New Popular Romantasy! Shield of Sparrows - #Booktok Made Us Read It | Book Chat - Shelf Addiction Podcast

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hey, booklovers, Welcome back to shelf Addiction, the podcast where
we dive deep into the pages of thriller and fantasy reads.
I'm your host Tamara, and today we are diving into
a recent book, top popular romanticy.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
But first, quick heads up.

Speaker 1 (00:16):
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(00:36):
on the book Clubs app and don't forget to subscribe
and leave us a review wherever you're listening. Speaking of community,
I'm thrilled to welcome back my fantasy and romance writer
I co host Casey from heartfull of Ink.

Speaker 2 (00:47):
Welcome back, Casey, Yay. I'm so excited to be here.
Thanks for joining me on this one of course anytime. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:56):
So, you can find both of us online in all
the usual spots, the links for everything, or in the
show notes, so please do click around, do all the things.

Speaker 2 (01:03):
We appreciate you for doing it.

Speaker 1 (01:05):
Before we begin, I want to remind you that we
talk boll spoilers with book chats, so spoiler alert you've
been warned. Today we are discussing the book Shield of Sparrows,
written by Daphne Perry. The audiobook is narrated by Jason
Clark and Samantha Brittmore, published May six five by Entangled,

(01:26):
Red Tower Books and Tandor Media. The hardcover it's five
hundred and eleven pages. The unabridged audio is nineteen hours
in fifty one minutes.

Speaker 2 (01:35):
Wom Yes, that's long. Book, it is, casey. Would you
kindly share this synapsence. The God sent monsters to the
Five Kingdoms to remind mortals they must kneel. I've spent
my life kneeling to their will and to my fathers.
As a princess, my only duty is to wear the
crown and obey the king. I was never meant to rule,

(01:56):
never meant to fight, and I was never supposed to
be the daughter who sealed an ancient treaty with her
own blood. But that changed the fateful day I stepped
into my father's throne room, the day a legendary monster
hunter sailed to our shores the day a prince ruined
my life. Now I'm crossing treacherous lands beside a warrior
who despises me as much as I despise him, bound

(02:18):
to a future I didn't choose, and a husband I
barely know. Everyone wants me to be something I'm not.
A queen, a spy, a sacrifice. But what if I
refused the role chosen for me? What if I've made
my own roles? What if there's power in being underestimated?
And what if for the first time, I reached for it? Okay,

(02:41):
so when you finished the last page, do you want
to go first? Because I don't know if I'm having
the right reaction.

Speaker 1 (02:51):
Okay, I mean any reaction is appropriate, to be honest,
but yes, I think that.

Speaker 2 (02:56):
I was like, oh, that was good.

Speaker 1 (02:59):
You know, my first instinct was to say I liked it,
although I had several issues on the journey, so I
was like, Okay, I'm kind of curious to see where
things go. So it did lead me in a place
where I want to know what's going to happen next.

Speaker 2 (03:16):
So that's a good thing.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
That is a good thing because my first initial reaction
was I liked it. I feel like that's a win
for book talk.

Speaker 2 (03:25):
It is, it really really is, because normally we come
in here to book talk just hating, just straight hating. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (03:33):
Now, is this the quintessential pick for a romanticy?

Speaker 2 (03:39):
Is this the most unique book you ever read?

Speaker 1 (03:42):
Hell no, hell no, hell no, No, it's pretty.

Speaker 2 (03:51):
Yes, very very trophy. Yeah, And that's kind of where
I went to it was. It was a good read,
a good book. I just don't know if my brain
is like turned up to a ten on the editor scale,
because I spotted every single plot twist in the very beginning,

(04:14):
like from the initial onset of the story, and then
by the time we got to the end of the book,
I was just really annoyed that it had taken us
over five hundred pages to reveal all of this, and
I was like, I just want more from the story.
I've known this from the start. Give me something else. Yes,
And I don't think a normal person would have that real.

Speaker 1 (04:37):
You know what, I didn't spot every single one, but
I was pretty damn close. So the obvious one I
knew the Prince wasn't the prince immediately.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
From the media. They were in that throne room. Yes,
it was painted red on the wall obvious. Yeah, it
was like arrow, look at this. Yes, yes, it was
so obvious.

Speaker 1 (05:02):
And then for it to take so long to be revealed,
and I maybe that was the author trying to tease
us and get us like excited for their banter and
they're leading up too, and I guess she.

Speaker 2 (05:13):
Had to be real enemies and really hate each other.
But good god, that just went on.

Speaker 1 (05:20):
Forever forever, and for poor Dez to feel like she
was entitled to have lusty feelings about ransom, she had
to literally find the princess she thought was the prince
her husband.

Speaker 2 (05:36):
They've been gone for most of the book.

Speaker 1 (05:39):
Fairly around, but she had to find him with other
people in order for.

Speaker 2 (05:44):
Her, which was another big fucking clue. Yeah. Actually, as
soon as I saw that that maid was sleeping with
the king, I was like, okay, so she's evil, Yes, okay,
so she's a spy, she's evil, she's out to get
her sss or queen whatever. Like it was just like okay,
because a normal maid would not just randomly sleep with

(06:07):
the king who was married to her queen obviously has
not slept with his queen this whole goddamn time, even
though she tried to say that she met someone else
first and then and then they just shared.

Speaker 1 (06:22):
Because he likes to shar No, sounds like that's his
mom o. He likes to have three sons or something, so.

Speaker 2 (06:30):
Which they did mention early on in the book. But like, also, no,
you're not going to share the maid right, weird?

Speaker 1 (06:40):
And she in that particular maid was there, Josie or
joe Zell or something. She was ghost pretty quickly when
they got to their fight to the treehouse community, like
she wasn't around that much. The other Maybri was around,
but that one you never really saw her again. So
that was clear indicator she's off to no good mm hmm.

Speaker 2 (07:04):
Spying being a better spy. Yeah. And like even when
our princess was first put on the boat with her
two maids, she kept talking about how tall and beautiful
and strong they were, and I was like, do you
have a crush on them? Like are we gonna go
that route? Because that would be interesting. We did not
go that route, but she kept talking about that. I

(07:24):
was like, okay, so if we're not going down the
fun gay route, we're gonna see their spies.

Speaker 1 (07:32):
There's something else, Like oh, I really thought that the
prince xavior like the Prince.

Speaker 2 (07:42):
Yeah, I thought that she wasn't his type.

Speaker 1 (07:45):
Literally, I thought, he doesn't you have got the right equipment, girl,
that's why he don't like you. M But then later
when it was like, I was like, I have a
daughter and he's in threesomes. Yeah, I don't know what's
going on with him. He's just like a f boy
with a kid that he supposedly loves to death. Very strange,

(08:06):
but okay, I guess two things can be true. Oh god, yeah,
no personality though he didn't because the thing was he
was just supposed to act like the Prince. He was
supposed to be the Prince but also be a dad,
which is weird. I don't think he should have ever

(08:28):
been allowed to, like foe claim her because of the
situation they were in. So you're trying so that also
didn't make sense. You're trying to hide this girl, but
you're gonna let the guy who was pretending to be
the prince raise her.

