Thank you so much to the publisher and NetGalley for this eARC of 'The Atlas Paradox' by Olivie Blake. I was grateful enough to recieve 'Atlas Six' via the publisher in January 2022 so it genuinely means a lot that I was chosen again for the sequel.

'The Atlas Paradox' is the sequel to Olivie's 'The Atlas Six' and honestly, it matches in the amount of audible gasps I have given.

We start off instantly where we ended in Book 1 and from there we get introduced to new characters, new side plots - which were insightful and enjoyable to say the least, and much more twists and turns. I don't want to say too much to ruin the surprise of this book but I went through a lot of emotions constantly and it was only made better with NEW DRAWINGS?? These drawings owned me, I felt that they were absolutely perfect.

To finish this review, I have to mention the cliffhanger that links onto Book 3 (Which I desperately need right now) This ending was a shock to the system and I never expected it. I loved it so so so much and I am so excited for the final book in the trilogy whenever it may come out.

Olivie Blake continues to cement herself as one of my favorite authors with yet another five-star read.

The Atlas Paradox was absolutely amazing. I’m obsessed with these messy, pretentious, morally-ambiguous characters. I really found myself connecting with Callum in this book, which I didn’t see coming, and I loved how much more of Gideon we got to see. I still struggle to connect a little to Reina but it feels like she’s building to something really big for the finale and I’m excited to see where that goes.

I just love Olivie Blake’s writing style. Every word feels really intentional and every character has a really distinct POV voice. Yes, her books are slow and definitely characters and vibes over plot, but I really love that. I’m always struck by how great Olivie Blake’s characters are and I feel like they just get better with every book I read.

I loved the time travel element that was a bit more prevalent in this book. It was really fun to see how the past and present tied up and I’m very intrigued to see what the fallout of some of that is going to be in the next book.

These books are not romance heavy, but there was a tiny taste of romance in this one that made me super happy. I will say as much as I ship these two characters with each other, I also ship pretty much every single character in this book with every single character in this book. I’ve never read a book where the tension between every character feels so sexual. Obsessed.

Overall, I just loved this book. The ending absolutely floored me and I’m really sad I have to wait for book three.

Content warnings: Child abuse, death of a family member, illness, domestic abuse, kidnapping, suicidal ideation, alcoholism, violence, death, blood, gore, mentions of a car accident, fire, explosion, nuclear event, sexism.

I sure hope that Olivie Blake plans to name the third book "The Atlas Redemption" and fixes this book or else this series will eternally rest in my wormhole of the forgotten series.

Allow me to quote Kaul Wen, expectations are a funny thing. This is my most anticipated release of the year (yes, surpassing even Babel, or The Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of the Oxford Translators' Revolution, how unfortunate) and now The Atlas Paradox is going to be in my least favorite books of the year. Delightful.

Let's start where Olivie Blake objectively did wrong. Throughout this book, I feel like Blake doesn't know what she wants to talk about anymore. In The Atlas Six, one of my favorite things was the academic discussions between the candidates. They show me that Blake knew what she was talking about and that she is passionate about it. In this book however, I can't even follow the new study topics introduced anymore. Too many academic topics, but too few explanations for how they might be relevant to the action of the story. In this 400-pages-book, around two thirds of them are essentially a guide of how powers work, but no real usage was seen throughout the plot (if there is, they were very, VERY vague.) It seems to be one of the main complains regarding TA6, so people who didn't like Book 1 because of its vagueness, will hate this.

Now for the things that went wrong for me, and how ultimately I can't rate this more than a 1/5. I am convinced that Olivie Blake has lost her grip on her characters. This book was heavily promoted with the pitch of "new, unlikely alliances", and maybe it seems like a good thing to spice things up, it ultimately did the unthinkable - make me hate every single character of this series.

Picture this: after the initiation, everyone now knows everything they needed about the other candidates, but no one knows that. Instead of exploiting the details as much as possible to form PLAUSIBLE alliances, everyone kinda got involved with each other. But for what? I was asking that question throughout the 400 pages too. Instead of the unique dynamic the pitch aims for, the new alliances for me are nonsense and useless.

Furthermore, this leads to some interesting (derogatory) characterization. These six characters, whom I adored in TA6, turned into one-dimensional, pure archetypical characters. I am tired of seeing the archetypes being used and repeated over and over. Most of their behavior and their thoughts didn't correlate to their characterization in TA6 (and i am not even going to talk about the info dump at the beginning and how all of the sudden they all turned into saints/devils)

Finally, the insinuated romantic relationships in this book secured its place in hell. I am not going to spoil it, but let's say that Olivie Blake made some :) questionable :) decisions.

