Review: Dividing Eden

Dividing Eden by Joelle Charbonneau
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Normally, I love me a good Joelle Charbonneau book, but this one - her first stab at the fantasy genre, as far as I know - left me a little wanting. The concept's a pretty good one - royal siblings forced to fight for the right to rule their land, reminding me of Three Dark Crowns even though I haven't read it yet - but the execution kinda fell flat for me. A major issue, of course, was the third-person POVs used - similarly to Throne of Glass or And I Darken, and especially the latter only because it's split between the brother and sister. But at least Carys and Andreus aren't quite as unlikable as Lada - though neither of them really make a strong impression. They feel oddly bland as YA leads go, though I'll call Carys the true hero of this story because I feel a little more connected to her - and the ending to this book makes it clear she's the one we want to root for the most.

As far as genre goes, this one's predominantly fantasy, but with a few sci-fi twists - like the use of electric lights - that give me a strong sci-fi postapocalyptic impression as well, hence the blurb comparing this book to Red Queen. It's actually a little more in line with Prince of Thorns, with less emphasis on people with powers than RQ has - or, perhaps even better, with Game of Thrones, with the main threat to Eden being the Xhelozi, which are basically the werewolf version of White Walkers.

For my usual Charbonneau standard, Dividing Eden is a bit of a disappointment, but I'm reasonably interested enough to stick around for the sequel and hope it builds in quality from there.

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