Review: Grey Sister

Grey Sister by Mark Lawrence
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Thanks to Netgalley and Berkley for providing me with an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review!

Mark Lawrence, you've done it again. I raved about Red Sister (ps, thanks for sharing my blog post on your Facebook page! I got a bunch of views! WOOHOO!), well, because it was deserved. Like I said in my review for that, I struggle with high/epic/dark/true fantasy because it tends to be slower and harder for me to get into... and harder for me to forgive overused tropes and predictable plots.

So I said in my Red Sister review that Lawrence created a pretty easy to understand world (still true), a cast of characters with personality, depth, and vitality (he kicked that up another notch!), a cool magic system (gets even more badass)... and he does all of these things again in book two... all the while basically destroying the world he created in book one and building a new reality for our characters. This one, unlike the first, doesn't involve being safe inside the walls of the convent. This new world is DANGEROUS and full of enemies.

I also loved that we got chapters from the POV of Abbess Glass, and got to see her story unfold alongside Nona's.

All in all, to those who ask if this is "better than the first," I'll have to reply it's equal. I can't compare the two because it's so different, it so completely demolishes the world of the first book and deeply affects Nona to her very core.

That ending though? Mark, you're killing me here. Write faster. I need to know ALL THE THINGS. RIGHT NOW. *GIMME*

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