Speaker 2 (08:45):
That's sound dumb, so dumb. It was so dumb. I'm sorry,
I'm sorry it was so dumb. Yeah, honestly, okay, normally
I don't like kids and books We've talked about this previously.
We hate the pregnancy trope. I also hate the little
kid trope, the one that's supposed to humanize everybody, and

(09:08):
everybody dotes on this little baby and she's like the
most precious thing and running out with her crossbow, and
everybody's like, oh, let's, you know, take her to go
buy toys and go do this and go do that.
I hate that so much. I hate that trope so much.
She was there as a pond to humanizeavior, make Ransom

(09:28):
look like he has some kindness in his heart. Yeah,
to give I don't even remember our main character's name,
death deess Odessa. It was meant for her to like
learn how to spy because she fails on her own,
so this four year old has to teach her how
to be a spy. Like it was just so she

(09:51):
was the most annoying thing in the whole story. She
literally helped her make two big discoveries. The child did
minimumly so.

Speaker 1 (10:01):
The books toward the end, it was the books that
were in the Queen's room. Who was acting like she
was the secret her secret room, the secret queen secret room.
And earlier she took her down to the dungeons or
something where she wasn't supposed to be. So this little
girl that's got a big mouth is most little kids.

(10:22):
And also like at one point she stopped her. I
was like, let's listen to these people talk. And Odessa
was like, wait, you listen to people talking. I was like,
you're supposed to be a spy. I know your dad
didn't teach you anything, but like stopping and listening to
people talk is spying. This four year old is teaching
you how to spy better than anything else in this story.

(10:43):
It was so to take it all the way down
to like the base. We understood that she had zero
plans on being the what do you call it, the
spare bride, the bride, the sparrow, the spirit.

Speaker 2 (10:59):
I thought it was going to be sister. She never
trained for it.

Speaker 1 (11:02):
The father always picked the sister as the sparrow, not her,
And we understand that.

Speaker 2 (11:08):
But I'd like to know why. And I guess we
kind of got a glimpse of the possibility at the
end of the book, but it seems so weird, Like
why are you dying your hair?

Speaker 1 (11:18):
Why you're the oldest, but you were never picked this
the sparrow? What is the secret, and that is something
we still haven't addressed. The author is holding that for
the next book annoyingly. Yeah, like give us a little
something like why and then why didn't you get any
of the training that your sister got?

Speaker 2 (11:38):
None? So she just like she went to weapons station once.
Felt so annoying, like what if that? Okay, So, first
of all, she is the oldest, and typically you know,
you have the air and then the spare. Yeah, the
second child is the spare, but somehow it's flipped here.
So the elder child is the spare who doesn't do anything,

(12:02):
doesn't learn anything, and you would think that her father
would have trained her at least a little bit, at
least over the years, been like learn how to spy,
learn how to interact with people and you know, listen
to conversations, or learn how to sword fight, because her

(12:22):
sister could sword fight, but she can't even run, just
to start with walking, which is absurd. It was good
that we got to see a heroine who can't do
anything and like has to start at the very fucking beginning.

Speaker 1 (12:39):
But yet she's cliff shomping. Mm hmm, you're cliff shopping
but you can't. But you can't run right. Oh okay,
so there are some things to be desired. Yeah, there
are some things that need explanation. If they they could

(13:00):
have been done better and execute it better. And I
agree with the child. The child was kind of cute,
but I also don't love the child being the center
of everything.

Speaker 2 (13:11):
Yeah, I could have. I would have enjoyed this book
a lot more without her period.

Speaker 1 (13:17):
She didn't need to be there. She really confused the
story more. Maybe it was just another layer of the onions,
so to speak. But now this kid is stuck with Daz,
I'm stuck with the prince's sibling, which.

Speaker 2 (13:35):
Again was also really obvious to me, because why else
would Ransom be nice to this random child.

Speaker 1 (13:41):
So you know that scene where she figures out that
Ransoms little treehouse is next to hers, and she thinks
there's a woman in there?

Speaker 2 (13:51):
Was her child in there?

Speaker 1 (13:52):
Yes, it's not what you think it is, dug It
never is.

Speaker 2 (13:58):
Oh, you're upset that he has somebody in there talking
to I was like, it's either Xavier or a child
or like something something else, a soldier or something his
mother and his mother.

Speaker 1 (14:10):
Yes, and what you think it is because you're so
dense m h m hmmm hm.

Speaker 2 (14:17):
And he was really mean to her.

Speaker 1 (14:21):
It's like it was his goal to have her hate
him the entire time.

Speaker 2 (14:26):
Which is dumb. But men are dumb, so like that slide.
So he is like.

Speaker 1 (14:33):
He accomplished his goal. And then they started using the
word hate.

Speaker 2 (14:38):
As love hate.

Speaker 1 (14:40):
I know you don't hate you, Yes you do, Yes
you should you know? Yes, I don't know. And then
all of a sudden, he just spills his guts. You know,
I'm dying. I'm I'm sorry, I lie. But now you'll
be free like all this, But is she really no,

(15:01):
she's gonna can She got taken and you just made
her promise to take care of your fucking sister.

Speaker 2 (15:06):
So what freedom is that. That's not freedom at all.
She's still bound to your land as queen. She'd probably
have to marry Xavier no matter what, because he was
still alive at that time. He might die, but he
will probably survive, because this author was like, oh wait,

(15:30):
he's still alive right now, so he'll probably live, but
he won't be the king anymore. I know. It looks
like Ransom has freed him up. That which is good.
This poor boy should not have been pretend prince for
eleven years. Yeah, over a decade of his life and

(15:51):
pretending to take care of somebody who is the princess.
But they're not letting her be the princess. But that
was sorry, I need to let that go. That was
just so it was a little much too. So they're
telling her she's the princess. So this little girl has
been lied to so bad.

Speaker 1 (16:07):
When she gets old enough, if someone tells her the truth,
she's gonna be like, wait a minute.

Speaker 2 (16:13):
She's gonna like try to destroy all of them because
because her real mother was her mentor made tutor person
but never told her and then got her head chopped off.
Her real father or her father is the king, is
the king, but her the man she's calling papa is

(16:39):
only kind of like her cousin.

Speaker 1 (16:41):
I guess it's her cousin cousin because he's the princess cousin.

Speaker 2 (16:45):
So that's her cousin. Ye, well, that's her cousin. And
then her uncle Ransom is actually her brother, and they
all know, and they're all just lying to her and
telling her we can't claim you because we don't want
people to think you're actually a princess. But we're gonna
let the fake prince claim you as a ward, so
you know you're a princess. But apparently that won't put

(17:09):
danger on your back.

Speaker 1 (17:12):
Still was Yes, if you're the ward of the prince
and they want to get back at the prince, they'll
take the kid that they know he cares about regarding
with that wood or not.

Speaker 2 (17:21):
They'll be like, oh, well, she's still a princess anyway
because she's under the care of the prince slash future king,
so she's in line for the throne. Let's get rid
of her. Like it was so dumb.

Speaker 1 (17:33):
Yeah, the tangled relationships didn't really like I understood it all.

Speaker 2 (17:40):
It was fine, but the reason for it seemed weak. Dumb.

Speaker 1 (17:45):
Yeah, the reason for it was weak, so we know.
And when we got his mother's story, that also was interesting.

Speaker 2 (17:52):
So the mother.

Speaker 1 (17:55):
Who is the tutor, the math science student, she's such
a briniac. She she was with a man and then
her father liked the man but said he wasn't of
this house or whatever, so she.

