Things I Liked
An adult fantasy book
I loved the fact that Nevernight was an adult book. Sure, the main character is a "young adult", but I personally wouldn't class the book as such. It's definitely an adult book with a young main character.
- There are f-bombs, c-bombs, and more.
- There are extremely detailed sex scenes.
- And of course, gruesome murders.
This book is graphic and vulgar. But that's one of the things I liked most about it. It really cut through all the bullshit, restraint, and filters that are often in YA. (I love YA, don't get me wrong, but there's also a lot filtering, fade to black, etc.)
These assassins don't play nice
It's not uncommon to pick up an assassin book and then never have anything interesting happen. No murders. No brutality. Just a few clean fights.
But Jay Kristoff had no problem killing people in Nevernight.
- There are plenty of murders.
- No mercy.
- Plenty of gore. Things got messy.
Nevernight doesn't sugarcoat the life of an assassin. PEOPLE DIE. IN THEIR SHIT AND VOMIT.
Boarding school
Like Hogwarts for assassins? Sure.
I loved the boarding school set up. Dormitories, "professors", no wandering the halls after hours, classes on how to fight, poison, steal, and seduce... It's just an environment that I always enjoy in a book!
Mia + Shadows
Mia has some kind of shadow power/gift. She can kind of control or manipulate the shadows. It's a really cool part of the book. It's still a bit of a mystery in Nevernight, but will clearly be explored further later in the series.
It's so quotable
Every other line in Nevernight is something I was itching to tweet about or quote on Goodreads. The book is so beautifully written. Here are a few of my favourites:
"People often shit themselves when they die, did you know that?"
THAT IS THE FIRST LINE OF THE BOOK! O_O
"The last thing you will ever be in this world, girl, is someone's hero. But you will be a girl heroes fear."
"'Never flinch.' A cold whisper in her ear. 'Never fear. And never, ever forget.'"
"Iron or glass they'd asked? Mia clenched her jaw. Shook her head. She was neither. She was steel."
"Hmm. I appear to have misplaced the fuck I was about to give for what you think."
"your brain and ovaries seem to have switched places."
"The brighter the light, the deeper the shadow."
"The dark around them was not only angry. It was hungry."
Disliked
Throughout the book there are footnotes that provide more detail on people, objects, or events that are mentioned in the normal story. At first I quite liked these. They were interesting and sometimes just kind of funny. But as the book went on, I found myself skipping them most of the time.
- They didn't feel necessary to the story (though I guess that's a given since they're footnotes).
- I didn't feel like I was missing anything by not reading them.
- I think they just offered more detail than I was interested in.
This book is long and the footnotes just made it feel even longer. Plus some of the footnotes are several paragraphs and go into extreme detail in a way that didn't really add to the story.
The footnotes were an interesting addition, but I lost interest and patience with them after a while.
Although I liked the book, I wasn't addicted.
It took me about twelve days to read Nevernight. The biggest thing that says to me is that while I liked the book, I wouldn't say I ever got hooked or addicted (until maybe the very end). I was happy to keep reading, but I never felt like I NEEDED to keep reading, you know? I didn't really think about the book when I wasn't reading it.
I liked it a lot, but I think for me it was missing a little X factor that would have really kept me hooked and felt inclined to give it a five-star rating. But despite that, I fully expect Nevernight to be a five-star book for pleeeenty of other readers. It truly is a fabulous book!
NOSE GRAZE