When I read the premise of this book, I knew that it would be something I'd love, I just didn't know how much.

You know what else I wasn't expecting? ALL THE TEARS! This book made me cry.

The author did a wonderful job of getting the emotions across throughout the entire story. I really felt for Lenora because of all she had to go through.

And I love love love her hair colour. There's a surprising lack of (partially) green haired characters in books, WE NEED MORE OF THEM.

The book is over 400 pages long, and a lot happens, but I didn't feel like any part of it was rushed.

I read most of it in one go because I just couldn't stop reading. I only took a break to do some chores and then jumped straight back into this wonderfully crafted world.

There were a few choices that I wasn't sure about (like one adult action which I didn't think belonged only in that age category), but by the end it was explained why it was the way it was, and it made sense.

I liked both of the romance plots, don't ask me which one I like better though, because I can't tell you. But what I can tell you, is that the heartbreak hurt me as much as it hurt Lenora. Books that manage to hurt me so deeply get catapulted to my favourites list.

I'm reaching the end of my review and I still haven't mentioned the numerous plot twists, let's remedy that.

There's twist upon twist upon twist. The author managed to keep most of them well hidden until it was time for them to be revealed which I appreciate, since I'm normally pretty good at guessing.

The ending twist in particular was very good, and got me excited for the next book.

If The Crossing Gate was released during the big YA dystopia boom, I'm sure it would be right up there with the greats. I'm hoping that it'll still grow popular, even if the dystopia craze isn't as big now as it was then.

*Thank you to the publishers and NetGalley for providing me with an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review*

This was such an amazing read! Lenora needs to make a crossing to become an adult but fails and needs to follow certain laws in order to avoid suspicion. I really enjoyed Lavie's writing as she captured the Greek world pretty well and did an amazing job with creating a new world. Her writing brought back the 2010s books like Divergent and Red Queen which is a good thing in my opinion because Divergent is such an amazing book that I haven't read anything as amazing as those books. The storyline was amazingly structured but I do have to say that it wasn't totally original. The pacing was well done with all conflicts and action well put together in the story.

Lenora is the main character in this book and I enjoyed her story. She is such a brave character and kind of remind me of Mare from Red Queen. She develops throughout this novel but readers can tell that more development is coming in the upcoming books. There are also some great side characters like Lenora's best friends and Erick. I enjoyed most of the side characters and their involvement in the book. This book has a love triangle which is not one of my favorites as it's hard to ship a couple when you could be upset if you are wrong. Even that the romance was just not for me with a 1/5 level of steaminess.

The ending was just amazing with there being so many twists and turns. It just brought back the Hunger Games and Divergent's ending as they always ended so well with a twist that makes you want more. This book was very well written even though I had some minor problems. But I'm glad to have read this book as it gave me old time feels with a bit of newness to it. This book is perfect for fans of The Hunger Games, Divergent and Red Queen.

I hate leaving 1* reviews. I really REALLY hate leaving 1* reviews, I will give books I despise 2*'s just because I feel bad. So when I give a book one star, it's been a pretty dire read for me. I wanted to like this, the cover is so pretty and the concept sounds interesting and a lot of fun, but I wanted to throw it at a wall before I got 10% in, and that urge just kept growing. I ended up DNFing at 56% so if it got better after that, apologies, but I couldn't read any more of it.

I found it to be rather ridiculous and I couldn't stay immersed in the plot for any real anything of time and the more it progressed and Lenora learned more and more about her world and the adults and rebellion, the sillier it became. Nothing was logical. A lot of it was incredibly uncomfortable (and not in the good way where it is clearly meant to be and it works for the plot, just a cringe way) and there were huge chunks that just made no sense. The romantic element was ah, well it was there- I wasn't a fan whatsoever. And the characters were also there. None of them felt very individual except for Lenora and that was mainly because of how annoying she was- she stood out.

