Mirrored Heavens by Rebecca Roanhorse: Book Review

 

Mirrored Heavens by Rebecca Roanhorse
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

The war on earth may have yet to start as the gods claimed their vessels and set their stakes, but the war in heaven had already begun.
For what was earth but a mirror of heaven?
And what was she but a thing caught in between?

Mirrored Heavens, the final instalment of the epic Between Earth and Sky series, sees Serapio try to fulfil his destiny but still keep a piece of his heart to himself, Naranpa learn to walk the dreamland and deal with the threat there, and Xiala try to help save her people before finding Serapio. The series has a lot of the building blocks of epic fantasy like intricate world-building, a powerful magic system, conflicted characters, politics and character driven plot.

The immersive world-building based on Pre-Columbian American civilization is the strong foundation for this series and kept me going until the end. There is a lot to praise in the diverse cultural roots of the Meridian and the different backgrounds that the lead characters come from, even including a past storyline with Serapio's mother. Roanhorse's writing easily balances the character arcs with the plot and even goes beyond with snippets from songs and in-world books as epigraphs.

However, all these building blocks don't seamlessly come together for me as I found I couldn't relate to the characters and some of the decisions they make through this series (mostly in the third and second books). All the characters go through a lot and see quite a bit of growth, but disliking some of their actions and decisions deterred me from being invested in their arcs. The romance subplots I could understand, the 'do anything for undying love' plotlines felt forced, especially in the given timeframes. The plot is mostly character driven - which I appreciate more than just reactions to events, but there seemed to be too much simply acting towards perceived destinies for my taste.

On the whole, I would recommend the series for anyone interested in epic fantasy with diverse cultural roots, and would personally keep an eye out for more of the author's work!

Thanks to NetGalley and Saga Press publishers for an advanced copy of the book, all opinions are my own.

🌟🌟🌟1/4
[3/4 star for the premise and the whole book; Half a star for the characters; One star for the world-building; Half a star for the story and themes; Half a star for the writing - 3 1/4 stars in total, rounded down to an integer 3 stars.]

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