Review – Glass Sword (Red Queen, Book 2) by Victoria Aveyard (4/5 stars)

Reading Level: Young Adult
Genre: Fantasy
Length: 464 pages
Publisher: HarperTeen
Release Date: February 9, 2016
ISBN-13: 978-0062310668
Stand Alone or Series: 2nd book in the Red Queen series
Source: Borrowed from Library
Rating: 4/5 stars

“Mare Barrow’s blood is red—the color of common folk—but her Silver ability, the power to control lightning, has turned her into a weapon that the royal court tries to control.

The crown calls her an impossibility, a fake, but as she makes her escape from Maven, the prince—the friend—who betrayed her, Mare uncovers something startling: she is not the only one of her kind.

Pursued by Maven, now a vindictive king, Mare sets out to find and recruit other Red-and-Silver fighters to join in the struggle against her oppressors.

But Mare finds herself on a deadly path, at risk of becoming exactly the kind of monster she is trying to defeat.

Will she shatter under the weight of the lives that are the cost of rebellion? Or have treachery and betrayal hardened her forever?

The electrifying next installment in the Red Queen series escalates the struggle between the growing rebel army and the blood-segregated world they’ve always known—and pits Mare against the darkness that has grown in her soul.”

This is the second book in the Red Queen series and I enjoyed it but not quite as much as I enjoyed the first book. There are three books planned for this series.

This book finds Mare spending the majority of her time fleeing from place to place with the Red Guard trying to rescue the other Red Bloods with powers life herself. The Red Guard doesn’t trust Cal at all and trusts Mare only a very little bit. This encompassed the first half of the book and was a bit slow for me. Mare seems a bit tired through this part of the book and reminded me a bit of Katniss in Mockingjay; just worn out and sick of being used. She’s just too complacent.

The story picks up more in the second half of the book when Mare decides to actually do something useful with her status and power and I enjoyed this a lot more.

There’s a lot of tension between Cal and Mare throughout; they’ve decided to focus on their mission and not each other which makes for some interesting scenes.

I really do enjoy Aveyard’s writing style; it’s very engaging and easy to read. I do think that the first part of the story could have been paced a bit better and that the story as a whole was a bit bulky; but overall I enjoyed it.

Overall a good addition to the Red Queen series. This is a wonderful epic fantasy of sorts (if also has kind of a sci-fi, superhero, and dystopian vibe to it). There are a lot of politics and sneaking around. I would recommend to those who enjoy YA epic fantasy. I will definitely be reading the third book to see how things wrap up.

This book goes towards the following reading challenges:
– You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge
– New Release Challenge
– Flights of Fantasy Reading Challenge