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A review by the_bookishmum
The Crowns of Croswald by D.E. Night
Disclosure: I received this book for free from the publisher and NetGalley in exchange for a fair and honest review. All opinions are my own.
Ivy is a sixteen year old orphan girl who works in a castle as a scaldrony maid (a kitchen maid who works with ovens that are actually dragons) and has spent most of her life being mistreated by the cruel Helga who runs the kitchens. Her only friend is a dwarf who has known her her whole life and there is no magic in the castle where she lives (though she is aware of magic in the Crosswalds as a whole. After being kicked out of the castle after an incident involving pies gone wrong Ivy is dragged into a world of magic and learns that she also has magic after all. She is taken to magic school and begins her journey to becoming a scrivener with the mysterious circumstances of her family and the dark queen for some reason after her.
I really wanted to give this book more stars than this. I’m going to start this with some positives. The story itself is really good, the premise and plot were interesting. The magic system and world building were well done and I enjoyed the villain face off at the end. I’m a bit on the fence with the class based magic roles though (if you’re a royal you get a crown to do magic and if you’re poor you get a quill and basically get trained to work for the royals) it seems like they could have been given different schools. I do think that had I read this book as an 8-16 year old I would have enjoyed it, the magic is whimsical and the creatures are described in a way that brings life to them.
Now for some more negative parts:
The pacing was a little weird, it felt like an entire school year had passed in the blink of an eye. The characters were one dimensional and I really didn’t like the way the author treats the ‘Butterlove’ family, the mother is criticised for being fat and the only thing we truly know about the son is that they like butter. Even the main characters don’t feel like they have any depth, I suppose there is still chance for that with future books. The villain pops up randomly but until the end never truly feels villainous, it makes sense why Ivy has absolutely no fear towards her. The dialogue at times felt unnatural and way too polite in comparison to the situation. This is a personal thing but I feel that as the first book of the series it could have done with a cliffhanger, something to make you want to keep reading. A lot of the actual action and information barrels at you near the end which felt like a very tell don’t show approach.
In spite of the negatives though I would still read the rest of the series. I’m interested to know where this is going.
Ivy is a sixteen year old orphan girl who works in a castle as a scaldrony maid (a kitchen maid who works with ovens that are actually dragons) and has spent most of her life being mistreated by the cruel Helga who runs the kitchens. Her only friend is a dwarf who has known her her whole life and there is no magic in the castle where she lives (though she is aware of magic in the Crosswalds as a whole. After being kicked out of the castle after an incident involving pies gone wrong Ivy is dragged into a world of magic and learns that she also has magic after all. She is taken to magic school and begins her journey to becoming a scrivener with the mysterious circumstances of her family and the dark queen for some reason after her.
I really wanted to give this book more stars than this. I’m going to start this with some positives. The story itself is really good, the premise and plot were interesting. The magic system and world building were well done and I enjoyed the villain face off at the end. I’m a bit on the fence with the class based magic roles though (if you’re a royal you get a crown to do magic and if you’re poor you get a quill and basically get trained to work for the royals) it seems like they could have been given different schools. I do think that had I read this book as an 8-16 year old I would have enjoyed it, the magic is whimsical and the creatures are described in a way that brings life to them.
Now for some more negative parts:
The pacing was a little weird, it felt like an entire school year had passed in the blink of an eye. The characters were one dimensional and I really didn’t like the way the author treats the ‘Butterlove’ family, the mother is criticised for being fat and the only thing we truly know about the son is that they like butter. Even the main characters don’t feel like they have any depth, I suppose there is still chance for that with future books. The villain pops up randomly but until the end never truly feels villainous, it makes sense why Ivy has absolutely no fear towards her. The dialogue at times felt unnatural and way too polite in comparison to the situation. This is a personal thing but I feel that as the first book of the series it could have done with a cliffhanger, something to make you want to keep reading. A lot of the actual action and information barrels at you near the end which felt like a very tell don’t show approach.
In spite of the negatives though I would still read the rest of the series. I’m interested to know where this is going.