I LOVED THIS HFJSKGLFS

gearbreakers is a masterpiece and godslaters is no different this is everything i ever wanted!!! sapphic sci fi needs to become a new genre quote me

I won't say much about the plot bc I don't want to spoil anyone and also you can just read the book description up above if you want but I do want to say !!! this book was absolutely lovely oml

if you liked Gearbreakers even a little bit pick this book up and give it a shot. it expands more on the found family aspect of the first book and tbh the domestic scenes with the squad were an emotional break from the total brutality of their world that I was grateful for. I loved the continued lament on children inheriting wars from dead parents or families and getting stuck in the roles handed down to them and I especially loved Mikuta allowing her protagonists to be selfish as hell. I feel like I so rarely see it done genuinely; a main character is supposed to be happy to sacrifice themselves to save the world, or at least not hesitate after a teary goodbye. Eris and Sona are genuinely not great people, and they're completely unapologetic about it. there's multiple times in this book that they make questionable calls to save people closer to them and tbh I loved that

also Enyo !!!! he really came outta left field for me after his violent arrival at the end of the first book and I ended up way more attached to him than I ever would have anticipated but he was just so interesting.

my single complaint is that I won't have my preorder in hand until June and I want to look at the cover in person bc it is unfairly beautiful

thank you to NetGalley for providing the ARC, I was ecstatic when I got okayed tbh

I really enjoyed this book! It had everything the concluding piece of a duology should have -- fast paced action, romance, found family -- but for me, it fell just shy of GEARBREAKERS, which I loved every second of.

GODSLAYERS was enticing and from the onset was fast-paced and action packed. I truly loved how it weaved in more politics, backstory, and emotions from the first book. It picks up right where the first book leaves off. However, in some points, this book felt as if it was 2 different stories mixed together and I wanted to see more of both plotlines. It felt like it could have been a trilogy.

I think Hana Mikuta does a phenomenal job worldbuilding and each of their characters is so well rounded that they lift off the page. You can imagine every scene and feel the emotions of their characters.

4/5 stars.

The same worldbuilding issues from the first book carry over into this one, such as:

The mix of religions for some reason only includes European religions, many of which fell out of practice centuries ago.
No justification for why "resource villages" are routinely destroyed
The extremely expensive yet very low tech technology
Bad naming
Edgelord dialogue
Lack of descriptions

No good reason for keeping Bellsona or Eris alive

"Hangar" is specifically for things that can fly. The Windups are kept in garages, which sounds a lot less cool, I know, but it's what that sort of thing is called.

A metal hand closes around Eris' ankle. If the mecha is 160 feet tall, it's hand is about 20 feet across, each finger about 2 feet wide. Something that large can't wrap its fingers around her ankle.

"Electrical resistivity tomography imager" - just say ERT, or a scanner, or anything less wordy. The author doesn't know what this is or how it works, most of the target audience won't, and no one will interrupt the story to look it up.

"...fingertips searching to catch on a loose seam…" - the word you want to use here is "thread," but it's too obvious so the author substitutes a somewhat related word. The problem is that a seam isn't something that you can pull, it describes a line formed when two pieces of fabric meet. You can pull apart a seam, but you can't pull the seam itself.

The characters narrate in very pseudointellectual prose, the kind that sounds deep when you're writing it but when you revisit it ten years later is just pure cringe. Worse is that they all sound the same. For example:

"Greedy things, Gods - their hands rise, searching for me…" - Eris
"The Pilots were greedy, reaching for her…" - Sona, five pages later

You would think Eris reducing the mecha to their ostensible function as "gods" and Sona opting to emphasize the human beings within would indicate some depth and variety to how they perceive the world as individuals. This could be an intentional and clever choice the author made, but it isn't.

Mecha aren't something that would be created in the real world. They would be too expensive to build and maintain. If for some reason we did make them, just for shits and giggles, having a human pilot them would be unnecessary. It would be safer, and cheaper, to operate them remotely. In order to suspend disbelief i.e. throw it out the window with mecha, they need to be cool. Inelegant, slow moving, skyscraper-sized steampunk "windups" that are easily dismantled by a zany teenager are not cool.

Too many domestic scenes. I don't care about sleeping arrangements. It's boring.

How did the gearbreakers take over a cavern full of dozens of windups without anyone noticing. Why aren't the windups tracked in any way? An entire cohort of people piloting giant robots defected and instead of dealing with it it was covered up by "blueprints blotted from history" (how would blueprints for these things be publicly accessible in a totalitarian state) and "the Academy told to give a blank stare to anyone who asked around." Why would the people "asking around" be left alive in a country where "resource villages" on which the city is wholly dependent are routinely destroyed for minor infractions? The explanation given is that they destroyed another "hangar" and left a couple of their cohort in the rubble and moved to another location. But there is no possible way these mechas can be stealthily moved en masse.

