Days of Blood and Starlight: The Sunday Times Bestseller. Daughter of Smoke and Bone Trilogy Book 2

Product Information

Not having read the third book yet, I’m going to take a stab at a seraphim (a name for an angel) in the dark and assume that these well-curated low points by the author are all leading somewhere, and for the purpose of Karou’s character arc. In this sweeping and breathtaking new novel by National Book Award finalist Laini Taylor, author of the New York Times bestselling Daughter of Smoke & Bone trilogy, the shadow of the past is as real as the ghosts who haunt the citadel of murdered gods. Fall into a mythical world of dread and wonder, moths and nightmares, love and carnage. National Book Award finalist Laini Taylor has created a lushly imaginative, fully realized world in Daughter of Smoke and Bone . Taylor’s writing is as sumptuous as poetry, and the story overflows with dark and delightful magic, star-crossed love, and difficult choices with heartbreaking repercussions. Readers of all ages will be utterly enchanted." Well, the pessimistic, miserly old grinches win out this time because DoBaS isn’t quite as good as its predecessor, but it’s certainly nothing to turn your nose up at. But, you know, if you were to turn your nose up at any Laini Taylor book then, my god, have you no soul?!

Also the scene with Karou and Akiva and Thiago in the same room and the scene after that was awesome.I don't even know how the author came with that idea.It was brilliant and wise! For this one, Karou is left deciding where her loyalties lie as she explores more of her old self. As a reader you wonder what she’s going to do next to survive. Will she continue to suffer and help the chimaera rebuild an army? Or make amends with Akiva and run away like they were supposed to? Days of Blood and Starlight delves deeper into Elsewhere and the age-old battle between seraphim and chimaera, with our two heroes on opposing sides. Because they are both heroes: one of the strengths of the novel is that it is impossible to know who to root for. You can't help but cling onto the dream that Akiva and Madrigal shared, and root for peace. In fact, the reader is not alone in this. It becomes clear that others around Karou, including the delightfully quirky Zuzana (Karou's best friend) struggle to accept the notion that Karou and Akiva are now nothing but enemies and therefore can't commit themselves fully to the cause Karou believes she is fighting for. Yo sé que Ziri tiene las mejores intenciones del mundo con relación a la causa quimérica y demás peeeeeeero... ¡DEJA DE PENSAR QUE VAS A PODER ESTAR CON KAROU! ¡NO, NO, NO Y NO! KAROU ES DE AKIVA Y AKIVA ES DE KAROU. PUNTO. Once upon a time, an angel and a devil held a wishbone between them. And its snap split the world in two.’Goodness. You would think that with so many themes abound in one book that things would get confusing. But alas, Laini is a skilled writer. She pulls it off with ease and finesse. And on Akiva's face, gratitude vied with the emptiness that Liraz had started thinking of as his death wish look. She remembered a time when Akiva had laughed and smiled, when in spite of the violence of their lives he had been a full person, with a full range of emotion. He had never had Hazael's sunshine demeanour - who did? But he had been alive. Once upon a time." I understand why Stalin’s regime romanticized and justified genocide, and the same with Pol Pot, Hitler, and Mao. Propaganda is useful when you are clinging to maniacal power. And as Eddie Izzard says,

Ahhhh this was so good!! 🤩🤩 I went in with high expectations bc I really enjoyed Daughter of Smoke and Bone, but it was great that it fulfilled them! There really isn't any better feeling than a sequel living up to a great first book 😌😌🤌🤌 In einer zerstörten Welt ist Hoffnung ein zerbrechliches und kostbares Gut. Können Akiva und Karou sie am Leben erhalten, um Eretz in eine bessere Zukunft zu führen? After the seraphim burn all of Brimstone's doorways to the world, Karou assumes that Issa is dead. Akiva confirms this after her memories return from breaking the wishbone. The truth is that Issa and Yasri have had their souls placed in thuribles. Am I wrong, or did all the hand-burning on the doors stuff happen when Karou was seventeen? But, I know Brimstone made her a baby because she has memories of her childhood, and it’s never indicated that they are false. So, like, this book is trying to tell me that Akiva was the nicest guy ever, and dreaming of peace, but then he did all of the hand-burning stuff in reaction to seeing Madrigal get killed? But, he just waited seventeen years to express his heat of passion genocide? That makes no sense. okay. when i read ‘daughter of smoke and bone,’ i complained that the relationship felt too insta-lovey. and now after reading this, im going to complain that there wasnt enough love. WHO EVEN AM I?! i just really want to see karou and akiva happy and heathy and in love. is that too much to ask!?Vor mittlerweile vielen Jahren hatte ich den zweiten Band gelesen, doch ist er mir nie so sehr in guter Erinnerung geblieben wie der erste. Nun ist mir der Grund dessen bewusst geworden. Most of us had to prepare ourselves for the fact that DoBaS, like most middle child books, was probably not going to be quite as good as it’s older siblings. Personally, I always hold out hope for middle child books, wanting to be pleasantly surprised! Issa is the guardian for Brimstone's shop. Whenever a customer looking for Brimstone's services enters the shop, he or she has to wear one of Issa's snakes as a pre-emptive measure. Karou is now the resurrectionist, she took over Brimstone's old job. But she is making things for Thiago that are horrific and more deadly. The war between the seraphim and chimaera is neverending.