It did have an early 2010's feel to it though and maybe if I'd read it back then I would have liked it, back when I devoured dystopian. The idea of it is great, and I can see the potential, and it covers some important themes. I just really did not click with this book at all, and it's one of my first 2022 books (all of which have been a little bit meh), I'm a bit devastated but it is what it is.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for an e-arc of this in exchange for an honest review.

Read 22% of the way into this book but kept starting and stopping. I had trouble getting into it and figured it was better to review as is. It was written well just not my cup of tea.

This is a captivating and unique story. I do wish the world building had been a little more consistent but the way information is reveled in the story fits their society. That said what I did know was plenty intriguing to keep me reading and I am looking forward to learning even more in the next book. I liked the characters and it was particularly interesting to see how the class differences were both so harshly defined and also blurred when it served the wealthiest to do so. The blending of the dystopian future with Greek and Roman history and mythos was also well done and very compelling. All around this is a cool book.

Thank you to Netgalley, Absolute Author Publishing House and the author, Asiel R. Lavie, for providing a copy of The Crossing Gate (A Waltz of Sin and Fire book 1). I have reviewed honestly.

The Crossing Gate features, but is not limited to, the following themes:
○ YA fantasy
○ Coming of age
○ Dystopian
○ Feminism
○ Women equality
○ War
○ Rebellion
○ Chosen One

My overall rating for The Crossing Gate is…

3.5 Stars!

Firstly, this book has some powerful messages within, including that of women equality, feminism and the emotions we discover as we come of age. Add a fantasy and dystopian setting, with rebellion, war, romance, friendships and so much more, you have a solid and entertaining tale. The story started light and fluffy but took a dark and sinister turn at the halfway point, which made me feel like I was reading an entirely different book, it was surreal. In the darker parts of the book there are references to rape, sexual assault, assault and violence, which may be confronting for some younger readers. Towards the end I felt the tale got a touch messy and bland, but overall, The Crossing Gate is an invigorating new YA tale that will captivate teen readers across the globe.

🚸 The Crossing Gate - Asiel R. Lavie 🚸
🔮 A prophecy
🚧 A half-adult
😈 An evil Prince
⚔ A quest for freedom
🧠 A twist-filled read

(ARC received in exchange for honest review at www.netgalley.com)

She can’t grow up. Literally. After multiple failed attempts at crossing into adulthood Lenora is on the Kingdom's watch list. No one knows the crossing gate's history but all citizens of Elpax must cross three times to grow up 🚸

For each age only certain knowledge/activities are permitted under pain of imprisonment, mutilation & death. Breaking the rules causes sin spots to appear on adults which are searched for as proof of wrong doing. Curiosity is a Sin.🔍

Despite being impossible in Juveniles Lenora starts experiencing adult emotions and before long she is walking the knife edge between following the rules & finding out what is happening to her. With another failed crossing attempt Lenora becomes embroiled in a rebellion against her will & uncovers secrets that change everything 🤯

Omg this dystopian adventure was a WILD ride. There were layers upon layers of twists, intrigue, politics, knowledge & relationships that created a complex & intriguing read 💡

Despite all of the overlapping complexities the story moved at a good pace & was not too tricky to follow. I thought the world building was spot on for the story but ⚠️ WARNING: it does include violence, killing & multiple types of assault and oppression which may be confronting for some readers - see Goodreads for full trigger warnings ⚠️

While naive characters usually irritate me - I thought Lenora's naivete was well done in the context of the world building. The characters were interesting but I have no clue who to trust, if anyone! 🧐

The insta-love/love triangle felt a little bit stilted/awkward but it will be interesting to see how it evolves with that last minute revelation (Seriously? I can NOT EVEN! 😯) 💞

Overall, The Crossing Gate really drew me in & I need to know what happens next 📚

I am absolutely obsessed with this book. The plot itself was amazing. With every piece of Worldbuilding and and plot point I become more and more addicted. The book goes into detail to help you understand the world and time we are in without info dumping or making it unbearable.

