This is my fifth time reading this book (I think) as I do a re-read so I can finally finish the series! I love these characters I really do. Achmed is forever my sarcastic, cynical favorite. Grunthor is a gift. And Rhapsody of course is perfect. Love‬ ( )

If there'd been an ending after they came out of the root and discovered where they were, this might've hit 3 stars. I was ready for an ending at that point. The mini-adventures after that didn't hold my attention very well. None of these characters were developed enough to withstand a book that went on so long. Rhapsody for all her issues, at least had moments where she almost had personality beyond being a Beautiful Incarnation of All That is Good. Grunthor was the cut and paste scary looking guy who is the Perfect Big Brother Figure. I'm assuming Achmed was supposed to be a Strider/Aragorn clone, but bloodier and with a less believable transformation. Street-Urchin the Brat-Sister was only in the second half because Rhapsody was too busy to admire Grunthor's predictable wise-cracks, so someone else had to do it. No-one else was worth remembering. ( )

I actually read this one many years ago. And what I remember was that I was bored, bored, bored.

I also remember I picked it up multiple times after that because I somehow forgot I read it already.

The last time I did this I actually started reading it in English and realised somewhere around chapter one why it seemed familiar.

And still I think it's a shame because apparently I really like the blurb and the cover. ( )

Awesome.

I'm not really sure how to review this without spoilers as I've read books 2 and 4-6 before reading this one so my experience was most likely very different than most. I'll just say that this book did not disappoint and I'm so glad to see where Rhapsody's journey started as well as where some characters come from and get more of characters that didn't make it all the way.

And that's it because I don't have anything else to say that isn't in the context of the rest of the series, but please go read this 'cause it's a great fantasy book in the vein of Game of Thrones, but with more magic and I liked it more. ( )

This book and its whole series (at least as far as I read; I couldn't stomach it enough to get past book six, The Assassin King) is so insipid and stupid I can't do it justice in a review.

The protagonist, Rhapsody, is a Mary Sue who is so beautiful all men fall over at the sight of her ( apparently only allosexual, heterosexual, and cisgender people exist in this world.) Her love interest, Ashe (or Sam or Gwydion, take your pick) is a domineering creep.

The romance is a ridiculous insta-love that would be only silly and stupid if it had not involved sex with a fourteen-year-old girl (and she was only barely fourteen. It was her fourteenth birthday).

The writing style is purple and melodramatic, and the magic system is supposed to be so amazingly powerful that it can do virtually anything, but it's only used a few times in the whole series up to where I stopped, and then it's stupid. For example, if Rhapsody can only transform people and things by saying their true names, how did she turn back into Rhapsody after turning herself into a raindrop? Do raindrops have vocal chords?

The only characters I could stand were Achmed and Grunthor. They are the only reason the whole series isn't 1 star. ( )