The Scorpio Races

by Maggie Stiefvater

[Amber]

I’m about to upset so many people. Ha. Hahaha. Don’t kill me.

I was told by a once trusted friend and co-blogger that I would enjoy The Scorpio Races the most out of all of Stiefvater’s books. I had been commenting on how The Raven Cycle seems a little too try hard quirky with not enough plot, especially after Blue Lily, Lily Blue, and Tatum said I would probably like The Scorpio Races more if I’m not into quirky reads. WELL YOU WERE WRONG WEREN’T YOU TATUM.

My main issue with The Scorpio Races is that I was bored throughout. I tried really hard to get into it but by page 50 I was so exhausted by it because, like with Shiver, it was slow going. Terribly slow going. To the point that I couldn’t tell what the plot was meant to be, because I THOUGHT it was about horse racing turned deadly, but most of it was a girl trying to talk to this guy who is a champion horse racer. Or something.

It’s a very quiet plot, which was not what I expected from a book about murderous water horses. So that was strike one.

Strike two was that I couldn’t connect with any of the characters in the slightest. Puck and Sean sounded exactly the same on the page, and I had trouble telling them apart when I was in the middle of chapters. Especially since there were no distinctive plot points and so I had no idea who was doing what.

Another thing I have noticed is that Maggie Stiefvater’s books (those that I’ve read so far) feature very few significant female characters in comparison to the amount of significant males. Her books seem to be overrun with boys, and The Scorpio Races is no exception. I’m not going to lie, now that I’ve read more of Stiefvater’s books, this is starting to get on my nerves. Where are my awesome female friendships?! Or awesome female villains.

I started skimming The Scorpio Races at about the halfway point because it was sending me to sleep. I am so incredibly disappointed in this book, and I have been BETRAYED by my co-blogger, so this wasn’t a fun experience at all. Maybe it’ll get more entertaining when the mob comes to burn my house down for my blasphemy .