Author: Leigh Bardugo Rating: 99.5% | A+ | ★★★★★ Warnings: + Violence Synopsis (from Goodreads): Nikolai Lantsov has always had a gift for the impossible. No one knows what he endured in his country’s bloody civil war—and he intends to keep it that way. Now, as enemies gather at his weakened borders, the young king must find a way to refill Ravka’s coffers, forge new alliances, and stop a rising threat to the once-great Grisha Army. Yet with every day a dark magic within him grows stronger, threatening to destroy all he has built. With the help of a young monk and a legendary Grisha Squaller, Nikolai will journey to the places in Ravka where the deepest magic survives to vanquish the terrible legacy inside him. He will risk everything to save his country and himself. But some secrets aren’t meant to stay buried—and some wounds aren’t meant to heal. Initial Thoughts King of Scars has the distinct honor of occupying my second top rated novel ever. There’s really very little I can say without spoiling any aspect of the novel, because everything is so intricate. Weighing in on the “should I read The Grisha Trilogy first” debate, I’d say that you probably don’t need to? There’s a lot of exposition in this novel, and it recaps roughly what happened in the trilogy. I haven’t actually finished the trilogy myself, but just knowing roughly what happens was enough. Reading Six of Crows, on the other hand, is practically required. There are heart-wrenching moments that would be lost on the reader if they hadn’t read Six of Crows, and there are multiple references to characters in the series. Breaking it down item by item on the rubric (which is comprised of Plot (30), Characters (30), Writing (20), and Closure (20)), KOS gets full score on everything except Characters for me. But it’s more of an opinion thing than anything else. The plot is perfect and fast-paced, and Bardugo’s writing is as pristine as ever. This is her best writing to date, her words crisper and rawer than anything I’ve read in the past three or four years. The most gratifying thing for me, I think, is comparing how juvenile The Grisha Trilogy seems compared to King of Scars; The Grisha Trilogy was Bardugo's infant stage; King of Scars is out for blood and savoring every drop. King of Scars was … not what I was expecting. In fact, I don’t think a single person got a detail of the plot right. This book took me by surprise every step towards the end, and the characterization of characters also forced me to reconsider what I had cast them as in my mind. In the end, King of Scar's mere 500 or so pages is ensconced with wave after wave of wrecking action, story, and cadence. It was my absolute honor and fortune that I got to read it on the day of release. Click "Read More" for spoilers.
0 Comments
|
Table of Contents |