This might be my biggest disappointment of 2021.
I know it's a little silly to have this hope/expectation ahead of time, but I thought She Who Became the Sun would be a new all time favourite of mine. I made that assumption based on the amazing premise and the early reviews that seemed to confirm that hope. As you can probably tell from my rating, that did not happen.
The book started out interesting enough, but after the first ~50 pages it just went straight downhill for me. I think the main problem I had was a complete lack of attachment. I felt like the whole book was at a distance, including characters and stakes. Things happened, but I didn't care. I wasn't invested or involved.
Everything felt very shallow. Instead of digging deep into the story, it felt like we got flashes here and there. Ultimately we got the overall picture, but it was made up of snippets of scenes, instead of actually being involved in the whole thing… if that makes sense. That made it very difficult to get invested and actually care about what was going on.
I never got attached to any of the characters—not even the main character. I just… didn't find her very interesting? That sucked. There's a bit of a romance between the MC and another character, and I wasn't interested in that either. I didn't think there was any chemistry at all.
And finally, there was so much repetition.
“I will find greatness.”
“The greatness!”
“She had claimed greatness.”
I kind of never want to see the word “greatness” again. It was all so literal.
I'm massively disappointed. Sigh.