Title: War Hour (The Broken Trials, #1)
Author: Lauren Loscig
Genre: Fantasy, romance, romantasy, young adult
(2.75★/5)
Thanks to the publisher for the e-arc via the author
Blurb:
When powers are earned and not born, who shall wield them?
Lysta lives in constant fear of Trialing, a deadly test that bestows an ability upon its victors, but only after pushing their mental and physical limits. Forced to Trial against her will, Lysta becomes a weapon others plan to use against the Untrialed, until an unexpected intruder from another Court presents her with an opportunity to stop it. But can she trust the plans of a man who seems to play the lines between enemy and ally?
Only through treason can Lysta save the people she once struggled beside. With the fate of her Court and the lives of the Untrialed at stake, the burden will fall on Lysta to convince the other Courts to intervene. Not to mention, the Crowns seem to fear the frustrating albeit handsome man who rescued her more than the one she testifies against. Lysta must find her own strength in a world of powers, battles, and court politics while navigating tumultuous relationships and hidden enemies.
Will Lysta save her Court or be ended by it?
“No bravery without fear. No strength without struggle.”
Here’s the thing.
I’ve read better, and I’ve read worse. I’ve read plenty of bad indie books to know what is bad. This is by far one of the better ones.
At first, I didn’t think War Hour was so bad. It had a plot, characters, and funny bits of dialogue. That’s all I could ask for. Normally, I don’t even care about character development, but this time I did. Lysta was constantly getting shoved around, place to place, person to person. She acts like she’s all tough and strong, but there’s nothing special about her. She’s got that Mare Barrow feeling to her.
Normally, I love side characters. They’re the comic relief and sometimes the most interesting part of the story. I didn’t love Sar, Bash, or any of the other heirs. If anything, Ardis was the most interesting, but we know even less about him!
I wish the actual Trialing was longer and more than just getting shoved into an arena with a beast. Being the call to action point, main pitch point, the reason so many people die, and the whole reason people have powers, I would have innately expected the trial to be longer and more challenging. But it wasn’t.
Around the 25% mark, when characters are revealed and plans are explained, I found it a little confusing. I didn’t fully understand the reveals, but that just may be a reader error.
This book is slow for the first half of the story. I never understood why fantasy authors write 400+ page books if they are unable to make the plot interesting… This book suffers from that problem.
In an ideal world, we would have a proper introduction to Lysta and Thoman’s relationship so that when it is taken away, it hurts more. bro literally doesn’t exist for 85% of the rest of the book. I thought Thoman was going to be like Gale from Hunger Games, Torryn was going to be like a thousand from ACOTAR, and Evander seemed to be Tamlin/Maven/Dain (ACOTAR, Red Queen, & Fourth Wing respectively). But since Thomas is so far out of the picture, there’s no room for a love square, and now there’s a love triangle. He returns for a bit at the end, but at that point, it’s too late for a romance or something. I want to witness the blindsided readers by the Evander-Tamlin-Maven-Dain reveal.
As I was reading, I was thinking I’d give this book 4 ⭐, but in reality, the concept isn’t that original. It’s just like if you take Hunger Games, Red Queen, and Throne of Glass, shake it up a little, and get middle-of-the-road execution. It’s all there, the bare bones, but the meat is plain. But since it’s better than other books I’ve had the pleasure 🤢 of reading, it automatically ranks higher.
Bottom line: not perfect, but would recommend! There’s potential!
I’m hoping everything gets revised, but it’s getting pretty close to the publish date. If anything, I only hope that the next books are better than this one.
[received an e-arc in exchange for an honest review]
Lauren is quite literally living my dream. Having the skill to write a book, getting published, and gaining quite a bit of traction for a debut. So Lauren, if you’re reading this, I’m proud of you!
Thanks for the arc!!
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