Well, this book is a little disappointing. And yet I still like it. I can't quite figure it out (yet).

My own reading began with promise and interest, but soon dwindled for various reasons: a singular, linear, one-dimensional plot that, along with many of the scenes and characters, was neither surprising nor always believable; a eclectic troop of characters that, aside from their names, were nigh impossible to tell apart; actions and reactions seemed to be pulled out of a hat, written and rigidly unfolding as though through adherence to a schedule - mostly, I think, from an expectation of a reader's sentimentalism towards certain subjects (love being the obvious and most frustrating one), and perhaps because the book felt far too rushed to move forwards with action to bother planting the seeds of anything beyond what seemed like superficial voiceovers. The story and writing got sloppy in the middle, followed by an anticlimactic resolution (but overly sentimental/dramatic) that was far more focused on wedging in a love interest than resolving any of its original promises.

I'm sad about this book. I'd love to have read it if it were written well and developed with more complexity. I would like to know more about Goredd, about Seraphina, about her garden of grotesques, but I just can't bring myself to read the following book.

I shouldn't condemn this book for my own expectations and reading preferences; I think I just won't bring myself to read any more YA.