Speaker 2 (18:10):
Could he was like a different land.

Speaker 1 (18:13):
Yeah, so she ended up having to marry what's the
day the king's name, the king who also has our name.

Speaker 2 (18:21):
Oh, I don't know it's another our name is like.

Speaker 1 (18:27):
Ransom two point zero, just not something like that. Yeah,
I don't know whatever. So she marries him but never
loves him. But apparently he loves her so much he
gives her everything and just hopes and praise that this
woman will start loving him one day. She never does,
so he gets angry.

Speaker 2 (18:48):
So I had a question about this. Yeah, Supposedly, when
Ransom was telling the story, her lover was already dead,
but when the king was killing her, he was strangling
her and kept saying, you killed him. Do we think

(19:08):
that one is the king infected because this was almost
identical to how the soldier tried to kill Odessa, strangling
her and saying like you killed him, I need to
kill you. Or two? Do we think that the queen
infected her lover at the time and maybe accidentally killed

(19:29):
him herself and then the king just kind of stumbled
upon it.

Speaker 1 (19:35):
I don't remember him saying you killed him? And this
is like when when the king burst found her right.

Speaker 2 (19:41):
Well this, yeah, this was told her Ransom's point of view.
So Ransom came into the room and saw his father
strangling his mother, and I think I need to go
back and reread this, but I think he kept saying like,
you killed him, it's your fault. It was something like that. Well,
but then when Odessa was nearly strangled by the soldier,

(20:05):
it felt again like this is a very similar situation,
which makes me one question. And then we found out
that the mother was, you know, behind everything, So I
was like, did she try and poison her husband? Did
she poison her lover? With this? Like, I.

Speaker 1 (20:22):
Don't there's something. I think there's a connection that is
missed there. Okay, because when that one random person on
the street tried to kill Odessa, he was like talking
about how his body was burning and he had to,
like I guess, do what he had promised, which was
killed her. So it wasn't exactly the same other than

(20:46):
the strangling itself, like it felt.

Speaker 2 (20:48):
And that's that's what I was wondering because this author,
every other thing had been so like, oh, you know,
every other plot twist was so visible. This one felt
like it was supposed to be a plot twist too,
but it just wasn't resolved in this story. So I
don't know if it's going to come out in the

(21:09):
next one or I'm just like grasping for something new
that I didn't notice.

Speaker 1 (21:16):
So Okay, at this point, I'm not sure who could
make that revelation. Maybe the king, Yeah, maybe maybe he
can express what he what was happening because she's dead.

Speaker 2 (21:31):
East left. But do we trust him? Probably not.

Speaker 1 (21:34):
No, everyone is kind of an unreliable narrator, like they
all have the versions of things.

Speaker 2 (21:43):
But Ransom was a teenage boy and he was watching
his father try to murder his mother. So it was
mostly the strangling that was like, Okay, this seems to
be similar. This seems to I don't know, it just
it felt weird. So who do you think sent the
So you think the king? I don't know if the

(22:05):
king sent the soldier or if it was the magical
men doing it, or if this author is going on
a deeper level, which she hasn't yet, So I don't
know if I trust this, but like it could be
a thread through the monsters. But that's the thing.

Speaker 1 (22:21):
Why would they choose to kill Odessa because she doesn't
look like the queen at all with this stark red hair.

Speaker 2 (22:33):
No, no, no, no, there's something about Odessa that people
want her dead.

Speaker 1 (22:38):
But see, I don't know if it's even that, like
honest to god, I'm not sure they want her dead.
I almost feel like that random guy on the street
is something separate from the monsters because okay, because.

Speaker 2 (22:52):
I feel like the monsters were coming to her.

Speaker 1 (22:55):
Yeah, they were like drawn to her, but I'm not sure,
like all that that last fight, she's doing, all that
running around and shit, and no one tried to kill her.

Speaker 2 (23:06):
Not really. She's like, yeah, that's fair. So I don't
accept the magic men kidnapped her at the end. I
cannot remember the name of their magic.

Speaker 1 (23:14):
Right, So maybe I feel like there's something else the
author is not revealed yet.

Speaker 2 (23:19):
Oh absolutely, because I don't.

Speaker 1 (23:22):
I don't think that makes sense to kill her because
if the crux, the biggest crux there, we found out
at the end it's her mother. Huh we think it's
her mother? Think yes, because it's not been put on
the page that that is her mother. But the woman
the monster turned into a woman that had the identical hair,

(23:43):
yes as Odessa. So I'm like, she would not come
to kill her own child. There's something else, yes, Oh yeah, no,
I don't.

Speaker 2 (23:53):
Know it's it's.

Speaker 1 (23:59):
So she so the to be fair, I guess the
author did a good enough job making things tangled enough
that we still have to read the next book to
get everything untangled.

Speaker 2 (24:11):
Yes, absolutely, there's just enough where I'm like, Okay, what
are you trying to do? And then of course I'm
gonna read it and be like, oh, yes, duh. Of
course it was this very simple thing. It's the whole time.

Speaker 1 (24:25):
Yeah, it's gonna be like, oh yeah, that makes total sense,
that makes sense.

Speaker 2 (24:31):
I don't know. I just there's a lot going on.

Speaker 1 (24:35):
There's a lot of a lot, a lot of a lot,
and sometimes that's good. And I guess that kind of
kept me interested, even though, like I said earlier, I
was able to spot some of the reveals early on.
Mm hmmm, Like the only thing I didn't expect was

(24:55):
that her mother would be a monster.

Speaker 2 (24:57):
I kind of knew something there has something. I knew
something was going on with her mother and the monsters.
I didn't know the monster would turn into her mother's exactly.
But like again in chapter one or chapter two or whatever,
it was like she walked through that hall and had
all the pictures of that bird, it had all the
pictures of the monster destroying people, and even her father

(25:18):
was like, damn you and your attraction to that hallway
or whatever, like you know, he wouldn't get rid of it.
So I was like, okay, so this is very important,
this is somehow connected to her and voila mother at
the end.

Speaker 1 (25:31):
But so far she's not turned into anything. She's not
been able to do something she was surprised by. Right,
she's totally she was. So far she's been totally normal.
I kept waiting the whole book, were like, okay, when's
your magic gonna just sprout?

Speaker 2 (25:48):
Like what is it? What is your magic? What's gonna say?
Same and again, like in the early chapter, she picked
up that necklace from her hiding spot and put it
on and like felt the magical tingles. Yeah, and then
of course she felt the magic with the magic men
around the castle, and I was like, okay, so you
have magic. We were establishing this early on. You have magic,

(26:09):
and like you, I kept waiting for something to happen.
I kept waiting for it to come up, but it
never did. It was like, come on, yeah again, we're
what six hundred pages in before she learns that like
everybody else doesn't feel the magic, nobody else is scared
of them because they don't feel it. But we've been

(26:31):
so obvious.

Speaker 1 (26:32):
It's obvious because there were other times where she had
touched the guy she had this reaction.

Speaker 2 (26:37):
Everyone else just standing around, I know, the kids running
to go play with him. They're like, oh yeah, bubbles crowns,
it's so pretty.

Speaker 1 (26:47):
Yeah, it's just her. And I'm like, why don't you
express yourself like you're starting to trust Ransom a little bit?
Why don't you say anything like you're just not gonna
say anything like.

