A review by kaelynbyers
Kingdom of the Cursed by Kerri Maniscalco

adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Plot
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

5.0

 Still on a mission to solve her sisters murder, Emilia has gone great lengths to get answers. And now she has agreed to be the Queen of hell. Emilia and Wrath travel to the Seven Circles of hell, where Emilia is tested by all seven of the Wicked in every way. All of her questions lead to more questions and nobody in the Seven Circles can be trusted. Emilia continues to avenge the death of her sister, but she has to trust somebody, and maybe she has always known who she was supposed to trust. 

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I was recommended this book by a friend after finishing ACOTAR and this series DID NOT DISSAPOINT. 
If you are looking for a finished series that feels like ACOTAR, this one checks a lot of those boxes and I cannot recommend it enough!! 

Oh. My. Gosh. 
If I could give this book 100 stars I would. Something about this book is perfect. Maybe it is the balance of lies and truths, of darkness and light, of love and hate. Something about this book is special. I gave all three of the books in this series 5 stars, but this book makes the whole series. 

 
Here are the things that stuck out as particularly wonderful when it comes to this book. 
1. Everything about the Seven Circles. 
This book starts out strong with the effects of the Sin Chamber on Emilia. The idea of a part of the land that is not ruled by any of the Wicked that plays on the desires and sins of the people who walk through it is so much fun. Not that the things those people endure are fun, but they sure do add tension to an already tense situation. 
The next part that I CANNOT quit thinking about are the courts of the seven princes. In book one we met some of the Wicked, but in this book we get to travel around Hell and see their castles, their courts, and their people. This is where Maniscalco blew it out of the water. Not only has she created the 7 princes to be addicting characters, but their homes and people fall in line with their princes. The detail put into describing 7 sins as princes, each with their own unique castles and courts and people, is amazing. While there is still a shallowness to each other princes due to their own evil, nothing has ever captivated me the way the writing of these princes has. They each have their own color, and their sins are not typical. When you think of gluttony, you think of food, but Maniscalco writes his character as overindulgence in all things. Food is the least of the gluttonous things that we see in Gluttony's castle. She is a genius for the way she wrote these princes, and I would give anything to see the princes and their castles brought to life one day. (But not in a movie or a tv show because they would mess it up and I can't handle that...)
2. The complex relationship between Wrath and Emilia. 
After leaving her home and pledging her soul to Pride, I was expecting the relationship between Emilia and Wrath to slow down. But, man, was I wrong. Once they get to the Sin Chamber everything I thought would calm down just got much better... I mean worse. Everything that Emilia felt on the island for Wrath was magnified while she was in Hell and the Seven Circles played with her emotions and desires. Seeing the tension increase was really fun considering the fact that Emilia thought she was going to marry Pride, but was living in Wrath's house. If I hadn't already been distracted by the state of their relationship, Emilia being in Hell and working so close to Wrath just made that distraction so much more apparent for me as the reader, and it even showed in their own focus on the task at hand as well.
AND THE FACT THAT WRATH WAS WILLING TO GIVE UP HIS BIGGEST FEAR IN PLACE OF EMILIAS. OH MY GOSH. i CRIED. WHAT A NICE DEMON FROM HELL. 
3. The ending. 
OH MY GOSH THE ENDING. As I approached the end of this book, I was already so head over heels in love with Wrath and Emilia, that the ending was everything I wanted and more. First, watching Emilia learn the truth of her sister was a plot twist that I didn't see coming. And the cliff hanger that we are left on after Vittoria returns is one that was so shocking that I couldn't even guess what would come next. 
Second, seeing Emilia finally swallow her pride and admit to Wrath that she has powers, that those powers have always felt different when around him, and discovering the curse all before finally agreeing to finish the marriage bond. It all happened so fast, and I understand that time was of the essence, but I LOVED the pressure. There had been so much build up to this point in the story that finally hearing them talk to each other while being completely honest for a second was a breath of fresh air, even if it all changed on page 1 of Kingdom of the Feared! It was nice while it lasted!! 
 

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