Furyborn (The Empirium Trilogy, 1)

had some really good parts, but i just never fully connected with the characters and the plot — this angel-stuff didn't feel thought through at all.

(and i just realised it took me over 2 months to finish, wow)

rielle is the most annoying protagonist ever, i couldnt bring myself to care about her and her story in the slightest. i found myself rushing through her chapters to get to eliana's, even more so in the second book.

I’ve never read anything like this

3.5

Oh well, I don't know what happened. Maybe I've been too hyped because so m6ay people told me it's awesome. It took more over 200 pages to feel engaged and at least care a little bit about the characters and their story. Personally I think the characters were too flat and random, I didn't feel any connection or any kind of emotion. I didn't care if they'd be killed or survived. There are many fans out there who love it and I'm pretty sure there a many reasons why. Everytime I picked up the book I had to force myself to continue reading it, always thinking "so many people love it, just keep going".

I had high expectations for this one, because the blurb promised some intangeling stories and I normally love to put all the connections together. This book could not quite live up to that, but was entertaining none the less. The chapters switch between two POVs: Eliana's and Rielle's. Both girls are very similar to each other. They are fierce, brave, powerful and adored. Those I the best qualities for two bad ass female protagonists. They pursue very different paths, one thinks she is a monster and might not even be, the other one thinks herself a saint, which also might not be so true. This contrary representation of the two chracters, who besides this seem to be so alike, was very interesting to read. I acutally liked Eliana's story a bit better, because I kind of already knew most of Rielle's story. Now we come to the - in my opinion - worst mistake the author made: the prologue. The prologue is set in the future from Rielle's story, but in the past from Eliana's point of view. So I knew what would happen to Rielle in the end and where her story was headed. I didn't really see the point to read about all the trials she had to face, when I knew exactly where this would lead her. It made whole tension of her POV go away. This prologue also anticipated most of the plottwists in Eliana's POV. So I wasn't surprised by most of them, even though without the prologue they would have been shocking. Besides that I enjoyed Eliana's story a lot. She seems to be so fearless, but when with her brother she becomes tender and caring, even though she would never admit that out loud. Her brother is my favorite character in this story, he is very innocent, a storyteller and makes everyone around him feel good about themselves. I also liked the other "protagonist" in her POV a lot: Simon, who is so very mysterious and about whom I hope to uncover more in the next book. In conclusion the story is very entertaining, but the author didn't make use of all the potential. The worldbuilding was solid. And while it could not fascinate me in the beginning, I could not put it down in the end.

Overall I can say that I definitely enjoyed this book, it just didn't blow me away. I did like it enough to decided I will continue with the series. The story is totally intriguing, this is the first angel connected thing I read since I was like 16 that I actually enjoyed, so that's cool. But anyway, let's get into the review. In the beginning, it was a but confusing to me, that the time jump between the two stories was so big, but I quickly got used to it and just didn't care anymore. I enjoyed both Rielle and Eliana as protagonists. They are two strong women that can fight for themselves and I liked that a lot. I did like Eliana's story line a bit more than Rielle's, the trials just got a bit repetitive and boring with time, but the romance between Rielle and Audric really was very sweet. Here I'm gonna be a bit #prude again, but I think the big sex scene in here was way too explicit for it being a ya book. It took up like 5 pages and went really into detail that I don't think is so appropriate. At least they were well written and had a lot of focus on the girl as well, so that was cool. Just overall think this should have been glossed over more. I have to say I guessed like most of the ending at at the 57% mark, that was when it was very obvious. Although I was super blind to other things. I wrote down that Rielle is Eliana's mother and she was brought through time when they just wanted to jump through space and that Corien must be the emperor. I also guess that Corien is actually Elianas father but weeelll, we don't know about that yet. Funny thing: I legit forgot Simon was in the prologue and then got super WHAAAAT when he appeared in Rielle's POV halfway through the book. In conclusion I did enjoy this book even though it was a bit boring and stretched at parts. I liked the characters and both timelines have intriguing parts, that I can't wait to read more about. I think this was definitely a great start to this trilogy and I hope it can get even better now. I also really liked the twist around Lu and who she really is, because the explained a lot of her behaviour throughout the book that I thought was really weird, like how she immediately wanted her best friends, to one of whom she was BETROTHED, to go and bang. But well, wasn't her all along, so that makes sense now.

Ugh. This was a pain to get through. I couldn't stand the two main leads, the world building sucked and the relationships felt flimsy and unbelievable. This was action packed but I couldn't wait to get to the end. While Eliana redeemed herself somewhat in the last few pages, her character was infuriating and her suddenly growing a conscience made no sense. I'm not gonna put myself through reading anymore of this series.

Den Einstieg fand ich etwas holprig. Es hat mich gestört, dass die Kapitel stur immer abwechselnd waren - Rielle, Eliana, Rielle, Eliana... Nach einer Weile habe ich mich aber daran gewöhnt. Gut gefallen haben mir auch die Zitate zu Anfang jedes Kapitels. Die Storyidee finde ich sehr gut. Auch das Engel böse sind gefällt mir richtig gut, ist mal etwas neues. Ich kann mir kaum vorstellen wie sich die Handlung über zwei weitere Bücher entwickelt, da in Band 1 schon sehr viel passiert ist. Ich bin aber sehr gespannt!!