Speaker 2 (26:57):
Well, she finally finally does after he sees her screaming
about it. Yeah, Like it was just so long. It
just I wish this author hadn't dragged out all of
her plot twists, give us some early It was really
she had the great setup with it, but I wish

(27:21):
she had revealed these things earlier and then we could
have gotten more out of this story.

Speaker 1 (27:27):
You know, the perfect time to have revealed ransomis the
Prince would have been when that first training montage and
you know, the faux prince was like enough and he
says when I say it's enough, he said no, when
I say yes.

Speaker 2 (27:42):
Like that would have been good and they're on the
boat even like, and then they could have still been angry.

Speaker 1 (27:49):
At each other and still hate each other, and it
would have been making more sense for them to take
a longer time to you know, I guess kind of
starting for each other.

Speaker 2 (28:01):
Yeah. No, it was just annoying, Like at this point,
I am, I am sure. I'm positive they're readers out
there who don't pick up on that, just because they
haven't read as many books as us, so they're not
as attuned to the trope, says us, like one hundred
percent readers out there who will be surprised by that.

(28:24):
I just it just graded on me. Yeah, it just
graded on me because I think you said it was
seventy one percent of the way.

Speaker 1 (28:33):
I made a note I said, oh my god, seventy
one before christ is No, that was a long time.

Speaker 2 (28:40):
Who's long?

Speaker 1 (28:42):
The whole time I kept thinking like, okay, when is
he gonna say something now? Is somebody gonna say something now?

Speaker 2 (28:47):
Like what's mm hmm. It just kept going on and
on and on, and he would come and go and
come and go, go off and fight, come back, go
off and fight.

Speaker 1 (28:54):
It was the fightnoying was a plot device and just
keep them apart, to keep yeah, m and.

Speaker 2 (29:03):
The concept, oh well my husband does this and I
need to think about my husband over here, and I'm like,
he's been gone for like two months. You don't need
to pretend you care about him. Yeah, you've spoken like
three sentences to him because he doesn't speak. He has
no personality. He is just there in the air, so

(29:25):
to speak like it was just he was gone.

Speaker 1 (29:28):
They decided for the Fau Prince not to speak, just
so that in case someone asked something he couldn't answer,
pretty much like.

Speaker 2 (29:39):
When they were teenagers, somebody would ask him stuff and
he just wouldn't respond because he didn't know. And then
they're like, well, well let's just make you mute. Let's
just say the Prince is mute. Yeah, he only talks
to a small circle of people. M h.

Speaker 1 (29:54):
I mean even the people he's sleeping with don't know.
He can talk, apparently, which is why old how do
you stay during a threesome? Like it's not just but
he probably just can't talk. I guess that's even weirder.
Why don't you speak? If you can grunt? Like, come on, if.

Speaker 2 (30:22):
You can make all these noises, why can't you speak.
I don't know, it's so weird.

Speaker 1 (30:27):
It's definitely again, there are things that need to be
tidied up a little bit.

Speaker 2 (30:32):
M m mm hmm.

Speaker 1 (30:35):
It's that I think just not speaking wasn't the way
to go, although that was an easy way to make it.

Speaker 2 (30:40):
Was the easiest way to make it work. Yeah, it
was the easy way to trick her.

Speaker 1 (30:44):
It was the easy way to try to do a
sleight of hand at that that marriage sham.

Speaker 2 (30:50):
But even though we spotted it right away. I mean, seriously,
if you were making a binding magical contract mm hmm,
you should be the one speaking. If somebody says I
speak on behalf of the prince, they are the prince. Yeah, duh, duh.
Like that was just the most okay, dumb moment. And

(31:13):
then I kept expecting him to reveal it and reveal
it and reveal it, and I was just like no,
Like it was he obvious.

Speaker 1 (31:21):
He held on to so many secrets, and the author
did that. I think it's more ways to kind of
create tension, I guess, But he didn't need to hold
on to all the secrets. Like when he says, you know,
the story of his mother, and he talks about the
little girl and stuff, why couldn't he just say who
his mother was at that point. Obviously Odessa wasn't going anywhere.

(31:47):
Obviously he trusted her at that point, you're gonna tell
her this much in that you're gonna make her try
to figure out who your mother.

Speaker 2 (31:52):
Is, just say well, it may have been one of
his blood oaths. Because she did even joke about this,
She's like, how do you have any blood left when
you've made all of these blood oaths? And I laughed
out loud at that, because I's like, yeah, no, he's
made a shit ton of blood oats to so many people. Stupid.
He doesn't he didn't make a blood and it doesn't

(32:13):
make sense, and it's just creating tension where there doesn't
need to be. He's an adult.

Speaker 1 (32:19):
He was an adult when he rescued quote unquote his mother.
He does not need a blood oath not to tell
people who his mother is. He's an adult, he's not
a child.

Speaker 2 (32:30):
You'd think, you'd think there were so many things that
just yeah, like that, that.

Speaker 1 (32:35):
Just I'm going to rescue and hide you and hide
my sibling, and then I still have to.

Speaker 2 (32:40):
Do a blood oath for what. That's dumb. Maybe so
he couldn't tell his dad if he was ever taken
and tortured. I don't know.

Speaker 1 (32:53):
This character seems like he would die before he lets
a secret out of his mouth that he doesn't want to.

Speaker 2 (32:58):
Well, yes, but I don't know. I'm trying to come
up with the explanation and I got nothing. Well, I
don't know.

Speaker 1 (33:07):
The only people that should be under blood olds are
people that have a possibility of talking, like the other
than nanny right or whatever?

Speaker 2 (33:18):
Who was helping his mother.

Speaker 1 (33:21):
She couldn't tell, but she was still going around giving
her books to learn them anyway.

Speaker 2 (33:26):
She's like, I can't tell you, but I can give
you all of these books. I can't tell you, but
I can look at her and say, just tell them now. Yeah,
I guess it's a loophole. I guess so.

Speaker 1 (33:37):
So technically, I guess Ransom could have said, you know,
I can't tell you who my mother is, but you
don't have to look very far.

Speaker 2 (33:47):
And she's a great in science. Yeah she's around here
in this house. You've met her. You know who she is.

Speaker 1 (33:58):
Yeah, I don't know something, but you know, I think
the author was really she was trying.

Speaker 2 (34:05):
I feel like she was trying.

Speaker 1 (34:07):
But as you mentioned, as seasoned fantasy readers, the stuff
is just so.

Speaker 2 (34:14):
Obvious, so obvious. Yeah, and it's again like if she
had laid this groundwork and then done some of these
reveals at twenty percent, at thirty percent and like slowly
revealed more and more and then had more plot twists
at the end, that would have been fantastic.

Speaker 3 (34:35):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (34:35):
But the fact that like again seventy one percent of
the way through the book, we finally figure out or
she finally admits that he's the prince and our herain
finally understands what's been going on this whole time. Like, no,
that's way too damn long. Co sign on what you're saying.

Speaker 1 (34:55):
Okay, this is actually a great place to take a break.
You gotta check out these commercials by listening to those
you are supporting the podcast. Don't forget to pick up
a copy of the book or journal available right now
and will be right back. Okay, welcome back everyone, Let's
finish this conversation. So, you know, one thing that bothered
me as well is why were they treating her like

(35:19):
a freaking prisoner? So because she was like, okay, everybody,
everybody in Ransom was streaming her like a prisoner, like
she talked about when she wasn't go up to her
little tree house.