On top of that I love Lenora. She is incredibly brave and kind (albeit quite naive due to restrictions on what she can know). At times, however I found some of the characters unlikeable or just plain annoying. Though I get at some points they are supposed to come off as unlikeable or even some characters themselves are supposed to be unlikeable there were points like when Jason was warning about pulling their little library stunt where I didn't like him at all. I know he was trying to protect his friends but he came on as overbearing and a little douchebaggy.

Overall however, I absolutely loved and am excited to see where this series goes.

Review of The Crossing Gate by Asiel R. Lavie

Thank you NetGalley and XpressoBookTours for providing me with an eARC of Asiel R. Lavie’s novel, The Crossing Gate. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Okay, I’m going to be honest: this book wasn’t for me. However, there were some things I appreciated about the book, so I’ll start with those. First of all, the world-building in this book was done through our protagonist, Lenora, who isn’t given any knowledge about the society she is in due to her status as a minor. I thought that was an interesting way to do world-building because the government forbids adults from informing minors about anything that the government deems “adult” and there’s a lot of commentary about how keeping teens in the dark about important things is a bad system because it doesn’t prepare them for the rest of their lives.

That being said, a lot of the plot hinges upon keeping readers in the dark by keeping our main character in the dark. I think this is common in the first books of a dystopian series. The problem I had was that there were a lot of things revealed in the final ten percent or so of the book and it was often difficult to keep up with the ever-changing rules of the story.

I will say that I was intrigued enough to finish the book; I couldn’t stop reading until I found out what happened next. Dear readers, I lost sleep over this book, so I can say that Lavie did a good job of giving just enough information to pique a reader’s interest to keep them reading.

One of my main problems with the book is that Lavie seems to be intending to write a feminist story, but I had trouble taking it seriously simply because a middle-class white female character is meant to be revered as the epitome of oppression. I think Lavie probably means well with the commentary on the way women are treated, but the problem I have with the way it's executed is the examples given are almost exclusively white women. There are so many people who are left out of the equation: people of color, queer people, impoverished people, people with disabilities, and people who are neurodivergent. It just bothers me that this is how feminism is presented here. There were only discussions of the ways the society hurts women—most of whom were white—without a mention of how class status, sexuality, race, and other demographics are mistreated. It made it hard to read.

Another problem I had was with the pacing and the time skips. Sometimes a lot of time would pass with few events, and other times the pace was lightning fast, and I had to reread passages to understand what was happening.

There were just a lot of things I didn’t like. I’m not a fan of instant-love and the love triangle made me uncomfortable. It was a major part of the book, and I just didn’t like either choice. There was a point in the book when I didn’t know how old Lenora was and that made one piece of the love triangle uncomfortable to read—especially with the lack of information that minors have about the world. There’s a power dynamic in both love interest options for Lenora because both potential love interests are considered adults by society and have been allowed to learn adult information Lenora is not privy to.

I know that a lot of people liked this book, but it really wasn’t for me.

2 out of 5 stars.

Also, one suggestion that I have is to include a list of trigger warnings at the beginning of the book, especially because this book is a young adult novel and there are several depictions of sexual assault. I’m not arguing that serious topics shouldn’t be included in young adult novels. Books are meant to be places to read about things regardless of whether those things are uncomfortable or not. I just think a little warning could be useful to prepare young readers for what they’re about to experience. (I also would’ve preferred a trigger warning. There’s no mention of the serious topics depicted in this book in the NetGalley description.) Lavie includes a list on GoodReads, but I think having it in the book would probably be more helpful for readers.

Trigger Warnings: Sexual assault, slavery, murder, blood, violence, suicidal thoughts, starvation, mentions of corpses, sex trafficking, physical abuse, verbal abuse, and more.

I wanted to enjoy this book more than I did. The premise was original, the setting of the dystopian landscape was surprising with many layers of lore to accompany the world, and I think the topics about the transition into adulthood and the dangers of the ways minors can be taken advantage of was interesting.

