“…a yolky thing.”
Alex Aster, Lightlark
After Powerless and a few other books, I swore I’d never fall for TikTok hype again. But after seeing Alex Aster on the Kelly Clarkson Show (yes, of all places) and being bombarded by the Skyshade cover every other scroll, I caved. I read Lightlark.
As usual, TikTok let me down, and yet, I couldn’t stop reading. This book made me want to throw my Kindle across the room repeatedly, but I was also glued to it like I was caught in some kind of hostage situation. There’s probably a social study on why these books have us in a chokehold (hence, the viralness).
Anyway, I’m done with Lightlark now, and I’m still not sure how I feel. Maybe ranting about it here will help me sort it out.
Lightlark Spoiler-Free Synopsis
Every 100 years, a mysterious island called Lightlark appears for the Centennial, a deadly competition where six rulers fight to break the curses on their realms. To do this, one ruler must die, and naturally, everyone’s got secrets.
Enter Isla Crown, ruler of the Wildlings. Her curse? She’s doomed to kill anyone she falls in love with (tragic, really). Groomed her entire life to win the Centennial and save her people, she enters the game ready to lie, cheat, and deceive her way to victory.
Review
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐
Spiciness: 🌶️🌶️
TLDR; It was fine. I’ll give the second book a shot—but only because of Oro, the series’ resident mean Golden Retriever.
Lightlark has an incredible premise: six rulers locked in a deadly game, fighting to save their realms. The curses are intriguing in theory, if a little simplistic. For example:
- Sunlings can’t go outside in the sun.
- Moonlings die every full moon.
- Skylings can’t fly.
- Nightshades can’t go out at night.
- Wildlings kill anyone they fall in love with.
- Starlings don’t live past 25.
I found it a bit odd when she named all realms similar except for Nightshade. It’s a bit of an ill conceived attempt at writing the “bad” realm I suppose. The Wildling curse also is the only one that feels remotely interesting, as if the author only put the thought into Wildling realm. It feels a bit like a cop out, like she didn’t want to set up the curses to be something complicated because the plot and secrets are all complicated, which is… fine.
The narration is juvenile, the sentence structures are simplistic, and while I wasn’t expecting Tolkien-level prose, lines like “The Starling Isle was silver” made me roll my eyes. The book seems torn between being YA and something spicier, resulting in a weird tonal mismatch. The language feels 14+, but there are scenes I wouldn’t hand to a teenager without a heads-up.
Isla: The Protagonist Who Was Too Good at Everything
Isla Crown could’ve been interesting—emphasis on “could’ve.”
Instead, she’s the classic FMC who is perfect at everything. She’s gorgeous, a talented sword fighter, a master tracker, and can climb walls like Spider-Man. All of this despite being “powerless” (which is of course false). The phrase “She was trained for this” shows up every time she does something impossible, and her plot armor is so thick I never once worried about her.
Her characterization also felt contradictory. She “doesn’t care about clothes” but wears skin-tight dresses with spaghetti straps every other scene. She can sing so beautifully, but was never trained. She is the most beautiful, gorgeous girl alive and she can seduce anyone, but she’s been in isolation her entire life.
The Magic System: A Hot Mess or Nonexistent
The magic system felt slapped together, like it existed purely to serve the romance. The stakes rarely made sense, and plot devices were either overcomplicated or insultingly simple.
And then there’s the relics. Why wouldn’t Oro—or anyone, really—use the mystery relic to break the curses? Half the stakes crumble under scrutiny.
Why all the rulers before them killed themselves? Why were they not allowed to have heirs? Why did Oro have so much power other than so Celeste can steal all six powers at the end?
The world-building also fell flat when it came to diversity. The realms all felt like “white people with different hair,” which is reductive and jarring, especially since Isla isn’t white. Attempts at diversity (Cleo’s sexuality, Azul as a person of color) felt half-baked.
Characters: Half baked and obvious, but mostly readable
Celeste
Celeste is too good of a friend to be true, so I was suspicious of her from the beginning, especially because the book is marketed as “everyone lies about everything”. That being said, while I expected her to be revealed as the one who cast the curses, I didn’t see her being someone else all together coming.
Grim
Grim was fine, playing the role of the generic brand shadow daddy in this book, who has a kitchen sink of shadow and darkness abilities thrown at him. And of course, he wears all black and has a voice dark as the midnight.
I was very icked by how all in she was to Isla from get go, but I’ll give Aster credit there that it was a well placed easter egg considering the two have been together.
However, I loathe MMCs who take away the choice from the FMC though and ever since Willow and Tara from Buffy I have not been able to tolerate mind vandalization. It will be really hard to recruit me to team Grim.
His motives were surprisingly fine, he wanted to kill two birds with one stone, get rid of the ruler he’s been fighting with for hundreds of years and save the girl he loves. Besides, bold move sending his girlfriend to seduce his enemy without her knowing. Mad respect for the chops to do that.
Oro
Which brings me to Oro. Honestly, no notes. He was the entire reason why I was so enraptured in this book. The all mighty powerful king who’s brutally honest, funny once you get to know him, but has to guard his heart because he has to protect his power? He was like a mean Golden Retriever the entire book, and I ate it up. Even when he seemed to turn against Isla (which he didn’t but I wouldn’t blame him if he did), he was still true to his word.
Will I continue reading?
The plot resolution was predictable, but the twists around Grim gave him some much-needed depth.
That being said, despite my complaints I pretty much read this in one sitting. I can’t resist a good “who-dun-it” and with the chemistry between the leads was enough to keep me engaged. Since I’m a compulsive completionist, I will be reading the rest of the series just to give myself the opportunity to be annoyed by Isla and read more about Oro.
And who knows, maybe Grim will be a more appealing romantic lead for me in the next book which is enough to keep me going!
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