A rollercoaster of Romantasy
Rachel Schneider’s Metal Slinger was such a rollercoaster, I’m going to turn around and read it a second time. At the end of the book, everything was tying up nicely, too nicely if you know what I mean—and then that twist hit and now I have to reevaluate every sentence! I’ll try to say nothing more on that. I enjoyed the character development quite a bit, our Brynn at times feels like every other heroine in current romantasy, and then it’s a 180 and I’m feral for book two. She’s strong, cunning, and FLAWED. I love it. There were a couple of spicy scenes, for those who wonder. The love interest Acker is head over heels for our MC, but the possessiveness was a bit of a red flag for me. But, whew, I love wrong about that. My favorite element of Metal Slinger was the lavish world building, the world felt incredibly thought out and new. My personal favorite was Alaha and our two and half idiots being stuck at sea. I was just thinking a Water World inspired story would be so fresh feeling, and then my ARC request gets approved! (Thank you Netgally and St. Martin’s Press!) Some locations felt boring like court, although looking back, it was on purpose certainly. The magic was another element of the book I really enjoyed. It was intriguing and well thought out. We were given a lot of information about the magic, as well as being kept in the dark about it, and I felt it was a balance well achieved that’s often hard to do in these stories. It proves there is a lot more to the world than what’s just on the surface. Which is kinda like the whole book. My biggest critique would be the pacing, there were times I couldn’t put the book down. I had to know what was going to happen next. Then I’d feel like I missed a few chapters. I’d go back and realized I was right where I left off and I had read everything before. There was a chapter where I think our Main Character took a bath three times in a row, and it was jarring. Overall though, I enjoyed it a ton. I’m giving the book 4 stars, and I WILL be looking forward to book 2!
