Tag: fantasy

Review: Shadow & Bone Trilogy

Shadow & Bone Trilogy by Leigh Bardugo (4/5)

I did a review for Shadow & Bone, but I wanted to do an overview for the entire series. I recommend this series for anyone who loves high fantasy with great world-building, fun twists, and questions of morality and fate. Also, anyone who has read Six of Crows first (like I did) and is underwhelmed by the first book, keep reading! I think it improves.

I actually enjoyed books 2 & 3 more than the first book. Part of this was the addition of Nikolai to the cast, but I think the characterization of all the characters improved, though I still prefer the characters in Six of Crows to anyone in Shadow & Bone. The message and writing grew stronger, as did the depth of emotion. The pacing for me improved as well.

Tropes You Might Want to Avoid

  1. Special Snowflake. You do still get the “special snowflake” trope with Alina in this series, which some people strongly dislike, but I think in this case it was done well. Especially after the first book. There’s a right way and a wrong way to do this trope–Leigh Bardugo does it right.
  2. The Scrawny, Not Pretty Girl. This one also improved after the first book, though it did annoy me in the very beginning. They make a point to tell us that Alina is skinny and unattractive, but this is kind of explained with the magic system so I forgive it. It’s not purely to make her seem more relatable.
  3. Love Triangles. Yes, plural. But it’s the type of love triangle where you know the whole time who she’s actually going to end up with and the other people are just vying for her attention. And really, the love triangles in this didn’t bother me. They didn’t exist for the mere purpose of creating drama. They made sense for the overall plot.

The tropes above are things that can annoy me when done poorly, but I think this series handles them all very well. If you seriously hate these tropes in all forms, then be forewarned.

Endings are the Hardest Part

I’ve read series where the ending didn’t measure up or actually angered me, but I genuinely love the ending of Rise & Ruin. Without spoiling, it’s one of those bittersweet “it couldn’t have ended any other way” endings. This book also made me cry a little, something that hasn’t happened with the last several books I read (which is saying something, because if anything is at all emotional it will probably make me cry).

Bad Science: Breaking Dawn

But Nicole! Twilight is a fantasy novel. Why are you bringing science into this?

Well, because Stephanie did. Or tried to.

I understand the impulse to explain magic by tying it to science, but if you’re going to do this, please do the research. This is such a brief part of Breaking Dawn (one chapter!) that it didn’t even need to exist, but it still managed to annoy me.

For those who haven’t read the book or don’t remember, Carlisle and Jacob spend a few paragraphs talking about chromosomes. Specifically, the fact that vampires and werewolves have a different number of chromosome pairs than humans. Humans = 23, werewolves = 24, vampires = 25.

Let’s start off ignoring the fact that getting turned into a vampire means you gain two extra pairs of chromosomes and focus on the faulty reproductive aspect of this. For vampires it matters less, since they’re not supposed to be able to reproduce anyway, but werewolves are another matter. If they have 24 chromosomal pairs, they would only be able to reproduce with other werewolves, lest they produce infertile offspring. The reason this is problematic is the same reason mules are usually sterile. A mule is a cross between a horse and a donkey, two species that have a different number of chromosomes. The resulting mule has an odd number of chromosomes (63), which disrupts the process of meiosis.

To really explain this, we’re going to delve deeper into genetics and molecular biology. You may remember meiosis and/or mitosis from biology class. Mitosis is how cells replicate themselves, producing an identical cell with the same number of chromosomes. Meiosis, on the other hand, is how our bodies made sperm and eggs, also known as gametes. We inherit half of our chromosomes from each parents, which means gametes need to have half the number of chromosomes, lest the offspring end up with way too many. During meiosis, chromosomes line up with their pair so they can be separated, producing cells that have only one set of chromosomes instead of two. The fact that mules have an odd number of chromosomes means that last chromosome doesn’t have a pair to buddy up with. This prevents meiosis from being successfully completed, and therefore mules have no sperm or eggs.

So how does this relate to werewolves? Since Meyer makes a point that most werewolves are male (Leah being the exception, blessed her poor tortured soul), it means that werewolves reproduce with humans. The result would be a child with an odd number of chromosomes (remember, humans have 46 chromosomes and werewolves have 48), and therefore they would experience the same reproductive problems as mules. They would be a genetic dead-end and werewolves would cease to exist.

As for the vampires, apparently drinking their blood and then dying somehow infects you with two extra pairs of chromosomes that infiltrate all of your cells and that turns you into a vampire. Vampirism would have to be a virus that can insert itself into your genome, those chromosomes carrying genes that can bring you back from the dead and allow you to exist without a heartbeat or blood.

Wait, did I just explain vampirism? Okay, Stephanie, I’ll give that one to you. But the werewolf thing still doesn’t work.

Update: I forgot to mention that Edward and Bella’s hybrid baby would have 23 pairs and 2 unpaired chromosomes, not 24 pairs as Carlisle implies. It’s an important distinction.