#phoenix flame

[fromagonytoirony]

“More often than not, you're gonna feel alone.

It's a long fall from the top. Can you stand it?

Gave it all that I've got everywhere I roamed.

I can't do this alone, can you help me?

This is how it ends. We fall, we mend.

Burn and start again. Rebuild, forget.

Lest we forget.”

[chemicalsugar]

[noveltyreads]

Infinity Reaper (The Infinity Cycle #2) by Adam Silvera Book Review

ARC kindly provided by the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review POTENTIAL SPOILERS FOR INFINITY SON BELOW What the hell was that ending? I honestly still need to wrap my head around that one even though I knew that it would go down that path anyway. Infinity Reaper definitely set things up for the next book, the grand finale of this series and I already came this far, I want to know how this will end. I just hope it doesn't leave on an Adam Silvera cliffhanger

Infinity Reaper starts straight after the events of Infinity Son. You might want to reread the last five or so chapters just as a refresher. I didn't because I read Infinity Reaper soon after finishing the first book but even then it took me a while to reorientate myself with the action and the world of Celestial/Specter New York.

The very first chapter is from Brighton's perspective which, now looking back and having finished the book, was a kind of innuendo that Brighton will be front and centre in this one. If you hated Brighton in Infinity Son then I think you'll hate him even more in Infinity Reaper. He was egocentric... more than usual especially with his new abilities and influence and I found myself disliking a lot of the chapters in his perspective. A lot of his dialogue both internally and externally followed a greedy path with the main vein being "I'm special", "I will be the most powerful person in the world. People will remember me as the Infinity Saviour" etc. Honestly I'm barely scratching the surface but yes, I did find that annoying and I was tired of Brighton's perspective by the end.

BUT and there's a big but here, I did understand the relevance of having Brighton's perspective in there because it served a massive purpose towards the end. I'll try treading lightly here because I feel like I'm slightly going into spoiler territory here (which I'm really trying not to do). I felt like despite the annoyingness of Brighton's narrative voice and egocentric personality, it was important and necessary to include for the ending. That being said, I felt like Silvera really could've elevated that ending and the effect of it by slowly inclining Brighton's jealousy and greed. It felt overwhelming at times but I reckon if it was given in digestable bits then readers would've understood Brighton's perspective better and potentially might've empathised with him.

Brighton was a bit full-on. I didn't mind him in Infinity Son but he definitely changed in Infinity Reaper as seen by his previous actions which obviously had grave consequences. By explicitly showing that transition from the Brighton he was at the start of the book vs the Brighton he became by the end I reckon it would've developed his character more and would've added another dimension to his character dynamic which seemed shallow despite all attempts to explain his thoughts and feelings. I felt like that point could be applied with all the other characters. I expected to see more of Emil's personality shine through but I didn't see anything different to how he was like in Infinity Son. The same goes for Maribelle. I felt like a lot could've been tapped into with her grief, anger and loss. Yes she was angsty, Silvera got her character voice down really well however, I wanted more dimensions, more layers. We saw her desire for love and for family but I wanted that to be drilled in more than it was.

Ness was probably my favourite character though and I always celebrated internally whenever his chapters came up. I felt like he was the most developed out of the whole cast of characters since his childhood and trauma was looked into a lot. I felt sorry for him and was cheering him on from behind the screen that I was reading the book on. I could empathise with his feelings of being trapped under the Senator's evil regime and his feelings of weakness and hopelessness. I also liked how his feelings towards Emil were explored however, I also felt like they were glazed over a little bit. I wanted more emotion from him to really set apart his character voice which like the other perspectives, seemed to blend into one. Characters aside though, I found that the pacing was really slow for a 500+ paged book. The main action happened after page 300 and that's when I felt the story pick up. Usually my interest would've dropped by then but I enjoyed Infinity Son the two times I read it to push through the slow bits.

