Member Review

Cerise Solon grew up in a temple to train as a seer as is the tradition for every second-born child. She is close to the day when her powers will either reveal themselves or she'll be proven useless to the order and forced to do menial labor in the temple. However, the High Priestess has a vision that sends Cerise to the castle in service of the Half King in hopes of breaking the curse that has plagued the kingdom’s noble houses ever since they betrayed their goddess. Will Cerise be able to break the curse? And can she do it while resisting the charms of the cursed Half King?

It's a solidly crafted story in which Landers does an excellent job of introducing you to the world, its magic system, and all the intricacies that make it feel real in a simple and straightforward way. There is no doubt about the power structures or how things work from the very beginning, leaving the story free to be all about the characters.

And all the characters are interesting, from Cerise and her optimistic innocence to the Half King hiding his vulnerability by brooding and even the character who ultimately turns out to be the villain. Every character that gets page time has a reason to be there and is crafted to feel as real as real as possible. There are reasons for their actions and you empathize with them.

The plot is believable and moves at a great pace to keep things interesting without feeling overly rushed. The end could have done with more breathing room, but I get that the rushed feeling of battle needs to be translated into words.

That said, this is one of those good books that suffer from so much hype that I was expecting it to be better. I can't even tell you what I would change about it; I just turned the last page and thought, "Is that all?"

Very happy thanks to NetGalley and Entangled: Red Tower Books for the magical read!