jmoses's review
3.0
Not a bad read, but not great. I enjoyed it, but didn't have a problem putting it down. The world felt like generic fantasy land #7 with generic plot 7. The characters were interesting and more than one dimensional though, so that was nice.
prationality's review
4.0
In many ways I feel its unfair of me to review this book. The concept is interesting, and I certainly wanted to enjoy it since it promised all sorts of gray morality fun, but in the end it didn't deliver. It should say something that I felt the worst for Leferic, who's intentions were fine and meant for the good of his Kingdom's people, but who went way overboard in his methods. I mean he went from a simple assassination plot to a conspiracy that wiped out an entire village and then just kept growing worse by the minute. And I'm not sure 'dark ambitions' is entirely appropriate since he had the same ambitions any second son of a feudal lord would have--to be the feudal lord.
Also his brother, the heir apparent, sounded like a colossal idiot, so I can't really help but think Leferic had the right idea in assassinating him and taking his position. Whereas his brother may have been helpful as brute force and PR, he didn't think things through nor care what much happened to anyone unfortunate enough to fall in with his plans.
You had the righteously good (Sir Kelland), the mostly good (Brys), the unbelievably evil (the Maimed Witch), the misguided (Bitharn) and then...Odosse, the peasant girl who left her village at the right time and had the misfortune to then run into Brys on her way back. The two extremes were easy enough to keep track of--they stayed true to their alignment without fail, but everyone else was harder to keep track of. Plans changed so often my head swam. Bitharn, the misguided childhood friend of Sir Kelland who stayed beside him to protect him at all costs, can almost single-handedly be blamed for a lot of bad things. Odosse,who shows a lot of pluck and promise at first, had an annoying habit of questioning everything everyone said, claiming she'll do the opposite of what is the better choice and then changing her mind over something inconsequential.
Merciel seemed to have wanted to set this up as an epic in the making, but it doesn't hold up well. Motivations aren't fully explored, multiple characters could have been interchangeable and plot threads were useless and misleading.
Also his brother, the heir apparent, sounded like a colossal idiot, so I can't really help but think Leferic had the right idea in assassinating him and taking his position. Whereas his brother may have been helpful as brute force and PR, he didn't think things through nor care what much happened to anyone unfortunate enough to fall in with his plans.
You had the righteously good (Sir Kelland), the mostly good (Brys), the unbelievably evil (the Maimed Witch), the misguided (Bitharn) and then...Odosse, the peasant girl who left her village at the right time and had the misfortune to then run into Brys on her way back. The two extremes were easy enough to keep track of--they stayed true to their alignment without fail, but everyone else was harder to keep track of. Plans changed so often my head swam. Bitharn, the misguided childhood friend of Sir Kelland who stayed beside him to protect him at all costs, can almost single-handedly be blamed for a lot of bad things. Odosse,who shows a lot of pluck and promise at first, had an annoying habit of questioning everything everyone said, claiming she'll do the opposite of what is the better choice and then changing her mind over something inconsequential.
Merciel seemed to have wanted to set this up as an epic in the making, but it doesn't hold up well. Motivations aren't fully explored, multiple characters could have been interchangeable and plot threads were useless and misleading.
behindthepages's review
1.0
To me this book was horribly slow, the main storyline did not interest me at all. The story of Kelland and Bitharn interested me the most and you barely heard about them. Too many different story lines with not enough content or development in plot to support them.
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