We follow Lenora as she approaches her third way through the Crossing Gate into adulthood. This eventually leads into a sort of revolutionary narrative against the dystopian government with way too many plot threads and topics being touched upon.

This book tries to address too many topics and all of them are in a very simplified way ( some examples including sexual assault, abuse, classism, and a few passing commentary on lgbtq+ ). I had a hard time figuring out who the target audience is meant to be because even for a young adult book, the writing and narrative felt very juvenile and yet the content felt a touch too mature in some places.

I had a huge issue with the writing. There were a lot of exposition dumps, the dialogue was awkward and a bit too forward, and the whole book was more a case of telling rather than showing through actions. Really, the book felt abrupt, disjointed and a touch forced ( in conversations, plot development, character dynamics, and romances ).

When I saw the cover of “The Crossing Gate”, I wanted to read it. The cover is absolutely stunning! While the artwork drew me in, Leen’s journey throughout Elpax held my interest.


Leen, also known as Lenora, has a problem. She’s not ready to enter adulthood, but she’s tired of being treated like she’s too young to understand.  She needs a full third line to live a normal life as an adult in Elpax. In order to gain her third line, she must journey through the Crossing Gate. Until then, Leen is trapped in the juvenile phase of her life.

“All you need to live a normal life is a full third line…”

As the story progresses, Leen’s world evolves. She learns more about the good and evils of her world. The characters are morally grey in this young—adult, dystopian novel. Even though certain knowledge and emotions are outlawed to anyone without three lines, the reader still feels love, hurt, betrayal, and loss along with Leen.

The reason I am giving the book four out of five stars is due to having a little difficulty following. The dictionary at the end of the book is an extremely helpful tool. The character development is phenomenal! By the end of the story, Leen is not the girl she was in the beginning, not by a long shot. She is a powerful woman! Bravo, Asiel, for
creating such a beautiful character!

The ending was a surprise and a cliffhanger, so I can’t wait for book two!

I recommend this to anyone who has enjoyed novels like “Divergent”, “The Giver”, “1984”, or “Fahrenheit 451”.

I received “The Crossing Gate” from NetGalley and the publisher in exchange for my honest opinion.

#thecrossinggate #netgalley #xpressbooktours #awaltzofsinandfire

A gorgeous cover, captivating description yet full of sentiment insides.

The Crossing Gate is a sci-fi fantasy dystopian story about journey of Lenora, the heroine who has to tresspass saving her mother and big crossover to take against the empire in restoring the peace of the kingdom without her knowing any idea about it..

The love interest here is common, yet quite intriguing. The dilemma of her juvenile mind against adulthood gut is wary. The confusion that prophecy gives referring who is who, the good boy or the 5 letter boy. And me too, I don't know where to put on my sympathy. Both of them have one in common—a strong and genuine love for Lenora, willing to give and sacrifice everything for her.

Time setting is futuristic and high technology element exists in the whole story. The mixture of advance science, such as inventions and fantasy is superb.

The world building is great and inspired by Greek Myths. I like how the author puts the classic idea of typical royal family dispute as everyone is greedy to seat the throne. And the back story of re-establishing the kingdom after an attack, bargain a nasty agreement and forging new rules to follow. This also exposed the several situations that in history and till now in reality we still are experiencing. Such as corruption, abusing the power, injustice on the lower class of society, privileges only for wealthy people and discrimination of women's rights.

Tw : Violence and Sexual Assult

Genuinely enjoyed this and looking forward for the second book. The author knew where to stop the typing and just leave me hanging. Thank you Netgalley for giving me a copy of this gem and Asiel R. Lavie for creating Elpax Empire and its tale.

#TheCrossingGate #NetGalley #AsielLavie #AWaltzOfSinAndFire

I received a copy through NetGalley for review.

The Crossing Gate is a pretty heavily dynamic dystopian book, it feels like a cross between The Hunger Games, and The Handmaids Tale.

