Daughter of Smoke & Bone (Daughter of Smoke & Bone, #1)

by Laini Taylor

[layawaydragon]

Loved it, found it original, surprising, unpredictable.Loved characters, setting, writing, descriptions, just everything. With the minor caveat that the romance doesn't completely sit right with me, though it gets better.

Pros
-Unique & original world building
-Unpredictable with fantastic twists
-Immediately engaging and unputdownable
-Compelling & complex characters with believable teen voices and actions
-Atmospheric setting and descriptions

Cons
-Subtle and minor problematic depiction of female sexuality and slut-shaming

Daughter of Smoke and Bone is definitely not your typical angel versus demon story, which I absolutely love. Not only is the world building unique in very unusual and atmospheric settings but it holds none of the typical Christian mores that plague these supernatural beings. (Usually, small slut-shaming tidbits slipped in.)

It’s a darker and mature young adult novel with believable teen voices. It's brilliant and sadly, there isn't anything I can really add to everything that's been said before thousands of times.
However, the romance has its squicky moments, and begin like most other YA romances. It wasn't much, especially comparatively, but it was noticeable. What really redeemed it was the twist and Karou getting her shit together.

Food for Thought

An independent woman suddenly becomes a puddle at the feet of handsome men repeatedly. Why must it always be beauty that disarms and threatens our strong young women? As if there’s no way to make her flawed except through her sexuality.

Of course, there are social justice issues to raise and criticism to make of Young Adult literature, which Daughter of Smoke and Bone takes part in. Antero Garcia discussed this in his book, Critical Foundations in Young Adult Literature, and has posted this excerpt, where the mention begins here:

In similarly problematic depictions of female behavior, Taylor’s Daughter of Smoke and Bone takes an otherwise independent and strong-willed protagonist and renders her all but helpless when encountering an attractive, male foe. Early in Daughter of Smoke and Bone, Karou encounters an angel named, Akiva. For Karou, his beauty is exuded to the point of distraction. While Karou is fighting Akiva, her internal monologue depicts a woman flawed by her own sexuality; the fact that she finds this angel beautiful drives her actions in ways that are potentially life- threatening:
Add in Akiva’s creepy stalker issues that get a pass because he’s more beautiful and hasn’t hurt her like the skeevy ex she just broke up with though they both harass and push boundaries. Not to mention Brimstone’s line about Karou “squandering” herself by having sex. He says to wait for love without explaining further but she thinks it was love so she’s left floundering and shamed. Quite a destructive painting of sexuality.

Why is the quoted portion a problem? I’d highly suggest reading the whole thing for more examples thoroughly explained but his conclusion is:

These are small microaggressions that female readers endure from one book to another. Instead of claiming that these readings of passages from Roth and Taylor critique too heavily minor, well-intentioned passages, I believe these are damning attributes of the literature we encourage young people to read non-critically. The messages of how females must look and behave that are read again and again in these texts typify identities that sexualize and pacify a female readership.

There’s this quote that foreshadows and tries to sound profound but is only a deepity. Of course humans love beauty but it’s too often ignored how beauty is culturally decided and differs. Instead, it acts as if beauty is carved in stone and describes characters like Greek statues. Ideas of beauty also change during your lifetime, at least for finding people your own age still attractive but also if you change by moving, beliefs, etc.

Notes & Quotes:

Page 22, “Inessential penises?” Karou had repeated, delighted with the phrase in spite of her grief. “Is there any such thing as an essential one?”
“When an essential one comes along, you’ll know,” he’d replied. “Stop squandering yourself, child. Wait for love.”

Page 45, She wasn’t innocent now, but she didn’t know what to do about it. This was her life: magic and shame and secrets and teeth and a deep, nagging hollow at the center of herself where something was most certainly missing.

Page 70, “They had to be pretty stupid butterflies to fall for him anyway. You’ll grow new ones with more sense. New wise butterflies.”

Page 120, “Like mold on books, grow myths on history. Maybe you should ask someone who was there, all those centuries ago. Maybe you should ask Razgut.”

Page 168, What is with guys watching girls sleep? Hella creepy. And of course, no one brings up the tossing, turning, snoring, rambling, drooling, farting machines people turn into for 8 hours a day.
Page 179, “Wiener-dog owners,” Zuzana corrected. “You’d have to have, like, a lentil for a soul to hate wiener dogs.”

Page 181, It was there, in the midst of the school-of-fish density of tourists on the Charles Bridge, that the wrongness crept back over her again, slow and seeping, like a shadow when a cloud coasts before the sun.

Page 193,”Beauty,” Brimstone had scoffed once. “Humans are fools for it. As helpless as moths who hurl themselves at fire.”

Page 383, “Hope? Hope can be a powerful force. Maybe there’s no actual magic in it, but when you know what you hope for most and hold it like a light within you, you can make things happen, almost like magic.”