Speaker 2 (35:34):
She'd go to bed.

Speaker 1 (35:36):
The the step that would take a letter would disappear
and then it will reappear in the morning. I'm like,
what do you think she's gonna do? Exactly? We have someone.

Speaker 2 (35:49):
My question is were they smart enough to do with
this with the maids as well? No, they weren't. WHI
should makes them dumb? Right, Like, so you obviously this
princess is true to lie. You know, she's trying to
se because she can't lie to save her life, but
her maids, right, But that's not the whole point, Like

(36:09):
why haven't do that to her?

Speaker 1 (36:11):
If one, you know she can't fight, train her, she
can't fight, she can't kill anybody. You know, she's lying.
You know, you know she's not good at it. It's
almost like just letting a child room around. She's not
gonna be able to do shit. Like, why are we
doing this?

Speaker 2 (36:26):
It's not like she's a four year old. Yeah, I
don't understand. Where do you think she's gonna run to
and do what? Exactly?

Speaker 1 (36:37):
So I didn't really understand the whole I'm gonna keep
you in this street house scenario, and yeah, you're right,
why not do that to her maids?

Speaker 2 (36:45):
Why not or put the three of them together and
lock them in the tower together, like that would have
made more sense.

Speaker 1 (36:57):
Now.

Speaker 2 (36:57):
And then at the end, he was always talking about well,
I want to give your freedom, Like what fucking freedom? Right?
What freedom?

Speaker 1 (37:04):
There is none? And the character did say, what freedom?
What are you talking about? Mm hmm, Yeah, it was
the whole thing was but yeah, no, the prisoner stuff,
the way they kept her locked in the towers and
in her rooms and you can only do this, and
you can only do that, and you can't leave, and

(37:25):
it was annoying and the funniest thing. And I thought,
this is well, I knew what was going to happen
when she and her one made Brianna or Briella whatever.
I think they'd make a plan for her to sneak out.
So she's gonna sneak out, go to the town. And
I can't even really remember what her goal was what

(37:45):
she was supposed to be doing, just spying.

Speaker 2 (37:48):
I think she was just looking for anything at that
point to make a map or do. I don't know.

Speaker 1 (37:53):
She just didn't have any information still, she had nothing. Yeah,
so they make a plan, she gets out of there.
I'm like, obviously he knows you're gone, you dummy, obviously.
So because she had this dye in her hair, she's like, oh,
I'll have my lady's maid walk around look like me,
and I'll just take the die out with my stark

(38:15):
red hair.

Speaker 2 (38:17):
Because it's so easy to get browned eye out of
red hair. Yeah, like that was just so easy. At
every turn she was like, oh my hair got wet. No,
it's bright red again. Like this dye just does this
day right off. Yeah, I've never heard of that.

Speaker 1 (38:35):
But anyway, so she goes if she sees, you know,
Ransom flirting up with some girl, you know, and she's
all acted jealous, I'm like, oh my god, of course
he's right there in her room.

Speaker 2 (38:46):
Once she gets the room, I'm like, funny, yeah, no,
that was a dumb one. My thing though, I got
really fucking mad at her when she just sat in
there ate her and then crawled into bed. Yeah, And
I was like, what are you doing, dumb princess. Yeah,
you just broke out of your tower, so to speak.

(39:09):
You're on your own, you have your freedom, and you
just crawl into bed and like pout and cry that
he caught. You leave the fucking hotel, go to the bar,
go spy, and do whatever you want to do. But no,
she just like had to sit under the covers and
pout until he crawled back through the window. So weak,

(39:30):
so weak, Like she didn't even have to do anything big,
just go down to the bar, go down and eat
her dinner around other people and listen to conversations like
she couldn't. That was her whole goal. But as soon
as she was I'm just gonna lay in bed. Yeah,
I'm just gonna stay here and do nothing. I mean,
she could have flirted with the random deuce to try

(39:51):
to get information. She could have did anything, be sads,
just stay in that room exactly. She could have done anything.
She didn't. And then the next day the monster's attacked
and she did fight, and I was like, okay, good,
you have some sort of backbone, But like, for the
love of God, don't just stay in your hotel room
and do nothing.

Speaker 1 (40:13):
Yeah, And then when the one lady dies, she's like,
oh no, is that his girlfriend?

Speaker 2 (40:18):
She did I'm sorry, not sorry. It was a sorry,
not sorry, That's what I felt like. She's She's like,
I feel so guilty, but also maybe now he's actually
single again. Yeah, exactly, So I mean there was and
then it turns out he was always single. It was

(40:40):
never with her. No, it was all illusion in her head.
But that's so.

Speaker 1 (40:46):
There were some funny things as well. There were some
things that so that so the story did half. Things
sprinkled throughout that kept my attention, which was good because
the pacing, what's the great?

Speaker 2 (41:03):
So it was slow, it was ungodly slow. I do
want to say, like I've said this before, I really
appreciate when we have a heroine who cannot fight, actually
learn how to fight and have to go through all
the months of training and lots of basics, Like I
appreciate that because so often we're like, oh, you don't

(41:25):
know how to fight, here's a sword. Two days later
you're defeating people who've been training for years. Like I'm
sick of that. So I am happy that it took
her forever to learn how to fight, and then like
at the end, she's like, oh yeah, months and months
of training do pay off.

Speaker 1 (41:40):
And she's still an average fighter at best. She's not
really that great because when that guy attacked her banner, yeah,
banner fiance, right, So which Also that didn't make any sense.

Speaker 2 (41:54):
So you're gonna come by your fiance.

Speaker 1 (41:57):
And then put a uh well a bullseye on your
back because you're gonna be dead after you attack her.

Speaker 2 (42:04):
Period. Well, he wasn't thinking with any sort of logic.
He's a dumb man like that. Also, his brother was
like into human trafficking, and he was just like like
what it was a fight over a girl.

Speaker 1 (42:21):
So he was gonna get revenge by killing Dez because
once he found out who the real prince was, he thought, hey,
I can kill you and get back at him because
he killed my brother. But my brother was not a
good person, so I mm hmm is this very crazy?

Speaker 2 (42:44):
Again? It felt like a not quite fully thought out
plot point. This is kind of like we've talked about
some of the other plot points here where it was like, okay,
you want to set it up so like her fiance heyes,
man she's going off with, and then we we need
him to show up at the end so she can

(43:04):
prove that she knows how to fight. But we're just
gonna like throw in this random story and it just
doesn't really fit and it doesn't really work. And maybe
he was gonna lie and say that like somebody else
killed her or the monsters came in and killed her
and it wasn't him, but also he wanted that revenge.
But also apparently he's been like so staunchly loyal to

(43:28):
her father forever that like this would break that loyalty. Well, yeah,
you go and kill his daughter. So I don't know
that one. That one wasn't thought.

Speaker 1 (43:40):
Out, like I guess, but why, like you have more
reasons not to do it than to do it than
to try to kill her.

Speaker 2 (43:48):
Mm hmm.

Speaker 1 (43:49):
So you're saying, you're a brother that wasn't a good person.
Takes precedence over your fiace that you apparently love and
came to rescue. Mm hmmm, takes residence over your loyalty
to this king and your place.