Karou's growth in this novel is tremendous. She has recovered her memories from her former life and she is in the middle of the never ending war. She struggles with the past, knowing she gave her heart to the one who helped destroy her people. She is bitter, sad and determined. She is far removed from the fun, care free, somewhat rebellious teenager we met in Daughter of Smoke and Bone. Now she is a fierce woman bent on helping her people, yet her heart bears an enormous burden of sorrow and shame. Zuzana and Mik, my baes, are still here, as well as Akiva, who is busy reimmersing himself into the life of the Seraphim. Training, fighting, politics, we see it all here and meet a lot of new characters as well. Once upon a time, an angel and a devil fell in love and dared to imagine a new way of living—one without massacres and torn throats and bonfires of the fallen, without revenants or bastard armies or children ripped from their mothers’ arms to take their turn in the killing and dying.

Did we miss something on diversity?

The world-building is so unique and compelling, the characters are extremely interesting, thoroughly developed and surprisingly easy to root for (despite their flaws and mistakes), the romance is heavily layered, the friendships/family bonds run deep and true, the writing is simply amazing, the pacing is unbelievably pleasant, and the plot is just SO GOOD!! When Jael's brutal seraph army trespasses into the human world, the unthinkable becomes essential, and Karou and Akiva must ally their enemy armies against the threat. It is a twisted version of their long-ago dream, and they begin to hope that it might forge a way forward for their people. Ziri's soul felt like the high roaming wind of the Adelphas Mountains and the beat of stormhunters' wings, like the beautiful, mournful, eternal song of the wind flutes that had filled their caves with music he could not possibly remember. It felt like home ." - Chapter 80, pg. 487 Dieser Krieg bestimmt das Leben der Chimaera seit so langer Zeit, dass sie sich Frieden eigentlich gar nicht vorstellen können. Ich hatte das Gefühl, dass niemand von ihnen, nicht mal Thiago, tatsächlich daran glaubt, dass die Rebellion erfolgreich sein wird. Der Weiße Wolf versucht nur, sein Leben so teuer wie möglich zu verkaufen. Er glaubt weniger an eine Zukunft für die Chimae

Meanwhile, two deer-like centaurs called Dama by the names of Sveva and Sarazal have escaped from slavery and are on the run. Sarazal has an infection from her manacles chafing her while she was enslaved. A boy named Rath of the Dashnag, chimaera with saber-toothed tiger heads, comes and helps them by carrying Sarazal to a Caprine village. The Caprine have a poultice to help Sarazal. When the seraphim, including Akiva, are looking for the Caprine, Sarazal wakes up to see Rath and screams. Akiva pretends that it was just a bird and leads the other seraphim away.It was certainly a typical book two of a trilogy or multi-series. The main character, Karou, is tested in more ways than one and hits some pretty low points. Furthermore, Laini Taylor simply outdoes herself with the world-building in this piece. Somehow, the battered, torn, and bloody land of Eratz has become such a real place in my mind that I wish to visit it and see it, for its simultaneous beauty and terror, all at once. Yet, for all its good qualities, I do have a few minor qualms with this novel, primarily, the set-up of the book itself. Unlike Daughter of Smoke and Bone, Days of Blood and Starlight flits between the perspectives of Karou, Akiva, Zuzanna, and a plethora of secondary characters we are unfamiliar with. While I enjoyed, for the most part, the round and full picture this type of storytelling provided us with, I also found that some small chapters could have been entirely done away with. I kept expecting them to play a greater role in the novel, and unfortunately, they didn't. In addition, the secondary (or quarterary?) characters we're introduced to have such little screen time that it's tough to feel anything much for them beyond fleeting thoughts.