Friday, October 23, 2015

Review: Soundless by Richelle Mead


Soundless by Richelle Mead
Publisher: Razorbill
Publication Date: November 10, 2015
Rating: 3 stars
Source: ARC sent by the publisher

Summary (from Goodreads):

From Richelle Mead, the #1 internationally bestselling author of Vampire Academy and Bloodlines, comes a breathtaking new fantasy steeped in Chinese folklore. 

For as long as Fei can remember, there has been no sound in her village, where rocky terrain and frequent avalanches prevent residents from self-sustaining. Fei and her people are at the mercy of a zipline that carries food up the treacherous cliffs from Beiguo, a mysterious faraway kingdom. 

When villagers begin to lose their sight, deliveries from the zipline shrink and many go hungry. Fei’s home, the people she loves, and her entire existence is plunged into crisis, under threat of darkness and starvation.

But soon Fei is awoken in the night by a searing noise, and sound becomes her weapon.

Richelle Mead takes readers on a triumphant journey from the peak of Fei’s jagged mountain village to the valley of Beiugo, where a startling truth and an unlikely romance will change her life forever...

What I Liked:

I LOVED this book... up until the ending. I kid you not. I was enjoying it (with the exception of a few small things) until I reached the climax and ending, and I didn't enjoy it much. It wasn't that the ending was BAD - the ending was satisfying! But in a very simplistic, unrealistic way. You'll see more of my thoughts on that later in the review! This book is a Pili-Pushed recommendation, and I'm counting it for the month of September (I'm one book behind, oops!).

Fei and her village are all deaf, and slowly, some of them are going blind. On the top of a mountain, they are helpless and cannot feed themselves, so some of the villagers are miners, who mine precious metals and send them via a zipline to the base of the mountain, and food comes back up the zipline, just enough or sometimes not enough to feed the village. They have no concept of who is behind the zipline, who is at the base of the mountain, what lies in the world beyond the top of the mountain. When Fei's sister is demoted from artistry (she's discovered as going blind), and Fei's hearing starts to return, Fei knows that she needs to do something. And that involves scaling down the mountain.

While I was reading, I was so incredibly sucked into this book. I HAD to know what Fei would discover, who would be sending the food, what the world would be like. Fei and a boy from her past, Li Wei, scale down the mountains, discovering bit by bit as they go. When they reach the base, and keep walking, what they discover is both wondrous and terrifying.

But I get ahead of myself. Fei is an artist, one of the selected few who are the recorders, the ones that paint every day to record history in pictures. Since there is no spoken communication (they are deaf, and they do not speak either), paintings are how history is kept. Li Wei is a miner. Miners are starting to go blind, but and Li Wei's father is one of them. Somehow, Zhang Ling (Fei's sister and fellow artist) is also going blind. Fei and Li Wei decide to go down the mountain to see if they can convince whoever is in charge of sending the food to send more.

Like I said, I was dying to know what Fei would find out. And it's fascinating, as they climb down, and what they discover at the base. The world-building of this story is incredible, very rich and well-detailed. I've never read a Mead book, but I'm sure this is is a product of her talent and numerous published novels.

I struggled a bit with Fei, but I think it's because her personality and mannerisms are a product of her environment and lifestyle. She's naive and ignorant at first, but again, this is because she knows no better. Her ancestors knew no better than mining and painting and waiting for food via zipline. Li Wei has her seeing things differently, which is how she ends up going with him down the mountain.

If you haven't guessed, the unlikely romance is between her and Li Wei. Years ago, Fei made the choice to apply to be an artist, leaving Li Wei to be a miner. An artist must marry an artist, so she broke his (and her) heart that day. Hence, unlikely. The two of them care greatly about each other, and this blossoms as the book goes on.

I loved this book, overall. It should have gotten at least four, maybe 4.5 stars from me. The ending, why did the ending have to be the catch?

What I Did Not Like:

The ending. It was entirely too simplistic, too neatly done, too perfect. Things wrapped up way too ideally. I wish I could go into the specifics, but it really bothered me how la-de-dah and happy-snappy things were at the end. Just two or three months passed, and suddenly, class differences have been erased, everyone loves each other, blah blah blah. Are you kidding me? Do you see how long it's taking racial differences to be eradicated in the world? And this issue is STILL present. The same goes for social classes, class differences. If that makes sense. This is super general, trust me, I haven't spoiled anything.

It's things like that though, that seem way to ideal and cute and cherry-on-top. Not realistic enough, and very wtf. Not to mention, a lot of things don't change, at the end. That all by itself is so irritating.

Also, there is a HUGE deus ex machina factor at the end that REALLY bothered me. Using deus ex machina is such a cop-out for authors, and this usage was no different. Sure, it was slightly hinted at throughout the book, but the presence of the... deus ex machina things were not physically in the story until the very end of the book. Hence the deus ex machina. So annoying! Sure, it takes care of things (helping that ending become really neat and whatnot), and answers questions, but it's so annoying. It sticks out like a sore thumb.

Fei. I didn't always like Fei. Like I said above, it's a product of her environment and lifestyl, the way she is. But sometimes she is so selfish and stupid and ignorant, you can't help but be annoyed with her. But for the most part, she grows up.

Would I Recommend It:

I really liked this (despite the ending), and I would recommend it. I didn't really mention the folklore, but that was pretty interesting. The world-building was unique and well-written, and for the most part, I liked the characters (definitely the romance). This novel is very unique, fantasy like I've not read before. Definitely something I'd recommend!

Rating:

3.5 stars -> rounded down to 3 stars. The rating is deceptive though, because I really enjoyed the majority of this book. The ending could have been much more developed (the book was so short and hello, this is a standalone!), but it's something that most people would probably overlook. Not a bad experience for my first Mead book!


