Book #11 of 2024: Knights of the Borrowed Dark | DNF: Bookshops & Bonedust

Knights of the Borrowed Dark by Dave Rudden.

Quick synopsis: The monster under your bed exists and a 13 year old "chosen one" will help save you from it.

Plot: There's another world connected to ours, one that exists in dark, shadowy places. Denizen is an orphan, and when he turns 13 his magical powers appear and he joins a tiny handful of knights who protect the world from the monsters that live in the shadows.

While these knights have magical powers, they try never to use them, because they come with a Cost (written with a capital C). Whenever the magic is used, part of the knight's body turns to iron. So mostly they fight with swords and knives, only using magic when they have no other choice.

Unless I missed something (I skimmed the last third of the book, so it's possible), I have no idea why they didn't use guns, bombs, etc. At one point one of the characters said something like "What if the armies of the world found out about these monsters!" and I just stopped reading right there, because that sounded like the perfect solution to this issue. Why have less than a dozen knights fight these creatures with swords and knives when you could have the US military roll in?

Writing/editing: Technically the writing was great (see Positives). But for some reason the story didn't hold my interest at all. I wanted to DNF it early on, and was sure I wanted to at 40% in, but the good writing kept me going. Until about the last third of the book when I gave up and started skimming.

Positives (at least for adult reader me):
* The author was great about describing the monsters, they were very creepy/scary. However this book is for ages 10+, so it seems like it might be too scary for them.
* I loved the author's writing. I saved so many phrases, this is just a few of them:

The torches flickered back to life awkwardly, as if unable to explain where they'd gone.

She sat cross-legged on the kitchen table, running a whetstone up her katana's murderous curve. The slow rasp sounded like a snake clearing its throat.

A church rose on the dark end of the street before them, its spire wounding the sky.

The wind rasped along his skin like a tongue.

Negatives
The plot was so unoriginal (though usually that wouldn't be an issue for me), but for some reason the story just did not hold my interest at all.

I really did not like the main character. Denizen talked back and had an attitude towards the adult knights (people who risk their lives daily and have bodies riddled with iron). I'm sure that's realistic for a 13 year old, but it was not at all enjoyable to read.

What I Liked/What I Didn’t Like: Loved the writing, but most of the rest didn't work for me. I'd be willing to give some other series by the author a try though.

Rating: 1-Hated / 2-Disliked / 3-Okay / 4-Liked / 5-Loved: 2. I'd like to give it higher, I think this is a "It's not you, it's me" situation, but sadly I just really did not enjoy this book.

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DNF #7: Bookshops & Bonedust (Legends & Lattes #2) by Travis Baldree. Book #1 (Legends & Lattes: A Novel of High Fantasy and Low Stakes, reviewed by me here) wasn't my type of book, but I liked the characters and that carried me through the story. Unfortunately I didn't like the characters at all in this book. I didn't like them at all. One character's entire personality seemed to be "curses a lot". I don't mind cursing, but this was a lot and felt pointless.

There was just so little plot (same as the first book).

The other excessive thing was that Every Single Relationship in the book was F/F. I have no issue with F/F stuff, but I was beginning to wonder if in the book's worldbuilding maybe no other kind of relationships existed...

I really wanted to like it, but I ended up DNFing it a third of the way in.