ARC Review: City of Shattered Light

A solid sapphic sci-fi read (hehe)!

Asa is set to become the heiress of her father’s tech empire, a role she was raised for. But when Asa’s father risks her sister’s life to further his own experiments, she runs away to Requiem. Enter: Riven, head of one of the most ragtag yet deadly gangs in Requiem. When Asa crash lands on the planet, they team up on an impossible mission to save Asa’s sister and the entire city.

The best point of this book by far was Requiem. I got so lost in the Neon descriptions, and despite its reputation as a deadly and sinister city, I really wanted it to be real. Winn did an awesome job of bringing to life the deadly and seductive vibe of the world. That being said, I’ve found one of my sci-fi pet peeves is the overuse of new and tech names for things, ESPECIALLY when they’re hyphenated. I don’t think it’s necessary to give everything a cute little name. Like the atmo-dome could’ve just been the dome or the carbon-fiber hulls of ships could’ve just been the hulls or the holoscreens could’ve been the screens. It’s fine to have a little tech lingo, but I found it kinda overpowering here.

The characters were pretty okay. I think Kaya would have been my favorite, so it was unfortunate that she wasn’t present in most of the book. I honestly can’t pinpoint much in the way of positives or negatives about any of them. They were just kinda -there-. The relationships, however, I did have an issue with. I really don’t get why Asa was soooo into Riven, and especially not why she continuously treated Ty like a stand-in when he was by far the nicest of the crew. Usually I’m one hundred percent rooting for the wlw couple, but in this one I actually didn’t think the character’s made sense together, which was disappointing.

In terms of plot, it was, again, your average sci-fi. It was pretty easy to guess the initial and final twists, and how everything would resolve. Despite this, it was still an enjoyable read. I wouldn’t say it was anything too new or exciting in terms of the storyline, but the writing was very atmospheric and paced well.

Overall I’d recommend to people who want fall into a vivid, but pretty standard, sci-fi book!

happy reading (:

Rating: 3/5
Pacing: medium-fast
Intended audience: YA
Content warnings: parental abuse, mentions of relationship abuse, murder, blood

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