I did like the political aspects of the book however it left a lot of questions unanswered such as the aftermath of the debate and also everything that happened with Senator Iron. I won't go into details but I felt like they either were left unanswered (to be answered in book 3) or they were answered but they were just brushed over. Which ultimately leads to my overall criticism of the book: a lot of things felt rushed from the action to the characters, both factors of which could've been drawn out more and would've made the book more interesting and enjoyable. I did like this book overall but I felt like there were so many opportunities to turn this from a good book into a great or fantastic one and those opportunities were not taken.

Nevertheless I will still read the last book in the series just because I genuinely want to know how Adam Silvera will take the Infinity Cycle and the great story and world. I just hope that Silvera and the editing team behind the book will really draw out those characterisation layers and dimensions because I think that would really make this book shine. I've read other books by him such as They Both Die at the End and More Happy Than Not and I've seen the calibre of writing Silvera displays and I know that he can really pack a punch to his readers but that desired effect will only occur if a real focus is put on the characters more than the action. ACTUAL RATING: 3.1 STARS

[epica-fantasia-ilustrada]

[esmeraldablazingsky]

ooh i’d love to ask 1 for the ask game, and also 9 and 18 (specifically for UDS)!! love your work sm ❤️

1. Who was your first ever OC? Do you still "use" them? How have they evolved over time?

I'm not 1000% sure if she is the absolute oldest OC i have, but Phoenix has been around probably since I was 5 years old ^^' she was (and is?) a power fantasy daydream character, more or less, so she hasn't changed THAT much, but her design is a bit different now, as you can see.

She also used to have primarily fire control powers, but these days her important skills are more her shapeshifting and mental manipulation abilities, and she is less human-shaped.

9. Favourite OC?

Chiyue <3 which I would really hope is the case because she IS the main character. I like drawing her because her design is very simple but she has a particular vibe to her, and I like writing her because she is a disaster. I will yap about her forever to anyone who will listen, but this post is probably long enough already.

Random Chiyue fact: she can drive a motorcycle but not a car

18. Describe the setting of one or more of your wips (UTDS in this case lol)

Most of UTDS takes place in the demon world, which is laws-of-nature wise pretty similar to the human world except magic (both ambient/environmental and concentrated in certain inhabitants, including azhaiyos/demons) exists. Being a mage nowadays is mostly like being an electrical engineer, but in ages past azhaiyos used to kill each other with fireball like dnd wizards, so even though that's mega illegal today, lots of the powerful noble clans descended from strongly magical bloodlines.

Specifically, within this world, shit primarily goes down within the Razul Court, the current seat of power for the Azhaiyoser Khata Rasshes, an organization of many clans across a large area. Clan Razul are, you guessed it, an ancient mage clan, but rather than Killing People Directly, they mostly used their mastery over water and ice to gain power via taking control of all the major waterways. As a result, they are rich and powerful as all get-out. They are also, in modern time, mostly a bunch of stuffy, old-fashioned bureaucrats and academics.

This is the environment that Chiyue, a convicted murderer and accidental blood mage whose mother was a human and whose father was a commoner who was killed by the state, is dropped into. She does not like it. It does not like her. Story time :)

[silvernyxchariot]

"If you could transform into a monster, what would it be?"

A Phoenix

Trend from TikTok. Mine's not very "monstrous," but I wanted to focus on the pink flames. This is also a precursor/draft for my HSR!persona, who is also a phoenix, that I ship with Sunday.

Honestly, it's been a hot minute since I played around with drawing flames.

Looking at the road so far, choosing phoenix makes the most sense for me. Szayelaporro, my first "husbando" when I learned "husbando" was a thing, thought of himself as like a phoenix because of his resurrección ability, Gabriel. My main "husbando" right now, Doflamingo, craves immortality to cause as much destruction as possible. And my most recent, Sunday, will be going through a "rebirth" period in 2.7 as he joins the Astral Express.

P.S. If you're the person who is Spamming Everyone who does this trend to draw themself as an onryo, I'll block your account(s) here on Tumblr too. Draw yourself as an onryo instead of begging artists to essentially do it for free for you.

[chemicalsugar]

[chemicalsugar]