Speaker 2 (44:03):
I mean all of this, like it did not make sense. No,
his whole character did not make sense. It was more
of the trope, Like he was just a trope character
than an actual thought out plot point.

Speaker 1 (44:19):
So that's where things start to break down with some
of her connections and motives. Because as long as it
makes sense, as long as it's logical, I can just
accept it.

Speaker 2 (44:34):
But especially in this case, there was no logic about it,
No at all. No, And I mean sometimes there are
people and characters who aren't using logic, like they're so
consumed with emotion. But for him, it didn't really fit
with his character. No, he planned to come rescue Brielle.

Speaker 1 (44:58):
He planned that, he did all this stuff to get there,
and then he does not throw it away just like that.

Speaker 2 (45:06):
Yep. And then they both die and it doesn't matter anyway. Yeah,
they both die. How you like that? You like that
they're both dead? It's fine.

Speaker 1 (45:17):
And that's another thing I can't give props to as well.
I like, when people die, you can't have this kind
of danger quote unquote, like these monsters are really lethal. Oh,
people must die every time there's interaction with that. And
that was I yeah, like you have to give props
to this author. She was ruthless.

Speaker 2 (45:41):
She killed off so many people, people we knew, people
we didn't know. At the end, it was everybody we knew,
but like they'd be random attacks throughout and she'd be like,
this little boy is getting his head chopped off. Yes,
I was like, oh damn. Yeah. Some of it's like
gory too, like oh damn.

Speaker 1 (45:58):
They really She's not You're dead, She's with murdering people
in the most perfect ways. It's fine. So I actually
didn't mind that too much. I like one of the
things I really appreciated about the story is that like
nobody was safe. Yeah, and that's how it has to be.
You can't have this kind of danger, have this kind

(46:20):
of story. And I'm actually glad the mom died too.
I'm glad that he died because you have to take
players off the chessboard. You have to, you have to,
and he should just be lucky or we you know,
I guess the character should be lucky that the faux
prince even lived. I expected him to die, but then
to see that he was kind of like.

Speaker 2 (46:40):
I know, I know, that felt like a cheat where
I was like, Okay, he's dead, he's dead and gone,
and then oh no, he might actually survive. I'm like this,
this feels like a you tried to kill him off
and then you couldn't.

Speaker 1 (46:53):
At the end, Well, now he's alive enough. Hopefully he
will heal and can take his child back. Because the
last thing I want is to have Odessa running around
with this kid. I know I would not that shit's
gonna know in my ass, like put her somewhere with
these magic people until you know Ransom can come get

(47:18):
her yor you know her daddy quote unquote can come
and get her. Put her down, Sit that character down somewhere.
I don't know how that's gonna work, but if I
have a whole book of her running around behind Odessa,
that's gonna be infuriating.

Speaker 2 (47:36):
Completely infuriating. She's young, she's young still, she's four years old.
Four year olds are barely potty trained. Uh what is this?

Speaker 3 (47:49):
Mm hmm?

Speaker 2 (47:51):
Seriously, how are you gonna fight anybody? Do anything? And
you gotta look.

Speaker 1 (47:57):
She not.

Speaker 2 (47:57):
She lets her little crossbow and she runs out and
like to be a hunter like her papa.

Speaker 1 (48:05):
You have this toddler and this little baby wow animal
mm hmmm that you try to look. I actually was
waiting on that animal to attack Banner and it didn't happen.
I was like, she put the thing, she put the
little carrier down. I thought the animal will go over

(48:25):
there and try to bite the egs or something. Monster pet. Yeah, like,
what are you good for? Are you supposed to go
after the enemy? The pat couldn't even do anything but
sit there and be scared.

Speaker 2 (48:38):
So one theory I have for the future book is
that our little four year old princess is going to
be abducted and then the monster's going to track her down.
For like, because they kept playing hide and seek and
showing how like, oh, look, he can like run around
and smell where she's been, and he knows exactly where

(49:00):
she's hiding the under this bed or in this closet
or whatever. But it was like so detailed of like, oh,
he ran into this room and he stayed in this
spot because she stood here for a moment. So I'm like, Okay,
so in the next book she's getting kidnapped and this
month's gonna find her. That would be a good way
to like put that character out of commission for a while.

(49:21):
But then we're going to spend the whole time worrying
about her and trying to find her. It's gonna be
a whole thing. Yeah, but yeah, way, the way they
detailed that hide and seek game, I was like, if
this does not happen in the future book, this is irrelevant,
Like this should not have been included in the story
at all. But because it was included, and because it

(49:42):
was so detailed.

Speaker 1 (49:44):
She needs to be captured at this point Yeah, absolutely,
I think that's a good I guess guess of what
will happen. I think that's pretty solid. That's pretty solid guess,
unless she just waste it, grows it away, unless.

Speaker 2 (50:02):
She was like, I just need to take up more
space in my book, Let me add some pages here.

Speaker 1 (50:06):
Yeah, I feel like she picked the most random monster
that won't be able to do shit because I don't know.
This thing's supposed to grow and get really scary and
hard to kill mm hmm. But I feel like she
picked a weakling that can't defend itself.

Speaker 2 (50:26):
I mean, yeah, he was the run and he is.
I don't know. He's growing. Hopefully he'll grow into something better,
grow into like an adult attitude. I guess. I don't know.

Speaker 1 (50:37):
Maybe he would not be scared, you know, scared of
other I don't know. I guess we'll have to see
what she ends up doing with her pet monster. Because
that thing is not going away. Yeah, she's not going
to release it, or she does, it's going to come
right back, of course. Yeah, or she'll never release it
and he'll be you know, I don't think she'll really
have for.

Speaker 2 (50:56):
Her Yeah, I think I think she's going to keep
it forever.

Speaker 1 (51:00):
Yeah, So what about the green slash black blood?

Speaker 2 (51:05):
Do you think that was interesting? I mean it was
just easy to see who was infected and who wasn't. Yeah,
it didn't really, I don't know. For me, that was
just like, Okay, here's your world building. Infected people have
green blood. All right, let's move on.

Speaker 1 (51:23):
Yeah, it was like, what do you think about his
mother kind of creating the catalysts for that?

Speaker 2 (51:33):
That was interesting? Yeah, that I will say. I really
enjoyed that plot twist. I saw it coming just because
like she kept pointing her finger at the magic Douche
like they did it. They did it, they did. I'm like, Okay,
obviously they didn't do it, because when you keep pointing
at them, it's never them.

Speaker 3 (51:54):
Yep.

Speaker 2 (51:56):
But I did appreciate the fact that it was the
mother being like, oh, I need to save my people,
I need to save my son. I want to try this,
and oh, well you'd lost so much blood. I had
to give this to you. And all these other people
took it and never affected them, but all of a
sudden it affected you after the bite.

Speaker 1 (52:15):
Well you know, so it took something that was good,
well intentioned, right, She wanted to make them more durable
people where they could hide for a long time and
be underground and be more resilient, be able to fight,
you know, just make them stronger, healthier. She wanted to
biohack them a little bit, That's what she wanted to do,

(52:37):
but it ended up turning into this thing where now
her husband is trying to create soldiers.

Speaker 2 (52:44):
M h infallible soldiers, which is a smart thing to
do as a king. I guess if you want to
fight monsters, yeah, let's try turning them into superhuman moms.
Stirs too. Well, he just.

