I received an eARC of this novel from the publisher through NetGalley.
The Sunbearer Trials was one of my most anticipated releases of the year. I had loved Thomas’s debut novel and while I was lukewarm about his sophomore novel (though it was actually written first), I had high hopes for this one.
I struggled a lot with this book, in part because I wanted to like it so badly and it just was not clicking with me. The voice feels very Middle Grade aimed, while at the same time having an abundance of swears. A lot of the book includes pop culture references that are from our world but slightly off, which leaves this book feeling immediately dated. I also didn’t understand the character motivations of most of the characters for most of the book. Teo is friends with some of the Dioses and even ropes some of them into creating chaos with him, but also seems to hate some of the Semi-Dioses for genuinely no reason other than they were born at a different status than him. I spent most of the book confused as to what was happening, the relationships between the characters, or why I was supposed to randomly hate certain characters.
When the book was captivating, it was stellar, unfortunately, those moments came so few and far between that they couldn’t redeem my reading experience. I enjoyed the elements of the relationship between Teo and Aurelio, though, by the end, I had to wonder what the point of including it within this story was.
I wish I could say that the moment everything fell into place with the major plot twist, I was satisfied, but I honestly was dreading the reveal from the moment I pieced things together. I’m not a huge fan of stories that paint the main character as so good and pure just so that they can be majorly emotionally manipulated. I had seen other early reviewers say that the ending of the book made them desperate for book two, for me, it just made me want to put down the book and forget I read it.
Unfortunately, as much as I wanted to love this book, overall it just fell flat for me. Readers on the younger side of bridging into the YA-sphere of novels might find more enjoyment in it than I did, but for me, it just didn’t work.