Fen'Harel's Reviews > The Broken Elf King

I refuse to believe these books were edited by an adult. Or a human at all.
Let's start it off strong. How about we don't allow for a character to have her name spelled two different ways MULTIPLE TIMES!?!? Corleena/Corleenaa is introduced with two a's, switches to one a, and then begins a fun back and forth between the spelling. It was so obvious and done multiple times I almost started laughing. Is the author trolling us at this point?



Now, this book I will admit something. The romance was a lot better. There's a little bit of chemistry between them and I could see them being together. Here's where it also fails too. It starts that stupid bouncing like in the previous book. "I love you - wait, no I don't - but actually I do - but actually I don't". Just pick one! It gets so boring! And then it just gets tedious. Just like the last book where Arwen was squawking about her WOMB LANDS, Lani (I can't remember her full name despite reading it today because she was a boring protagonist) is all "he wants me for my empath power".

That leads us to the empath discussion. So, she's never noticed in her life that she sucks up people's emotions? Ever? She just suddenly can? And even though the word is pretty obvious what it means, she still acts like a clueless person about it? (view spoiler)[ Something else I will admit I like about this book is her other power, the blessing thing. I liked that she could also take which is discovered with the Queen. That was actually a good scene. I'd almost consider giving it more stars but I won't because I'm a hateful creature. (hide spoiler)]



Slavery starts us off and I regretfully report that it's not a major topic in this book, nor is it ever broached again. Lani starts this book off as a slave and I was expecting her to want to fix some of the conditions for the future people, maybe change the system but nah. Once she was a privileged slave (not even a slave, just an assistant) she didn't care what happened to the rest of them. So, uh, enjoy slavery I guess.

This leads us into the idea that she becomes he's food tester. I admit, it's a bit of a good plot point - except for the fact that it isn't and makes no sense after a while. When she's engaged to be married, doesn't she have to be pulled out of slavery? So why is she still tasting his food for poison when their wedding is the next day? And the whole "but no one else will do it". Can I reintroduce the author to the fact that she included SLAVES in this book? What do you mean no one else WANTS the job? Cut off a bit of the steak, feed it to the slave, wait five minutes to see if it's poisoned, and then eat your food. Damn, this was the dumbest storyline.
Note that I fully condemn slavery, but the idea that this world has them and they're like "hurr durr we'll make them wash plates and not taste food" is stupid.



Now, Lani is meant to be smart. She stands up for herself and is educated. But the idea that she can suddenly successfully lead an army left me scratching my noodle. This isn't because I don't think she would be able to, but because she literally says she's read a book and now she's ready to lead an army. So she does. Successfully. It just... rubs me the wrong way. And throughout the fight she's like "Ohh yeah a leader does this according to paragraph six". Eurgh.

The Queen is interesting. We're going to ignore Lani's misogynistic quote where she basically tells a bunch of soldiers that they're 'scared of a woman' as if that's laughable, and then refers to the only people fighting as men despite that fact that she's there too and she couldn't possibly know that every single person there was a man. She's literally right there.
Anyway, it's getting a little tedious how she's in each book and it's clear that she won't be eradicated until the last one where they're all united. At least make a couple of villains so they could get rid of one this book. Like, have her family members or a couple of guards be villainous characters so it feels like SOMETHING happened.



My other issue is the healing commentary in this book. The King says that only someone more powerful than you at healing can heal you, but I got confused. Lani wants to be a healer, and while she isn't yet, someone was easily able to heal her. So does that guarantee she won't be as strong as them? Or can you grow your power? Also, is it only healing power that does this? Or if she's a strong psychic (for example) can a low level healer not heal her? Just make it make sense. Pls.

Anyway, not thrilled by this sequel. The only reason I read it was because I bought the first and the second in store before I read them and it was the dumbest decision of my life.
I'm honestly in a state of confusion with whether I should read the final two because I love a bit of torture and they're quick reads, or if I should save my brain cells.