Speaker 1 (53:02):
Doesn't know that the catalyst for what changed Ransom was
a bite, being bitten, so that's the difference failing. Yeah,
he's killing people by injecting them with probably the blood
or whatever.

Speaker 2 (53:20):
I don't know, she said, trying to say, sorry, go
ahead again. I keep ranting about this, But like the
moment the king and Ransom saw each other and spoke
to each other, like it was so obvious, like you
have one month to come home, like okay, obviously this
is a father speaking to his son. Yeah, sorry, I'll

(53:40):
try to stop ranting about that. But that was just
so many clues everywhere, every time, it was always.

Speaker 1 (53:50):
So the prince was standing there, but clearly he's talking
to him.

Speaker 2 (53:55):
He's talking to I'll see there in that moment, I
thought it was just.

Speaker 1 (53:58):
Ransom, I thought, but he was like, well, maybe it
was a different scene. But at one point the father
was there, the king was there, and both of hers,
Ransom and the prince faux prince were there, and that
writing actually said, you know he's looking over here, because

(54:20):
he's like, yeah.

Speaker 2 (54:22):
I know you're standing in front of me, but you
get your yeah.

Speaker 1 (54:27):
No.

Speaker 2 (54:28):
There were multiple scenes where they all interacted, but there
was one very specifically where he was like, you have
one month and I thought it was just just her
and Ransom and I was like, okay, so do you
get it now? Do you get it now? And she
didn't get it, and it's just.

Speaker 1 (54:43):
Yeah, I think that was the place where they were
trying to leave before he got there, like he had
something until that they were coming, yeah, and they couldn't beat.

Speaker 2 (54:53):
Them and they didn't leave in time, and he was there. Yeah,
that was the whole time. Sorry, I keep I keep
ranting about it was so awesome, which makes it frustrating
for the reader because I've got to assume that other
people even if they didn't catch it early, they started
catching it later on, and it's like, we know, but
the dangon character doesn't know, so mm hmmmmmm. And that

(55:17):
that's just it makes everything annoying. It makes it annoying
when the readers know, but your main character is too
stupid to figure it out, you know.

Speaker 1 (55:26):
She that's her personality. Though she always complains about not
being told anything, not being she's the last to find
out everything, she really has the complex about like being
the last and not the last picked, the last to
know the last.

Speaker 2 (55:40):
You know, she just she's so oblivious that I feel
like people were probably telling her stuff and she just went, oh,
I don't know what you're saying. I can understand that. Yeah, weird.
It was so frustrating, it was, but yeah, she's a
thing character. Both kings, her father and this king, they

(56:04):
were both really annoying and they both just need to
pull their heads out of their asses and figure out
how to rule better. Honestly, her own father, I don't
know why he just couldn't tell her what he needed
and why because the thing is this, well, she can't
lie and he probably knows that if he told her

(56:26):
the truth, it would have been written all over her face.
And the first time Rinsam asked her on the boat,
here are you here to spy? She're like, oh, well,
that exact thing.

Speaker 1 (56:38):
What's the point, like he's gonna I don't know.

Speaker 2 (56:41):
It just seems yeah, no, it was. It was dumb.

Speaker 1 (56:44):
It was dumb, straight up, like exactly, that's like, you're.

Speaker 2 (56:49):
Such a bad No, there's not. Of course I'm not
here to spy.

Speaker 1 (56:55):
It's like you're a bad liar. But again, maybe the
truth might have motivated her to learn not to lie
a little better. I don't know, mm hm, I mean
she was more giving her some kind of context. Yeah,
I don't know, like I'm not here to spy, but
I don't know what I'm here to do either, or

(57:15):
I am here to spy, but I'm not I don't
know what I'm doing, which was just a stupid I
just that just seemed like a waste to me. And
that way the character wouldn't have been so down on
herself because she literally thinks no one picks her, no
one chooses her, no one tells her anything. It was
kind of like, wow, okay.

Speaker 2 (57:36):
I understand why. Yeah, like I don't know, she she
definitely had ADHD the way her brain just popped all
over the place, Like, yes, she definitely has ADHD. But also,
come on, girl, you can do better than this, a
lot better. So hopefully she will in the next book.

(57:58):
I help. So I don't know if I want to
read it, though, No, I don't know.

Speaker 1 (58:03):
I feel like what's going to happen is either book
talk will carry on and kind of forget about this
until you know. You said there was a movie adaptation.

Speaker 2 (58:14):
Yeah, the first paragraph of the blurb, which I skipped earlier,
says it's in development with Amazon and MGM so so movie.
I also movie.

Speaker 1 (58:26):
Do you kind of hate that they shot this before
the book was published because it makes me wonder if
it was more.

Speaker 2 (58:32):
Written with a movie in mind. Absolutely not, Like, this
is way too long to think that you can turn
it into a two hour movie.

Speaker 1 (58:43):
Well, you know everyone thinks serious. Now give me four movies,
give me a TV show on video?

Speaker 2 (58:51):
Like, would you split this book into two different movies
or would you try and cram it all into one movie?

Speaker 1 (58:57):
You would just cut that book down, Honestly, it doesn't
need to be that long. I would just I would
just chop it down and do one movie, or I
would do a season. I would do like six episodes
or something.

Speaker 2 (59:09):
I feel like six to eight episodes would cover this
one really well, like a or a four hour movie
or something like one movie is not enough.

Speaker 1 (59:19):
Well, no one is watching a four hour movie a
with antected story.

Speaker 2 (59:25):
Absolutely, no one is watching that.

Speaker 1 (59:26):
Shit. You can't pay me to go sit in a
four hour movie that it's not somebody that is well
known that I are in a franchise that I already know.

Speaker 2 (59:37):
Yes, absolutely, but no, if this was meant to be
a movie, I think they would have like only had
three hundred pages, Like a three hundred page book can
be easily turned into a two hour movie, whereas what
was the six hundred pages five eleven? I think that

(59:57):
feels like a two movie thing, or an six episode
or eight episode of a TV show. Like it's just
long enough that you need more than one movie. And
I know we keep saying it needed to be condensed,
but they I fear they'll cut too much and just
rush it and the movie will feel rushed and unfulfilled.

Speaker 1 (01:00:20):
Well I think they'll do that anyway, because they always
hack up books mostly anyway, Oh absolutely, this is why
I usually hate adaptations. Every once in a while they
do it right where they're able to be surgical about
the cuts they make instead of like just taking out
broad sections of the strokes. But I guess we'll just
have to see what they end up doing with this,

(01:00:41):
because I think what's gonna happen is, like I said,
either people are gonna forget about it and move on
the option falls through, because you know, it could be
optioned to sit there for a long time.

Speaker 2 (01:00:50):
They don't.

Speaker 1 (01:00:50):
It's not even written, is not written. They have a writer,
they have this screenplay writer. Yet they have the writer,
but it's not written, not done, and then they have
to obviously see and it's all that they still have
to cast the thing, and sometimes stuff falls apart before
it even gets there. So absolutely, if it doesn't make

(01:01:10):
it to film, people might forget about it. And if they,
if it does make it to film, then the second book,
whenever that comes out, it would probably have one more
couple of weeks on book talk if book talk is
still around. You know, Oh yes, I gotta say. I

(01:01:31):
was like pleasantly surprised that for once I didn't absolutely say,
oh my god, we'll talk, but I was scared, So
I yes, I was petrified because I don't know if
you remember when I told you about this book. They
were competing this book against that other book. They kept
talking about them in the same breath. They came out together.