Leen, Lenora is a juvenile in the country of Elpax. "Glory to Elpax!"
She has one more chance to make it through The Crossing Gate so she can be let into the world of adults.
Juveniles and Children are forbidden from knowing all adult feelings, and frankly Elpax version of adulthood seems to breed the darkest characteristics in its people. Sin the the control of the country, and only women are inspected for it by the government. Because only women are capable of sin right? Those that are found to sin are publicly punished, and sometimes executed, their families shunned.

The Wealthy in Elpax can buy their sins off and away. The working cannot.

And Leen finds herself square in the middle of the governments scrutiny when she panics on her third try and fails to cross again. Stuck between an ancient prophecy, a corrupt king who won't let go of his throne and control and rebels who want to set Elpax free.
Leen has to decide if the truth of Elpax should remain as is, or should she fight for a world where children are allowed to grow up with love of family and not loyalty to country and fear of sin.

What a ridiculous book. There was so much going on that most of it didn’t make sense. I didn’t care for the main character Lenora. She was immature and over dramatic. Why are there so many sentences that end with an exclamation mark? The story kept shifting to this and that that I lost interest along the way and skimmed half of the book. Romance was forced and I didn’t believe it. Strong pass for me.

Warning: Violence, sexual assault, physical and verbal abuse.


*Received via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review*

I was looking for a good somewhat dystopian book like the ones I used to read in middle grade.
This was a good one, it had its ups and downs but all in all I would recommend it.

I received a copy of this book from the publisher! All opinions are my own!

As someone who loves dystopian, I can honestly say that I absolutely adored the world that was created in this book! The uniqueness of it and the way that it was painted were picture-perfect, and I loved learning more about the world along with Leen!

I think my biggest issue with the book was the pacing. It felt really slow at first, and then towards the end it got really fast. It also felt really abrupt in that Leen discovers the horrors of the world and suddenly the book goes from being very innocent to dealing with things like r*pe and slavery. It was very jarring and left me a bit uncomfortable.

I did really enjoy watching Leen grow up, but it also felt as though the romance was really forced. I'm personally not a fan of love-at-first-sight, and that's essentially what happens for Leen.

All in all, I really loved the world that was created and the way that Leen is fighting so much for women's rights and freedom! There are some refreshing themes in the book and some important lessons. I will definitely read the next one, and I can't wait to see what happens in this world and how the characters grow. There was a lot of action and I can't wait to see how that develops!

If you're a fan of dystopian, you should definitely check this book out! book out!

I hesitated three different times, on three different days before finally requesting this book and you know what? I should’ve listened to my gut. I struggled like you wouldn’t believe to finish this book- The Crossing Gate has no idea what kind of story it wants to be.

Lenora- Leen to her friends- is still a juvenile. After failing to cross into adulthood twice, she is on her kingdom’s watchlist. No one knows where the mysterious crossing gate came from, or what gives it its magical abilities, but all citizens of Elpax have to cross three separate times to grow up: adolescence, juvenile, and adult.

There are things that are forbidden for each age group to know, and severe penalties to make sure the rules are adhered to. Many citizens are periodically body searched for sin-spots, and there are watchers that hover to make sure no forbidden words are exchanged.

Even feelings are policed.

When Leen starts experiencing adult emotions that she cannot name, and after a strange prediction from a fortune teller, Leen begins to question the kingdom she has grown up in.

On the surface, this book seems like any YA dystopian. However, it is so convoluted and complicated that it doesn’t fall into any one genre nicely.

For over half of the book, the only plot is the fact that Lenora doesn’t want to make a third attempt to cross into adulthood. A ridiculous amount of time could have been saved had Lenora just sucked it up and walked through the damn thing. What’s stopping her, you might ask? Vertigo. She gets dizzy and that scares her.

