A review by trinityb2021
The Prison Healer by Lynette Noni

3.0

3 ⭐️

This is the classic YA experience. “I’m trapped in prison but why is he kinda hot?” It is extremely nostalgic and kind of fun but nothing special.

I think the prison has a lot of weird plot holes. Why do they even have a healer? It seems they don’t care about the well being of the people (and we later find out something that makes it even dumber that they even keep Kiva employed as a healer much less three other people). They have an herb garden? I guess the healer has to get their supplies from somewhere and it isn’t like they’re going to import them but it seems weird they have a peaceful garden in this prison. It seems somewhere between harrowing and harsh (the tunnels and quarry) and peaceful (garden and trained healer).

You can’t look at anything in this book too closely or it starts to fall apart. That’s okay. I’ll just look the other way when plot holes start showing up. The inconsistencies in the prison setting particularly bothered me because it’s the whole point of the book.

Kiva is pretty fucking stupid. I strive to be this level of ignorant. She does not think about anything longer than 2 seconds. The only thing she is good at is treating people’s ailments. I don’t think the author intended her to be so stupid but the amount of time it takes her to infer basic things about her surroundings and closest friends is astonishing. I really hate stupid protagonists so this bothered me more than it should’ve. Even the reveals and twists that I didn’t see coming just felt kind of dumb and unsatisfying.

The story was interesting and about halfway through they introduce a good mystery element that I was eager to see how it was resolved. I was thoroughly entertained and it held my attention all the way through. It was maybe a little too long but it didn’t overstay its welcome. 13 year old me would’ve ate this up, no crumbs.