Where I am going with this? It is such a shame that a perfectly exceptional book, a fresh take of the genre, is ruined with a sequel that tries too hard to be original, to be new, even though Book 1 was exactly that. To be honest with you, I am angry. Angry that the vision of Olivie Blake (if she even has one) is undoing exactly what TA6 accomplished in the first place: original worldbuilding, critique of the elitism and classism of the quest for knowledge, unconventional characters, and dynamic relationships.

Overall, I regret that I have read this book. TA6 might be one of my favorite books of all time but this is definitely one of the worst sequels ever. I might write a spoilery review after its release but safe to say NicoLibby will be the only redemption of this series for me.

Olivie Blake never seems to miss. The follow-up to my favourite read of the year so far is currently battling The Atlas Six for the top spot. I am in absolute awe of Blake's writing and how she manages to jump between the different characters. The descriptions of the characters' power, what they learn and think about the world is so well executed. Again, hands down to Olivie Blake for writing another masterpiece.

I read the Atlas Paradox (thanks, NetGalley), and I am Entertained.

If you liked the Atlas Six you’ll like Paradox even more. It’s the ~25% point where we get anything resembling a plot - but until that point the protagonists did little more than psychoanalyse and insult each other in the barbed, witty way Blake specialises in. The medeian protégés are as repellant as always, but their worst edges have been scraped off in the sequel.

The only bit of the book that involves plot and character development is Libby’s story, and I thought that was really compelling and brutal. It has the juicy critique of white woman savourism and privilege the dark academia genre needs, and was >15% of the book. Were it more, Paradox would have been astounding. The other characters are static, we just learn more about them as allegiances shift.

But if you’re into Blake’s Atlas world and the shippery (Paradox I suspect will confound the most ardent factions). I don’t imagine any of this will put you off. And it shouldn’t. 😉

The Atlas Paradox is an incredible dark academia sequel to The Atlas Six. The writing is phenomenal. The characters are well-developed. Highly recommended! Be sure to check out The Atlas Paradox today.

I am going to try not spoil anything in this review as I personally hate spoilers, especially when it's a book that was this anticipated. So where do I begin... Blake is one of my go to authors at the moment. I absolutely devoured Atlas Six and this is exactly what was needed. I could not believe that the second book exceeded expectations as well as being an absolutely enthralling read. I cannot recommend this enough

I’m so exited to read ittttt.
I bet it’s going to be awesome!!
The cover is pretty, the writing seems good and yeah!

This series is truly amazing I will read anything Olivia Blake writes. She's a fan fiction author first and that's what makes her worlds so full and her characters phenomenal. I will love selling this in store

Overall rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5


First of all a massive thank you to netgalley For giving me an ARC in exchange for an honest review. This was probably my most anticipated read of the year and it did not disappoint!

I.LOVE.THIS.SERIES

The Atlas Paradox takes place after the events of The Atlas Six and follows the five initiates on their second year in the Alexandrian society and also on their quest to find the missing initiate, Libby Rhodes.

I loved everything about this book. The plot was amazing and not what I expected. (Although there was one part that I called and I was SO happy when it happened). The character development was amazing. I really loved how we got to see a lot more of the six’s backstories in this book and I fell more in love with all of them. I also liked Callum a lot more in this book he was much more relatable and less of an asshole.

The ending is definitely making me suffer from second book syndrome and I need the third book immediately!! I also forgot how well written and smart the writing in this book is, miss Blake is certainly unmatched in her writing style.

WHAT. THE. FUCK.

If you are a fan of the Atlas Six, there is no way you will be disappointed with the last 25% of this novel.

The Atlas Paradox is the long-awaited sequel to Olivie Blake’s literary phenomenon, The Atlas Six. The six are now in the second year of their fellowship and, having lost a member in the year previous, grapple with the reality of increasingly intense researching demands whilst also trying to get the lost back.

~

For the beginning of this book, I did fear it suffered hugely from middle book syndrome. The six perspectives often felt overwhelming and like I couldn’t pinpoint what was going on at any exact time, despite having absolutely no issues with this in the last book. It was slow moving and a struggle to get through, especially in comparison to its predecessor - many chapters felt like they were filler and it just felt as though not much happened. I honestly considered DNF’ing and likely would’ve done had it not been for my immense attachment to the characters (looking at you, Nico de Varona) and my need to see how the story ends.

~

However, the last 25% made it so worth it.

It was fast-paced and there were several scenes that had me gasping with shock and anticipation. It really picked up in terms of plot development - finally, everything I wanted to happen would happen. The character arcs of Libby and Nico in particular are everything I could have dreamed of - Olivie executed this so wonderfully and set everything up perfectly for the conclusion of the trilogy, which I need to get my hands on as soon as possible.

The ending made me want to slam my head into a wall…. I hate cliffhangers. Especially ones you’ve waited for. That’s all I will say :)

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC and to Olivie Blake’s team for continuing to work with me! (3/3 books so far babeyy).

also: https://vm.tiktok.com/ZMNGaBt8K/