Star Daughter by Shveta Thakrar

*Spoiler free*

The daughter of a star and a mortal, Sheetal is used to keeping secrets. But when a flare of starfire injures her human father, Sheetal needs a full star’s help to heal him. A star like her mother, who returned to the sky long ago. Sheetal’s quest will take her to a celestial court of shining wonders and dark shadows, where she must act as her family’s champion in a competition to decide the next ruling house of the heavens—or risk never returning to Earth at all.

I had seen so much excitement for this book online. So much so, that I couldn’t help but be curious about what it was about. It doesn’t sound like something I would normally completely jump on, but a half star, a competition, and a celestial court was more than enough to entice me completely.

I really don’t want to say that I didn’t like this one, but I didn’t love reading. It’s weird, because I think it’s an inherently good book, but for some reason I just could not get into it. Maybe this book is so not for me and everything flew completely over my head, I dunno. But I did find myself procrastinating reading it. Not to say that it’s bad! Because I do think it’s a really solid book, I just could not get into it for some reason.

To start off, the writing is utterly goregous. It ebbs and flows in a way that leaves you a little less breathless. Though, with that, I found the words sort of just slipping over me instead of landing on their intended mark. I feel like there were times I was just reading the words instead of getting their meaning. Though, that does not take away from the fact that Thakrar is a brilliantly talented writer. I’m looking forward to trying other things she’ll write/has written simply for that fact.

Moving on to Sheetal. I liked her. She was a neat character and I feel like there is such a sweetness at her center. She’s easy to love and easy to sympathize with. There is a sarcastic side to her, but it felt a bit stilted here and there. It was like her sharp comments and sarcasm were used for comic relief instead of something ingrained in her character. I also really enjoyed Minal’s character, but I wish she would have been developed a bit more. She was part of the story a lot more than I thought she would, but I would have liked for her to feel more fully there. Less like the story wouldn’t change too much if she was removed. There are multiple side characters that I really liked. They had such depth to them, their own stories and struggles, and it felt so full, even if they didn’t have ample page time.

There was also a romance. It begins before the book starts and that usually throws me off. It did, but not to huge extent, which is big for me! That means the love interest was awesome haha. And he was. He was sweet and caring. There are bumps in the road, but I did like seeing how their relationship developed!

The magic and the stars and the celestial court were probably some of my favorite parts of this book. I just found everything about them fascinating. They seemed to magical.

Though, I did have a hard time picturing the scenery. I didn’t quite know where everything was or how exactly everything was supposed to look. I would have liked for the court to be fleshed out a bit more than it was, but that’s honestly just a personal preference haha.

The emotional plot and the overarching plot felt like they could have been dug into a little deeper to me. It felt like things were just said and I didn’t quite grasp the true feeling of everything. It made sense logically, but I wanted to feel everything that was going on too. That might have thrown the pacing off a bit for me too. It felt like everything happened so slowly, though it didn’t feel like the book was slogging on, but it was actually only three days. It was weird.

Anyway, I feel awful that I didn’t like this book more. It has so much going for it, but for some reason it just wasn’t for me. But, I do know that it’s going to be the best book in the world for some people and I’m super pumped to for it to find its way into their hands! So, while I might not have loved it, I recommend giving it a try, since it does have a whole lot to offer.

Star Daughter comes out August 11, 2020! You can add it on Goodreads and pre-order a copy of your own!

Thank you for you reading!