Anastasia

Product Information

To calculate the overall star rating and percentage breakdown by star, we don’t use a simple average. I really felt connected to this book and Anastasia and it’s partly because I’m named after Anastasia and so is my daughter but I also think it’s because I’ve always loved the movie adaption. this is one of the most interesting/sad times in Russian history so i kind of wanted a little more of that.

Second of all, certain descriptions of the Cossack society did make me roll my eyes sometimes (for refence I live in Kuban, southern Russia, where Cossacks are still prominent to this day). Anastasia meets her love interest, Damien – because it’s not a retelling so Lark couldn’t use Dimitri but she had to come with A Good Russian Name (that’s irony) starting with the letter D, obviously – when he tries to kill her father. The character/family interactions were very similar to things I’ve read about them in the past so that was feeling realistic/well done. In my opinion the best executed part of the book were the characters because Damien apart, Miss Lark managed to breath life to all of them and give each and everyone a unique personality that makes them in some way or another unforgettable.

I mean, the depth of her characters is so heart-warming, it makes you want to rally for them, cry with them and support them in every way. It's hard to explain without giving any spoilers but I wanted to scream my frustration to the sky then.

Owlcrate did a theme a while back, ‘Courtly Intrigue’, a lot of this book was very much giving that. You can say it’s Lark’s first fantasy book and I shouldn’t be so harsh on her but truly, when did we allow mediocrity to rule our opinion? Minding you, this book is shelved as fatasy romance, plus 18 readers and mature smut scenes, while I have to say the smut is not heavy and the romance only just a subplot, that can be tricking to some people.I want to have a good time: I want the spice, I want the twists and turns, but I also, as a rader, don’t want to be treated like an idiot who can’t understand higher concepts. As a long term fan of Sophie's work I can honestly say this is like nothing she has ever written before. I loved how she constructed her magical world and how much competent was the narrative, that was amazingly developed. This is a Slow Burn between Anastasia and Damien and they know each other for many years and they don't fall head over heels right away, but rather first they have a friendship that grows despite their initial animosity.

I don’t think many, if any, child victims of devastation would want their story to be retold in this manner.

All of that said, I am excited for the paranormal/vampire trilogy that will be coming in the future. There is also a LOT going on and a lot that separates out two forbidden lovers, however, there is steam on page and it relies much more on emotional weight and the combining of souls than carnal language and erotic scenarios. and Damien and Anastasia - they shared a love that burnt everlasting, the real soulmate type of love. We've got a lot of side characters, Anastasia's siblings, parents, aunts and uncles, friends and so on.

Over 600+ pages of coming-of-age fantasy should NOT be mired down with that much detail over warring groups, troop movements, and the daily minutia of living in a palace. I wish this book was indeed a pure fantasy romance novel with some historical references so that I could put aside any notion of Russian history.It kind of makes me think of that quote, “you can’t pick and choose what parts of her you love” I think it’s from tog but of the top of my head I can’t remember. Now I’m used to fantasy books being long and setting up things but mostly that is happening for high fantasy worlds or like the fantasy elements in a story, and in this case we are not given a new world and the focus/time spent was more on the historical and political info for the time and the family. I'll go a step futher and say many of them were old believers of the orthodox church, and the rest you can assume yourself. Half the people in the comments are acting like the issue is that she’s writing about Anastasia at all and I literally never said that was the problem.