Book Review: Equinox (arc)

Equinox (2022) by David Towsey

Fiction | Fantasy | Sci-fi

Disclaimer: In every review that I complete, I try my best to avoid spoilers of any kind and include spoiler warnings when necessary.

About the book (from Goodreads)

Everyone is not as they seem in this fantasy novel, replete with war, witchcraft and secrets.

Christophor Morden lives in a world where everybody changes with the rising and setting of the sun. For every person contains two distinct identities – a day brother and a night brother. One never sees the light, the other nothing of night.

One evening Christophor, one of the king's special unit of witch hunters, is woken early by a call to the city prison. A young woman has torn her own eyes out, and the police suspect supernatural causes. The investigation takes Christophor far from home, to a village on the edge of the kingdom.

There he will find his witch – and his night brother will find himself desperate to save her. And as this battle of the self rages, the witch's ancient and apocalyptic ritual comes ever closer to completion...

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Note: Thank you to Netgalley & the publishers for allowing me access to this arc!

My Review

When reading the description of this book, my first thought was, "this sounds intriguing!" My first thoughts were right, as this book was certainly intriguing. However, the first half of this book is confusing, and it takes far too long to get to the good parts of the story. Had the first half matched the second, I would have given this four stars.

Note: Though this is a good book, I firmly believe that it may be better suited for a television show (or long movie). I think that the concepts would play out much more nicely on screen, and I'm not usually the type of person to say that about a book.

The Good Things

1. The overall concept of the story is fantastic! The idea that day and night are wholly different is interesting.

2. The characters (though they were a tad lackluster) in relation to the concept of day and night: it's certainly a well-designed idea that the night and day parts of characters affect one another.

3. I think it is important to say that the cover is gorgeous. Many potential readers look at a cover of a book FIRST, then turn to the book's summary (which is lacking), then to reviews.

The Bad Things

1. As I mentioned before, the book's first half was a tad confusing, and I had a hard time understanding where the plot was going. It can be hard to build an entire world right off the bat, but I feel like the first 50% (or so) was lacking significantly. The second half of the book gets much better and makes much more sense. If you can deal with this flaw, then read on!

2. I didn't LOVE the writing style. However, writing style IS the type of thing that is up to the reader, so my personal opinion on this matter may not matter much.

My Final Rating:

☆☆☆ (Goodreads)

☆☆☆ (Blog)

☆☆☆ (Amazon - will post as soon as the book is released)

Release Date: May 12, 2022. Pre-order this from Amazon by clicking here!

If you have access to this ARC, please feel free to leave comments concerning how you liked -or didn't like, no judgment here- it! If you don't have access, let me know if this is on your tbr! I would love to hear your thoughts!