It’s even more pathetic when you realize that all of her troubles could be solved if she just clenched her jaw and walked through the thing. She has a crush on a man who’s an adult. Her best friends are adults and the way they talk to her, and even their ability to hang out with her, is limited since she’s still a teen. And since the only people who are allowed to have jobs are adults, her mother is struggling to support Lenora and her two twin sisters. She could talk to her friends unhindered, help her mother, and even enter into a relationship with this man if she crossed through the damn gate.

But nope! After a night of stolen kisses- literally, since her relationship with Erick is illegal- she decides she wants to cross so that they can have a real life and she can fight the system to become the first female lawyer in Elpax. She’s convinced she’s in love with Erick despite having strained and limited conversations and interactions with him, oh, and for not even knowing what “love” is since people don’t learn about it until adulthood apparently.

But at her crossing, as she’s almost through the gate, she can’t see Erick and absolutely loses her mind. The gate breaks, and now the royal family is after her. But the royal family has its own drama and there are two sides fighting over Lenora: Queen Arianna is the puppet master for King Alexei and they want Lenora on their side, however Alexei’s half brother and true heir to the throne, Prince Thaddeus, wants her dead.

And then the rebels want Lenora to bring back an alien race known as Takasha, who are actually protecting Elpax and created the crossing gate as per an ancient agreement.

If that sounds wild and like it makes no sense, well you’d be right! It doesn’t! It was one thing when it was a regular dystopian where women and young people are oppressed and a group wanted to throw off the shackles of that oppressive regime. There were a lot of Handmaid’s Tale vibes because women were subjected to way more unfair treatment than men and viewed often as second class citizens; Hunger Games elements come into play a lot more if you view the royal family as she capital and the provinces of Elpax as districts; there’s even bombing of districts- oh, my bad, provinces- when they do something the royal family doesn’t like. But they just so happen to leave Lenora’s house alone, kind of like how the Victor’s Village in 12 was left standing. Lenora’s friend Jason even says he doesn’t want Leen to “become some piece in their games,” but Jason isn’t even half as noble as Peeta.

The inclusion of aliens from a parallel universe just made it even worse. There are so many tropes Lavie is trying to fit into this book that it just doesn’t work. The writing was also subpar- the dialogue was stagnant and stiff, like these characters were all coworkers who barely knew each other. One minute they’re running for their lives then the next is “Yo, man why didn’t you tell me about…” But also apparently friends are referred to as mates. There’s a lot of cyclical explanations: Lavie has to explain multiple things, and most of them are big plot points, multiple times in different ways because she isn’t clear or simple enough. What she wants to convey is way too complicated and she’s trying to explain it in a show-not-tell kind of way but she’s just…well, she’s just bad at it. One thing that really annoyed me was that Lenora was receiving plot pertinent “visions” about the in-fighting in the royal family out of nowhere with no explanation, but way later someone is like “Oh, we just installed this chip thingy in your head so we can send you memories!“ HOW?! How did you manage that? Why didn’t she realize that? Would it really have been so difficult to just tell her these things?!

The characters were the most annoying thing about this book, especially Lenora. She is so extremely immature and naive, which makes sense for a teenager who isn’t allowed to know what love is, but she is so naive to the point of annoyance, even after her crossing. She sees how unfair Elpax is, so she decides she wants to fight it by becoming the first female lawyer! Yeah, fight the system! However, she thinks it’s simply a matter of making a few phone calls and getting into university to solve decades of institutionalized sexism. She is convinced she’s in love with Erick after seeing him one time. And Erick is as boring as a piece of cardboard! Because of his status as an adult, he has to tiptoe around Lenora with no regard to the fact that he’s putting her life in danger. He’s so stiff and overly formal, it feels like a 30 year old is trying to move in on a 16 year old, even though he’s in his early 20s and Lenora is technically 18. There’s also an uncomfortable obsession with how “appropriate” he would be as a husband and that if Lenora would just cross already they can get married and start popping out babies- which Lenora thinks are delivered to doorsteps by a bird.

