices , young-adult , on-my-shelf , read-in , fantasy , lgbtqia. They say the best tales spare no mercy and spare no lies.
Y'all better stop sleeping on this series, please! And I also have to thank my dear friend Krisha Bookathon for gushing a lot about this trilogy and finally making me read it.
The plot is s Ughhhh We get to know more about the Faceless, their kind of dark magic and lots more about their quest for immortality. The world is also expanded more because the characters travel to a new kingdom and we get to know about the rulers and customs of the place.
There is also a lot more action in this one, and I was very impressed by these sequences - I totally wanted to see them on screen. However, the best part I think about this book was how it challenged gender roles and heteronormativity.
The characters are definitely the true heart of this book. Tea is such a delight to read about. She has grown so much, learning more about her abilities and responsibilities and helping people when needed.
The relationships in this series are so beautiful and each of them is special in its own way. The lengths to which Tea is ready to go to ensure Fox survives made me wanna cry. Her friendships with Mykaela, Althy, Polaire, Zoya were all amazing in their own ways and the scenes where they all fought together were awesome. I also particularly enjoyed her dynamic with Khalad because their destinies are so interconnected, making them indispensable to each other, but they actually end up becoming friends who care for and respect the other a lot.
Likh is probably the sweetest cinnamon roll of the group, so adorable and kind but also smart and brave and all the scenes where the gang stood by his side and encouraged him were so heartwarming. I knew this book was going to have more of the romance of the main leads but the development of it was so much better than I expected.
We also have a lovely sapphic relationship, and the banter between the two girls is super entertaining and oh so precious. As much as I enjoyed The Bone Witch, this is a step up - with expansive world building, lots more action and dark magic and phenomenal characters that you will root for every step of the way. This sequel answered many questions but left me with many more, and now all I want to do is jump right into the finale.
Nov 16, Bea Villaflor rated it really liked it Shelves: fantasy. Apr 01, Fadwa Word Wonders added it Shelves: audiobooks , fantasy , releases , bipoc , young-adult. This book was a continuation of The Bone Witch so my opinions are much of the same, aside from the fact that it took me longer to get into the first book. We have a bit more insight into why Tea became the way she is but a few a pieces are still missing to get the full picture and I'm excited to find out more!!
Unfortunately this second instalment in The Bone Witch series was such a disappointment for me when compared with the first book. Which is such a shame as I absolutely LOVED the first one with a passion, wrote it a glowing review, have been recommending it to everyone, and have been eagerly waiting to see what would happen next for about year and a half.
But I think that was what I loved most about it. The world was so fleshed out and real. I loved getting to experience all the locations and events in a way that made me feel as though I could actually have been there. And The Heart Forger just seemed very rushed and superficial in comparison. It felt much more like every other generic YA fantasy novel out there. The Bone Witch felt different, new, fascinating, and exciting.
The Heart Forger feels much more stale and familiar. The sections of the book with Bard the present day parts of the story were definitely the highlight for me. These parts remained true to the first book, were more interesting to me, and kept you guessing as to what was going to happen next with sneaky little cliffhangers at the end of each section.
I still love that the whole story is told with a mixture of past and present day. I think it works really well for this story and looked forward to these chapters the most. Especially when we got to meet certain characters again! I will definitely carry on with this series to see what else is in store for Tea, I just hope that the next book feels more like the first one again and manages to rekindle my love.
I feel quite deflated after finishing this one unfortunately. Mar 22, Amanda Kratz rated it really liked it. Actual rating 4. This is such a change from the first book. This was really good. The first book was so incredibly SLOW! Purple prose, detail detail detail, all world building. There were teases of a story in the first book but nothing really happened. A girl trained to be an asha magical fighting geisha would be the most basic summary.
This book however is Actual rating 4. This book however is all plot and action action action. At the same time this feels a bit jumpy at times and disjointed.
Really disjointed from the first book. Ex: she is standing talking to one character on one page, the very next she is down in the dungeon with another character yelling at a prisoner. Again like this first book, each chapter is broken into 2 sections present tense and the past tense. It seems all of the day to day activities and responsibilities that were so important in book 1 are completely gone.
They seem to no longer have any obligations and run amok Willy-nilly against not really complaining but it is an observation.
Spot on. Love it. Anyway so good. I recommend this book. If you can slog through the first one, this is worth it and completely different from the first.
This was so exciting and I finally got a little romance. The way she effortlessly switches from the past to the present is amazing. Sometime in books this wears me out, but I have found the opposite true in this case.
Jun 28, Jude: The Epic Reader rated it it was amazing Shelves: books-to-read , fav-covers , book-boyfriends. I love this one. Way more than the first one. I love Tea learning things by herself and becoming more powerful outside of the rules. I love it when my main characters start becoming morally grey. I loved most of the side characters though some annoyed me. May 26, Jeann Happy Indulgence rated it it was amazing Shelves: young-adult , fantasy. This was absolutely brilliant and definitely my favourite of the series so far!
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