Friday, April 8, 2011

REVIEW: Sacred Fate by Eressë

Sacred Fate (Chronicles of Ylandre, #1) Sacred Fate by Eressë
My rating: 2 of 5 stars

CAUTION: Major Spoilers

Stupid Characters

Unlikable and sometime idiotic characters. There is a difference between being innocent and being naive, and unfortunately Lassen fell into the latter. Lassen stupidly fell in love with Rohyr despite knowing Lassen could only ever be the king's concubine and not his consort. No matter, how much they love each other it was unrealistic of Lassen to not consider whether he could have a happy future with Rohyr. Love may be blind, but it sure as heck isn't stupid.

Rohyr was idiotic in the fact that he fell prey to his uncle Imcael's scheme. Just because they share the same blood doesn't mean loyalty was a given, and Rohyr fell for that *hard*. Royal family members who backstab each other for the throne? How UNsuprising. Moreover, you think Rohyr would have taken this history lesson to heart considering he remember his past-life as another king who was dealt the same crap. Past-life! OMG! Not only so, it made no sense that he accepted to marry Tyrde when he knew Lassen was his soulmate, knew the loss of his soulmate in a past-life when both Rohyr and Lassen were different people. How could he repeat this mistake? And then he expected Lassen to stick around? And slapped Lassen when Lassen didn't and thought that Lassen was pregnant with another man's baby? What a SOB!

Tyrde, stupid stupid evil Tyrde. Tyrde, if you wanted the throne, you could at least pretend affection for your king. Did you really expect Rohyr would endear himself to you for an occasional bang in the bed and your strict adherence to royal protocol? Did you really think mind-reading Rohyr would not discover your scheme to eliminate Lassen? It's fine if you make clear of your ambition, but it's NOT fine to alienate the one person your amibition rested upon.

Ending Kinda Suck

The end-fight felt rushed. It would have been better if Lassen learned to make use of his newly-founded psychic skill and to release it in the fight against Tyrde. So when Rohyr had to help out Lassen, it made the victory seem hollow.

Epic World

The world-building was superb, almost as epic as LOTR (the films). I literally felt the history of Ylandre moving across my eyes. I like how the author asserted the extinction of female-kind and the male-pregnancy right from the beginning. It didn't feel sexist to me because she build these people up as hermaphroditic aliens. Technically, this wasn't a mm-romance since the people were not truly male.

The sex scenes were creatively-worded so I wasn't bored by their shagging. Though the sex didn't evoke the oh-la-la hotness, but it was touchingly sweet.

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