I can tell Lavie was really trying to go for a Katniss like heroine: a reluctant symbol for a war she didn’t want any part of. But while Suzanne Collins succeeded, Lavie epically fails. Lenora is annoying, naive, immature; she questions the reason for the war because she’s pretty much siding with Thaddeus, who could be President Snow. Lenora even fails to be a morally grey anti-hero because she just does what she’s told, thinking she’s the one making the decisions; it would be so easy to use her as a tool for either side of the war because she’s so easily convinced. For someone who claims to be unable to trust anyone or anything again, she sure does trust a lot of random people.

This is probably the worst book I’ve read this year. It’s trying to do way too much without the skills to make up for it. I wanted to DNF the book, but felt obligated to finish. I’ve read nothing but glowing reviews, and I don’t know why. I tried to follow what was happening, but there were too many plots piled on top of each other that I simply stopped trying to follow what was happening and read the words so I could be done. I believe this is a debut book, so maybe Lavie will get better with time and practice, but I’m not going to test those waters; I’ll let Wikipedia tell me how this series ends.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ (4/5)

What a promising start for a series! It’s thrilling, gripping from the start and never lose its pace.

The Crossing Gate is a dystopian story with a Hunger Games vibe (the caste between people: royal, wealthy, middle-class, workers), in a world with Handmaid’s Tale vibe. Everyone in Elpax will walk through The Crossing Gate 3 times in their life: when they were born, to juvenile phase, and adult phase.

The world-building is captivating with all its lore, the sin-spot system, the silver-mint hair (a little weird, but I love that!) the concept and true nature behind the Crossing gate, and all the Greek references. Don’t forget the best part about the plot twists: it’s on every corner. Wow! I think that’s what makes this book is so gripping and turn out to be a great page-turner.

However, I’m not a fan with the romance trope. I can’t say anything because it will be a spoiler, but I hate that it’s so complicated and so dramatic that I can’t be fond with the love interest. But, all in all, this book is still a great read and I can’t wait to read the sequel.

Thank you NetGalley and Absolute Author Publishing House for the opportunity to read this eARC. All opinions are on my own.

TW: sexual abuse, verbal abuse, suicidal thoughts

The Crossing Gate Review

Let me preface this by saying that I am in no way trying to belittle, tear down or upset the author.

I went into the book with nothing but high expectations. The premise of the book is amazing, I mean who doesn’t want to read a book about a girl who can’t cross into Adulthood, with a Greek-inspired setting, but the execution was poor. I DNFed at 31%.

My first issue was with the main character. Lenora is a very interesting character, but she doesn’t act like a 17 year old. The way that she talks and acts reminds me a bit of a younger teen, or someone who is in middle school. Lenora is very whiny, and lashes out at her mother and friends in a way that reminds me of a tantrum. Her mannerisms tend to put others in harm, and I really am not a fan.

My second issue was the writing style. This might be because this book is marketed towards the younger side of YA Fantasy/Sci-Fi, but the writing didn’t flow. Every single piece of dialogue ended with either ‘said’ or something that just didn’t make sense. A few of the sentences were slightly confusing because it wasn’t until after the dialogue was spoken that I understood how it was meant to be said.

My third and final issue was the worldbuilding. Every single time something in history was mentioned, it was written in a way that made it seem like Lenora was learning it for the first time. And there were a few paragraphs where it was just names of the past kings and princes, and I’ll be honest, I skipped them because it was too much to take in at once. Secondly, there were tons of times where characters and items were mentioned briefly, and then never built on again, like ‘Adult things’, that younger people aren’t allowed access to. I can see why they would be more mysterious as the main character is not yet an Adult, but it just felt silly, and unnecessary. Granted, I did stop reading after 31%, but it felt more like an information dump than an actual story.

That being said, I would recommend this to younger readers who want to start getting into YA Fantasy/Sci-Fi. The writing style, characters and world are all very accessible to younger readers. Overall I would give this book two stars.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for granting me an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

I’m loving this! I really love the premise and this was my first dystopian book after so long. The cover is stunning too!

Further review to come because I’m on a vacation.