The words "rot," "rotting," and "rotted" are used a lot.

"Shiels doesn't waste generator power on lighting up the hangar" - they have dozens of mecha running on some limitless "central power core". Use one of those.

"The ball is the only place we can be sure he'll be in public." Based on what? One person telling you? How is this not an obvious plot to draw them out - more importantly, how did no one in this ridiculous war room think of that possibility? Literally no resistance to this paper-thin plan. A few sentences later the plan changes to re-recruiting Sona to kill him? The one rational-seeming adult calls attention to how absurd the plan is, yet readily agrees with it.

"Devoid guard - posting an unpiloted mecha to scare off unwanted activity - is a new tactic…" - in what universe is a scarecrow a "new tactic"?

What even is a Zenith? Why are they special? Why are they important? How is this government structured? We spend so much time trapped in the characters' heads, so much time reading infodumps of the most mundane aspects of their lives, that we never learn anything about how the world works, or even what it looks like.

Lack of contractions for the...I don't even know what they're side is called. The Godolians? "Do not be concerned." "You do not wear earrings." This is so overdone that it's more likely to be parodied than played straight, like the author does here.

If you liked the previous book you'll like this one since it's more of the same. For me, the lack of improvement over the author's previous work was fatal to this sequel.

Such a captivating sequel! I somehow enjoyed this even more than the first one, which shows how impressive the authors writing is! I was never a big fan of Pacific Rim, and was pretty new to sapphic storylines, but somehow Ms. Mikuta makes the reader completely invested in something they’re not familar with. It’s a gift, and I’ve gotten quite a few of my friends that are new to this type of fiction to try the first book, and they can’t WAIT till this one is released. Okay

The found family in this is top tier.
The gearbreakers are grappling with how far they're willing to go and still be able to live with themselves when this is all over if they make it to the end.
Sona and Eris trying to make space for the small moments of joy whenever possible for themselves and for the kids is so heart-warming to see.
The understanding they all have that they are all kids and how absurd it is that they have to fight in the hopes that no other kid will have to be pulled into this, so that others may still have a life as unblemished by this war as possible. I loved how much more we get to see of each of these characters, how young and flawed and traumatized they are. The growth from each of them is truly wonderful to read. We watch each of them come to terms with the bad things they've done and how they can try to do good, to be good in the future. I devoured this duology. Truly an amazing story that I hope will be as beloved as it deserves.

My rating: 1,0000/5 stars

How did I live life before reading this series? If Gearbreakers was amazing, Godslayers is on another planet. This sequel takes everything to the next level. The romance, the plot, the found family relationships. Wow.

We left our beloved main characters on quite a cliff hanger at the end of Gearbreakers, but readers will not have to wait long for their fates to become known. Godslayers jumps right into the action, something that Gearbreakers lacked in its opening.

While this series is objectively amazing on its surface premise of rebellious teens taking down giant robots, its what it underneath that makes these books amazing. The love that all the characters feel for each other is so evident in every single line. Godslayers reminds us that these characters are, above all, children who have had to grow up too fast. Godslayers will no doubt make you feel all the things way too strongly. If I think too hard about this book I might cry.

My favorite thing about this series will always be the found family within it. Eris’ crew loves and looks out for each other so fiercely. It is all I want in life and more to find friends like this.

The time jumps were really the only thing that bothered me in this book but only because I wanted every single Eris and Sona moment to be written out on the page for me to devour. I will forever be devastated that I will never be able to read a Sona/Eris scene for the first time again.

This book gave me major book hangover in the best way. So much so that I jumped right into a reread of Gearbreakers after finishing it. I don’t know if I will ever find books I love as much as this series. They just have all the feels, the perfect romance, the snarky side characters, the epic plot, the deep moments, the quotable lines, literally everything.

"Godslayers"
I honestly can't say how captivating this sequel was without spoiling the entire duology so far and not even saying how beautiful the development of romantic relationships and friendships is, especially the protagonist's relationship. It is very beautiful and the fiction did not disappoint and I dare say that it was even better than the first book and that dystopia was at the author's peak. 4 stars.

Thank you to netgalley for providing me with an eArc.

Thank you, Feiwel & Friends, for allowing me to read Godslayers early!

Zoe Hana Mikuta's debut last year was definitely a highlight for me and I was so excited about continuing the story of our beautiful sapphic couple, composed of a mecha-pilot and a sort of engineer. Action-packed and as emotional as its prequel, Godslayers was absolutely a decent end to the series.