I have a lot of thoughts on this book. I wasn’t sure what to expect based on the reviews as they seemed to either love it or hate it, especially with some other women not being as complimentary. 

First off, I liked all the female characters. Too rarely I think women are shown in such breadth or depth. They were fierce, weak, ugly, sexy, ambitious, and everything in between. I think a lot of romance/fantasy gets women wrong or they oversimplify common tropes, so it was refreshing to read something with complex characters that you love to hate and hate to love. 

Additionally, I think he did a great job trying to balance all of the POVs. Each section primarily shifts between two characters before jumping to others. Then in sections where it shifts POVs each page, it acts more like a camera in a show or movie where each POV is connected to the last, making it dynamic and easy to follow. 

Yes there are a lot of characters and relationships. Like a lot of other fantasy novels/series. If you can keep up with other fantasy novels, you can with this one too. I wonder if people struggle more with the Indian names and lack of familiarity, than actually being able to keep track of characters and relationships. 

Overall, it was a solid grim dark fantasy novel and I’m looking forward to reading the second in the series! If you like complex, dark, political drama fantasies, then this is right up your alley!

1/5 ⭐️ DNFed @ p.29 (but skim read the rest)

Look, this may be good for others but after finding no less than 5 editing errors in the first two chapters alone, not to mention the rampant sexism/misogyny, slut-shaming, and child torture, I’m gonna have to tap out on this one. 
After skim reading the whole novel I think ultimately this style of grimdark, ‘Game of Thrones-esque’ story isn’t for me. The prose is a weird mix of elevated vocabulary and anachronistic modern colloquialisms, shallow characterisation and a confusing plethora of dramatis personae, and overly descriptive & figurative language with heavy handed ‘tell’ style “world-building”. While characters and plot show some connections towards the end, it takes 85+% before it does and it’s all clearly a set up for book two. The negative representation of female characters (CW: marital rape, abuse, torture, suicide ideation, etc.) also continues for no other reason but to emphasise the grim nature of this world, all too much ‘men writing women’ for me. The action and epic scope of the story isn’t bad but the negatives outweigh what could have been an interesting series. 
If you like political/wartime, complicated, grimdark fantasy retellings with character driven action and extreme violence (it’s giving big ‘Game of Thrones’ energy with comparable characters and story arcs) then this might be for you.

There is something incredibly off putting to me about the writing in this book that goes beyond the MMC calling his sister an ugly slut multiple times in the opening pages. I usually try to give a book more of a chance than this but this book is over 600 pages and I’ve peeped ahead - it’s still shit at page 503. Im calling this a fail from a book subscription box that has mostly produced stinkers and am moving on. I hope this reaches its intended audience. 

Too graphic