Onyx Storm sucked ass. I'm not going to write a full website review as this book does not deserve it. It wasn't even fun bad like Iron Flame. It was just boring! To write reviews, I have to read the whole book and I refuse to do that so here's my general thoughts.
This is one of the most half-assed “fantasy” I’ve ever read. It is blatantly obvious that this series was created for money and nothing more. Each book is steadily getting worse and I have no idea how Yarros is going to squeeze two more tomes out of this barebones concept. It's very obvious she has no idea where the story is going to go. Even fans hate this book and I feel bad for them. They deserve better than this.
I don't know what's going on. The beginning of this book is insane in the worst way possible. The politics of the world make NO SENSE at all. The evil government, for no good reason, refuses to ally with the gryphon people even though they're fighting the same enemies. It doesn't make sense to not form an alliance after everything that happened in the last book. Violet and her gang do something to the magical wards that allow the gryphon people to use their powers and this action convinces the government to form the alliance even though the gryphon people's inaccessibility to their powers was irrelevant to the alliance! I was so confused. I don't understand how the politics of this world is supposed to work. Yarros doesn't know either (clearly) so she is just making shit up as she writes, disregarding any semblance of sense because who cares, right? Fuck the reader, I guess.
It feels like she took the "zero worldbuilding" critique to heart because there's a lot more of it here and it's all terrible, contradictory and deeply confusing. The dragons, yet again, make no sense. I’ll never understand why the dragons just do whatever the humans do despite them always saying they do not adhere to human demands. Why even make the dragons sentient if you’re not going to do anything with their characters or society? I fucking hate how it is said that the dragons the rebel kids got specifically chose them, picking them out via their radical tattoos, because they wanted to create a strong opposing force. Like… you’re fucking dragons! If you don’t like what humans are doing, just eat them and burn down their castles! I’ll never understand why the dragons subjugate themselves to the humans. The dragons and their motivations just do not make sense! Speaking of the dragons, they’re at their worst here. Tarin has been reduced down to grumpy old man and Andarna… oh my god 😒. She’s so annoying! I get that she’s a teenager but holy shit you didn’t have to make her accurate to teens. How the fuck do you make dragons boring and annoying?! That’s a talent.
Violet and a lot of her buddies get second signets because of course they do. It doesn’t matter if it goes against what was set up in previous books. Fuck you for paying attention and caring about that. We finally get the fuck out of dragon murder school and explore the rest of the world, but once again, the politics of the world make no fucking sense and people do not behave like people. There’s a scene where an old woman is giving Violet trivia questions to answer and then at the end of it she’s like “Do you love Xander?” Or something like that. All the character exist to make Violet and Xanana look good. They have no lives outside of them.
There's a scene were Lover Boy is training the other people how to fight using their powers and it infuriated me to no end. The signets are so unbalanced. Xanny Boy is basically a god. His shadows can do what the fuck he wants them to do. He just beats up everyone else who has a basic bitch signet (like fire bending and enhanced speed) with a flick of his wrist. He's too powerful and thus all actions scenes with him in it are extremely boring. He's One Punch Man but without the wit and self-awareness. I don't understand how people like Imogen is supposed to train her signet when her power is erasing memories. Not everyone has a combat power, but Yarros just ignores that and has scenes where Xandra beats everyone up because that sexy I guess.
The writing is just bad as the other books. Weird descriptors, way too many named characters who do not matter, excessive juvenile swearing, outright confusing scenes that do not make sense, repetitive scenes of characters doing the same shit over and over and poorly written and confusing action scenes. Yarros is just not a good writer.
Violet is still insufferable. I'm sick of being inside of her head. Once again we are told that she is smart but she is incredibly dumb. She's only smart because everyone else around her is an idiot. I fucking hate Violet so much. Xander is just as bad. He's still extremely boring and devoid of all personality except broody. Him being a Venin is such a non-issue in this book. It hardly matters. Yarros blatantly recycles the jealousy arc Violet went through with Cat in the last book by having Xanax be weirdly jealous of Dain and some new guy named Halden. Because we gotta have some angst I guess, I don't know...
This book sucked! I hated it. I bailed half-way through and I have zero interest in finishing it. I didn't even get a bingo!
Don’t read this schlock. You’re better off reading Sarah J Maas’ crap. Fourth Wing and its sequels are not art, they’re cash-grabs. Don’t read shit that looks down upon you.
Oh and another thing: I'm done with this series. I'm not reading the rest of this nor am I reading anymore "romantasy" books as I fucking hate the genre now. They're all bad in the same ways. They're boring. I used to be indifferent to the genre but after suffering through this schlock and others like it, I’m tired of it. I like reading bad books that are interesting, not boring. I rather be mad than bored. Don't ask me to read the rest of Yarros' crap. The answer is no.
Edit: If you’re a Fourth Wing fan, block me and move on. I’m not going to debate with you about the quality of these books. I don’t care if I got anything wrong. I’m never reading this series again. You’re talking to a brick wall. Leave me be.