(01:01:54):
It was like silver, what was it? It was elite,
silver elite. And then shortly after everyone was hyping silver Elite,
people were trashing it almost immediately. So right after this
huge hype, people were like, this is bad.

Speaker 2 (01:02:10):
It's bad, it's bad. What are you doing? And then
people start saying.

Speaker 1 (01:02:14):
Well, Shield of Sparrows is better than Silver Elite, So
if you're gonna read them, read Shield of Sparrows first
because Silver Elite might put you off and you won't
want to. So I'm like, well, let's just do this one.

Speaker 2 (01:02:32):
I know, which is good. Like it was a decently
written book. It was just annoying to me.

Speaker 1 (01:02:39):
Look, I don't know how the publishers are doing this anymore,
because I wish I knew their formula, and like how
they get these people on TikTok to talk about these books,
because that's probably past. Timing was immaculate, and I'm telling you,
Red Tower just jumped on that bandwagon. Actually, I want

(01:03:01):
to see who published Silver Elite. It's a big publisher
like Penguin or Tour or something. Okay, so let's see
Silver Elite Delray. So is that Penguin? Is that a
Penguin sub?

Speaker 2 (01:03:19):
I think so?

Speaker 1 (01:03:22):
So right now today as it sits, as of our recording, this,
Silver Elite has an average rating of four point zero
eight with about thirty one thousand ratings, and SHIELDA Sparrow
has four point five rating with almost forty eight thousand ratings.
So whatever they were doing with Silver Elite, it tanked

(01:03:45):
so fast people stopped trying to read that book pretty quickly.
So I'm never going to read Silver Elite.

Speaker 2 (01:03:56):
I can. I'm not even going to try.

Speaker 1 (01:03:58):
And that that was a whole other commentary as well.

Speaker 2 (01:04:01):
People were trying to figure out who the author was
for Silver Early. Have they figured it out? It's still
a secret, but people have.

Speaker 1 (01:04:09):
Some people said Stephanie Meyer, some people said, what's that.

Speaker 2 (01:04:15):
Woman, Colleen Hoover. I heard somebody make a joke that
it was JD. Vance. There's a character named Jay Vance
or something.

Speaker 1 (01:04:25):
Like.

Speaker 2 (01:04:26):
Okay, that's completely turning.

Speaker 1 (01:04:28):
Yeah, So but I'm glad we chose Shield of Spirows
even though it was not epic by any means, it
was still enjoyable.

Speaker 2 (01:04:38):
Now I got it done pretty quickly too, so yeah, yeah,
so I guess decent job Dephney Perry. That's what we
can say. Yes, all right, let's let's rate it. You
want to rate it? Or is there more ate it? Yeah?
I mean, I can keep complaining, but I don't think
you want to hear me say the same stuff over

(01:04:58):
and over and over again. I'll go first. I give
it a three stars. It's a good, solid book. I'm
just not the right audience or the right mood for it.
I guess, like it's well written. I'm just way too
annoyed with it. I still, to this very second, I'm

(01:05:20):
not sure what I'm going to rate it. I'm thinking, okay, okay.
So the ViBe's part of me wants to say it
was a four star because I liked it, But the
critic in me wants to give it a three star
because there were so many things wrong with it. Absolutely,
if I could like turn my brain off and just

(01:05:43):
vibe with it, yeah, i'd be four stars all the way. Yeah,
but I am so annoyed and so critical, and I'm
just like it's still well written, but I would have
changed or liked so many of these issues to be
tweaked or changed or different.

Speaker 1 (01:06:00):
Timately, I'm gonna go with a three star because for
this reason. I'm gonna go with the three star, because
it's totally within the realm of possibility. I unless it's
served up to me again on social media, I'll probably
never come.

Speaker 2 (01:06:14):
Back to this book again. This series. I won't remember it. Yeah,
same unless TikTok book talk blows up when book two
comes out, or if the movie actually happens, like I
won't remember it.

Speaker 1 (01:06:28):
And I feel like I got burned so many times.
And I'm just gonna say one book that started out
interesting and I feel like I got burned by it,
which is Fourth Wing, that last book, Oh my god,
the fuck. So it's like I don't want to get
caught up in anymore book talk things just because the

(01:06:49):
crowd is so I don't know. It's a solid three
and the caveat as you all just heard, if you
could turn your brain off, which is almost impossible when reading,
it's impossible. You should not turn your brain off. You
shouldn't have to do that. But if you are just
in a mood for some vibes, and you know, that's
all this was was good vibes.

Speaker 2 (01:07:11):
But even so much.

Speaker 1 (01:07:14):
Actually, when the couple finally got together, we didn't get
a whole lot of sexy time. We didn't get much
open door either, which was like, come on, give us something.

Speaker 2 (01:07:23):
It was so mild.

Speaker 1 (01:07:24):
It was so mild. I'm like, just give me some
raunchiness to make up. Come on, give me something.

Speaker 2 (01:07:32):
I mean, for all their sexual banter, we just got.

Speaker 1 (01:07:38):
Apparently he's not mine, no, and we just got aftermath
of her saying what a good lover he was, and
how you know he made her.

Speaker 2 (01:07:46):
He's such a gift, such a giver. So it was
closed door basically, though. Yeah, I mean there was a
one description and then he's like flip over, and then
it's the next day and she's just happy. It was
very mild.

Speaker 1 (01:07:59):
So if you're looking for a little exciting sexy time
to make up for the other stuff, you're not going
to get it. Nope, Nope, that's not this book. So,
I mean, honestly, I feel good that it was. It
did feel adult, so that was great. It was full
on adults.

Speaker 2 (01:08:18):
Except for the four year old running around. I'm sorry,
I'm four year old. Yeah, so three, we agree.

Speaker 1 (01:08:30):
We are in agreement there, Yes, Lord have mercy. Next
time it's Casey's pick and hopefully no, I mean we
just keep bouncing stuff back and forth.

Speaker 2 (01:08:46):
Oh no, this was my fault. So uh no, no, no,
it's not your fault. Like it was a good read.

Speaker 1 (01:08:54):
We've had much work, We have much Yeah, this is
a tick in the win column for book talks.

Speaker 2 (01:09:01):
Yes, take it. Take the win, y'all, take the win.
All right, I think we're done. What do you think?
I think we're done. I think that's okay.

Speaker 1 (01:09:09):
So this has been a fun conversation. Thank you for
listening to the entire episode. We appreciate you for doing that.
Don't forget to like and subscribe and follow us in
all the places, and of course, you know if you
want to give us your feedback or talk to us
one on one, join us on book clubs or on Patreon,
and you get to see stuff and talk about stuff

(01:09:29):
you get on the podcast. And yeah, that's it. We'll
see you next time. Take care of yourselves.

Speaker 3 (01:09:34):
Bye, guys, Bye, everybody.

Speaker 1 (01:09:46):
Did you enjoy today's episode, If so, please head over
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Speaker 2 (01:10:06):
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Speaker 1 (01:10:08):
For as little as two dollars a month, you can
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(01:10:29):
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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}New Popular Romantasy! Shield of Sparrows - #Booktok Made Us Read It | Book Chat