Was this review helpful? Please let me know in the comments section!

32 comments:

  1. Oigh, I'm so sorry that the ending really didn't work for you! I had been expecting something like that since the very first mention of well, them, so I was not as bothered!

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    1. It was too neat, for me! Way to concise and idealistic. -_-

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  2. Sometimes the ending does disappoint, but I am glad you enjoyed the book overall.

    sherry @ fundinmental

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  3. BOO! That really sucks that you were enjoying this one so much until the ending. It does sound a little too perfect. I hope now that I know, that I'll feel better about it than you did.
    Lovely review, Alyssa!

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    1. I'm happy to warn everyone! Hopefully you love this one, Nick!

      Thank you. <3

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  4. is it november 10 yet? -flails- now you have me wondering what kind of killed this for you

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    1. I detailed what I didn't like pretty well? Really it was the ending, and it wasn't anything specific. The whole ending.

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  5. Your review was def helpful girl! I loved reading it and reading your thoughts about it!♡ I've read a similar review about this one and was surprised that the author was making more books after Hush Hush (not that I didn't think she would ever create again but I didn't knkw she has any other works out) I'm loving the uniqueness of this one though and see it growing more and more hype!:)

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  6. Lol "cherry-on-top" and "wtf"! I can totally imagine those reactions hahaha. I didn't have the highest interest in this one so I think it's still a pass for me ;) Thanks for letting me know about the ending!

    Have a great weekend Alyssa <3

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    1. I try and write exactly what I'm thinking in my reviews. :D Without being rude, of course. There are so many books to read, Eileen! Hopefully you read something awesome instead.

      Thank you, and you too!

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  7. Ok, yep, that will keep my expectations in the right place, but oh yes, I want to read this one. The worldbuilding has me intrigued. It's like a fairytale style story.

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    1. Definitely go in with low expectations in terms of the ending! And definitely fairy-tale-esque, a great fantasy novel with interesting folklore.

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  8. Oh man. Well I'm glad I didn't take this one on after hearing about the ending. That would annoy me I think. It does sound great other than that!

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    1. It was SO great in general! Just that "perfect" ending. Too cookie-cutter perfect.

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  9. I LOVE Richelle Mead, so naturally I'm excited to read this book! However, I've seen a lot of mixed reviews and I'm getting nervous... I'll admit, I had to look up what deus ex machina meant and.. Yeah, I'm super nervous now! I'm so used to Mead's epic series' and she's a cliffhanger goddess, so between the mixed reviews and the idea that it's a stand-alone... I'll keep my fingers crossed, since you said the majority of the book was good, though!

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    1. No cliffhangers in this book! Deus ex machina is basically when a divine power (or something supernatural and unexpected) swoops in and saves the day. Mead totally employs that in this book's ending, and it bothered me so much. Anyway, I hope you love this one, Meredith!

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  10. I'm glad most of it was good, but ooh that's sooo unfortunate about it being good until the end, bah. I can't decide to read this or not, haha, it sounds really good, but now I'm scared about the end!

    Lovely review, Alyssa!

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    1. It was great, minus the too-perfect ending! So really, the ending might not bother some people at all!

      Thank you!

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  11. Gorgeous review Alyssa. <3 Thank you so much for sharing about this book. I must say that I am still dying to read it, lol :D I am just SO EXCITED for it. I hope I will love it :D You make it seem awesome. Yay for romance :D But ugh. I don't like what you say the girl did to the romance years back. Hmph. How mean. But hope it is cute now, hih :) So glad you liked the book. But aw, I'm sorry the ending was disappointing to you :( I.. well, I love happy endings, lol, so I might not be bothered by this at all :) But I do get why it bothered you a lot. Sigh. I'm sorry. Thank you for sharing about it sweetie. <3

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    1. Glad we had the discussion on Twitter - I am late on this response! Hopefully you love it when you read it, Carina.

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  12. Ok, I skimmed since I have this up to read next month and I didn't want to spoil myself. I did start it and have read a few chapters and was really liking it. I'll be nervous as I go though since I've seen iffy things about it.

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    1. You might love it in general! Or you might love it up until the ending, like me. Literally it was JUST the ending, so it's no surprise that you're enjoying it so far.

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  13. I JUST finished Soundless and I SO agree with you about the ending... I loved the story until the last few chapters just wrapped up so jarringly! It felt like a cop-out... I wish that the ending had been longer, without the deus ex machine factor (as you so intelligently put it!), and that Mead had solved the problems more realistically. Oh, and I also wish that the characters had ended up in a different place... Still, overall, Mead wove a captivating tale!

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    1. RIGHT!? Maybe a bit rushed, and it could have been a little more creative? It sucks that everyone is basically where they started... UGH! But I agree, overall, it was good. Definitely okay for my first Mead novel!

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  14. I hate that you didn't like the ending! That bums me out, especially since you loved the book until then. I so want to read it!

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    1. I hope you get the chance to do so, Angela! It's definitely worth the read, especially if you had already wanted to read it!

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  15. You haven't read the VA series? (Don't let Nereyda hear you!) Anyway, I'm reading this one by next week and I have high hopes for it :) Let's see how I do with the ending...

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    1. Nope! *hides* This is my first of Mead's! Hopefully that new book that was announced yesterday will be my second. Hopefully you love this one, Liza!

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  16. I'm sorry you didn't enjoy the ending, it's dead disappointing when a book is wonderful and then just lets you down. I'm glad you enjoyed the rest of it though, the story seems really unique, and I can't wait to read it.

    Sophie @ Sophie Reads YA

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    1. It's worth reading, in my opinion! I just wish the ending could have been a bit more realistic. I hope you enjoy this book when you get the chance to read it, Sophie!

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