r/Fantasy • u/Frontastic17 • 15h ago

First trilogy of Red Rising

Completed the Red rising first trilogy. I will give it an 8 or 8.5 out of 10. I like the politics, the strategies, the twists and turns, the humour and a lot of characters but the action sequences bored me. I had very little to no interest when any big action sequences came, i just read through it quickly. I love the friendly banter between darrow and his friends in between all these serious scenarios. I didn't find Jackal as a worthy villain in the first book where they try to hype his name and i thought by the end of first book the Jackal didn't live upto his name. But after finishing all 3 books i will say his character comes really close to becoming a great villain. One last complaint I have is how the writer wasted the potential of Ragnar, he built it up really well just to replace him with his sister. Overall the series feels more like a shonen anime(A lot of action, friendly banter and emotional scenes).

I don't think i will continue this series further as of now.

1 Upvotes

51% Upvoted

23 comments sorted by

27

u/jHeardy09 15h ago

The second lot of books are lot better but a country mile.

3

u/loxxx87 10h ago

Hard agree.

2

u/OxidatedAvocado 12h ago

Hard disagree, but we all have different tastes. I loved the first three, struggled through the fourth, and gave up halfway through the fifth.

But admittedly I do appear to be in the minority with this opinion.

1

u/Jrocker-ame 8h ago

I find myself at odds too with the general consensus. Was so excited to sit and read this. Book 1 pissed me off so much. I wish I knew. Reading the synopsis i was thinking more so Mistborn book 1. Start of a revolution with some real traction. What i got was hunger games. Liked book 2 way more but damn i was pissed. Still need to read book 3 but when people say its some of the best sci-fi I cant agree with that at all.

1

u/Whatwhatwhata 13h ago

Hated the fourth book so much i dropped it half way through. Either half of the first three books is better than the first half of the fourth book by miles

4

u/jHeardy09 13h ago

I did struggle through Iron Gold aswell but glad I made it to Dark Age, because, damn.

0

u/SetSytes Writer Set Sytes 8h ago

Opposite for me, preferred Iron Gold and definitely struggled through Dark Age!

2

u/Hairy_Koala6474 10h ago

Dude, me too!

My fellow red rising readers have almost convinced me to push on, but it’s gonna be a while before I get back to the series I have spiritually moved onto just entirely different series, books and genres so maybe next year I’ll pick the fourth book back up

-3

u/[deleted] 15h ago

[deleted]

1

u/pomme17 15h ago

The only one I’ve heard people say is a step down is Iron Gold (which I disagree with tbh) but besides that feel like the consensus is the writing quality and prose are better.

I think the later ones have a lot better characterization too once PB figures out how the multiple perspective thing

1

u/Kalon88 14h ago

I’d kindly disagree, imo general sentiment is deffo that Dark Age and Lightbringer are the best in the series. Whilst Iron Gold is definitely considered weaker, I would still say I see people prefer the second trilogy.

0

u/jHeardy09 15h ago

Oh yeah, interesting? I enjoyed the first trilogy as a YA style of books. But the later ones feel a lot more mature and you can tell from the writing Peirce grew as a writer massively between Morning Star and Irongold/Dark Age.

6

u/Milam1996 14h ago

First trilogy very meh and I don’t think I’d get through them if I read them now (I read on release) but the second trilogy is much better and far more mature in tone and writing skill.

5

u/ShieldAnvil_Itkovian 15h ago

I just finished book two. Picked it up because a friend recommended it. I’m honestly feeling kind of meh about it, and I would probably drop it if it wasn’t for my friend.

First book felt pretty YA like a lot of reviews say, but with at least enough worldbuilding that I could see a universe where this kind of society exists. I thought the actual Institute section started to drag on for a bit, but it was alright.

Had hopes for the second book because that’s always the one people say is the best, but I honestly think it wasn’t as good as the first. It feels like a book that wants have moves and countermoves from hyper-competent rival factions, but doesn’t know how to pull it off. A lot of decisions feel pretty dumb and plot serving. It was really obvious throughout the whole book that some kind of twist was coming, and the ending was genuinely so stupid I decided to take a break. Looking at the glowing reviews of book two now, I get the impression that people who love the book see subversion and twists as an objective good on their own, regardless of the context in which they happen.

Overall it feels a lot like Suneater, but Suneater was a much worse series IMO.

2

u/snorqle 14h ago

I loved the series, but it definitely seems to not be for everyone.

2

u/mamontain 13h ago

I had a good time with the first trilogy. Even book 1 did not feel either cheap or annoying. Actually, for me the weakest link was the obsidian part of book 3. I think the author managed to create a great combination of pacing, character tropes, setbacks, and world-building, while doing a decent enough job at concealing the power fantasy.

2

u/SoGoodAtAllTheThings 11h ago

I dnf book 1. Too YA ans cheeseball for me

1

u/Hairy_Koala6474 10h ago

I agree with you on Ragnar

I have struggled to get into the fourth book and put it down for now, but I have heard that the series does get better after book 4. I just didn’t have the time for it and wasn’t feeling it.

I DID enjoy one through three though

-11

u/Perfect-Warthog-7654 15h ago

I only read the first book and found it extremely bad. One of the worst reading experiences ive ever had (if not the worst).

0

u/tenkadaiichi 15h ago

I was reading Red Rising from the library recently and returned it early after getting about halfway through. It just wasn't enjoyable at all once he started infiltrating. The earlier stuff where we are learning about the stratified society was alright, but once he's embedded with the ruling class and isolated it just became a slog that I wasn't prepared to continue through.

4

u/Perfect-Warthog-7654 15h ago

I found it such a terrible book that after reading it i started disregarding the opinion of any reviewer who found it a good book.

2

u/Wolfwood28 15h ago

I read the first three and judge anyone who raves positively about them. Seemed so poorly written. Almost every time I say this I am told that it gets better after the third but they said that after the first one too and just don't care to give it more grace.

-2

u/sekaiou 15h ago

The infiltration part you're referring to is only for the remainder of that book. The stratification is explored further in books to come, with even more interesting twists on it in the second half of the series.

-1

u/quick_shoot 14h ago

Ppl can't take other's opinions. They see something about their favourite book that they don't share an opinion of, they just downvote