*Book source ~ Purchased from Audible
Yelena has been in the dungeon a very long time waiting to be hung for committing murder. It doesn’t matter that she was defending herself, the Commander of Ixia’s law is clear: there is no excuse for killing. However, when her time comes she is instead taken to Valek who is head of the Spy Network and the Security Forces. There is a rule: the first person due to be executed after Commander Ambrose’s Food Taster has died is given the option of becoming the new taster instead of hanging. Yelena is surprised to be given the option, but she takes it and begins studying with Valek all about poisons. Yelena’s only trouble now should be avoiding being poisoned. However, there is more going on than she is aware of and she ends up in the middle of it all.
Guest reviewers today:
My 16-yr-old daughter A
My 14-yr-old son T
My 13-yr-old son K
Plot:
This story was a hit with all three of them. A said she liked it a lot then changed her answer to stupendous when T & K said it was awesome. There followed a discussion on whether awesome was better than stupendous. They liked the plot and the fact there was magic, but T kept expressing his disappointment in the fact the story was dragonless. The world is pretty cool, magic is pretty cool and they didn’t like what happened to Yelena or her foster siblings at the hands of Reyad who they said was an asshat (my word) and deserved to be killed. They really liked the fighting and training scenes.
Characters:
A like Yelena more than the boys did though they didn’t have any objection to her in a general sense. Everyone thought Valek was the most awesome character and Ari & Janco followed close behind as favorites. A liked Rand, but was disappointed in him and no one liked Marge though I don’t think she was meant to be liked. They thought the Commander was tough but fair except when it came to executing people for having killed in self-defense. They thought that was grossly unfair.
Other points:
A thought criollo sounds like it would be pretty tasty and would love to figure out a way to try some. T said he thought the book would make an awesome movie even though they’d probably just screw it up. Um, I wonder where he gets that from? *whistles innocently* K likes all the fighting that happened and wants to learn how to do it.
Narration:
Everyone liked the narration.
All-in-all they were very happy with the story and look forward to moving on to the next in the trilogy.
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