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zoec24 's review for:
The Betrayed
by Kiera Cass
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
Very YA ending and the romance where she falls in love with her dead husband's cousin a month after his traumatic assassination felt thrown in there for the sake of it. Also, very minimal character development.
Even for really YA books, the plot was weak. It just went: Hollis goes to Isolte, gets summoned to the castle for Hadrian's wedding (and is complimented on optimism when she's like 'yes! oppurtunity to discover proof that Quinten is behind this!' instead of 'no! now Quinten has an heir and his bride's country to back up his rule'), goes 'meh, getting allies for our eventual revolt's all good', comes up with her one good idea to get proof, turns out there's a trail and of course it's ridiculously incriminating instead of just, like, one isolated case is all the proof we can find, happily sits at the castle while Etan rallies an army in a day, Quinten gives up and the the writing gets even lazier because she needs to confront Jameson so she goes back to confront a powerful king alone, Etan ditches his new throne to join her, we get lazy writing, and then Hollis and Etan decide to get married in yet another bit of cringey romance/plot armour.
Quinten was destroyed in a week total. He was that hated-congratulations on going 'everyone will rally behind Reid' earlier Hollis, you were actually right for once. Otherwise, we should all be seriously worried about Isolte's risk of collapsing thanks to forgery right now. Isolte's complete lack of stability irked me so much I would probably enjoy seeing them try to deal with a threat like Empress Margaraux from Castles in their Bones. Actually, if she came onto the scene, I would just be laughing from the sidelines. And with Jameson, the heroes can't possibly fight the bad guy for themselves. Speaking of which, Hollis is just like going into it and thinking 'Yep, this won't end badly' even though it will.
Even for really YA books, the plot was weak. It just went: Hollis goes to Isolte, gets summoned to the castle for Hadrian's wedding (and is complimented on optimism when she's like 'yes! oppurtunity to discover proof that Quinten is behind this!' instead of 'no! now Quinten has an heir and his bride's country to back up his rule'), goes 'meh, getting allies for our eventual revolt's all good', comes up with her one good idea to get proof, turns out there's a trail and of course it's ridiculously incriminating instead of just, like, one isolated case is all the proof we can find, happily sits at the castle while Etan rallies an army in a day, Quinten gives up and the the writing gets even lazier because she needs to confront Jameson so she goes back to confront a powerful king alone, Etan ditches his new throne to join her, we get lazy writing, and then Hollis and Etan decide to get married in yet another bit of cringey romance/plot armour.
Quinten was destroyed in a week total. He was that hated-congratulations on going 'everyone will rally behind Reid' earlier Hollis, you were actually right for once. Otherwise, we should all be seriously worried about Isolte's risk of collapsing thanks to forgery right now. Isolte's complete lack of stability irked me so much I would probably enjoy seeing them try to deal with a threat like Empress Margaraux from Castles in their Bones. Actually, if she came onto the scene, I would just be laughing from the sidelines. And with Jameson, the heroes can't possibly fight the bad guy for themselves. Speaking of which, Hollis is just like going into it and thinking 'Yep, this won't end badly' even though it will.
If you were another kingdom, wouldn't you be a bit concerned about all of this?
The instability, the young rulers, your continent's largest kingdom getting overthrown in a single night. And, you know, the bit where you now have a giant kingdom at the bottom of your continent ruled by two young rulers who overthrew the other guys in the span of two days.
In Hollis's case, she's just smiling her way through everything despite knowing nothing about politics.
Everyone accepts this?
Other random problems:
The instability, the young rulers, your continent's largest kingdom getting overthrown in a single night. And, you know, the bit where you now have a giant kingdom at the bottom of your continent ruled by two young rulers who overthrew the other guys in the span of two days.
In Hollis's case, she's just smiling her way through everything despite knowing nothing about politics.
Everyone accepts this?
Other random problems:
- Other people have said this, but when Hollis goes: 'wow, these border skirmishes are bad. Just give the other king the land.' From what I can work out (we aren't even really given details), this is just rogue bands of soldiers in these particular areas. You can't think of, you know, Coroa improving their justice system and accountability in the army and working with Isolte? Your only option is to forcibly integrate people into a country they probably hate because of the attacks and hope that the violence doesnt continue in another form because you redrew the borders?
- Hollis never really gets over her prejudice. It's would be a great theme if she did, but she doesn't. She whinges constantly about the fact that they didn't make every available surface as ostentatious as possible and practically calls Isolte uncultured for it and the Isoltans 'chilly'.
- What's the deal with overthrowing Quinten the 'right' way? Clearly he is a horrible king. He's ruling through paranoia and xenophobia, is threatening people's lives in fits of rage, his horrible governance and lack of care has led to huge slums, he's practically taken credit for chasing families' out of Isolte-not to mention how he's treated Valentina. Even if he hadn't killed hundreds of people directly (which everyone knew he had), dethroning him would indirectly save hundreds of lives (and can be done bloodlessly too, apparently), especially since the one thing that could dethrone Quinten was proof-he would never realistically have left that in his study.
- The princess of another country who married Hadrian got deposed along with everyone else and that country couldn't care less?
- This one conversation that keeps annoying me every time literally goes:
Hollis: Quinten is planning to betroth his grandkids to other royal families.
The Eastoffes: Why would he possibly do this?
Etan(the 'smart' character): Could it possibly be that they're offering each other support in an alliance/legitimacy?
Hollis: Oh no, what a cunning scheme that has never been seen before in the history of the world. We couldn't possibly have seen this coming.
I might even hate this more than the Betrothed honestly-I can consider that a fun but boring read to explore a world through someone's eyes if you ignore the plot and enjoy the world-building. At least this book didn't open with Hollis starting a food fight with acquaintances who resent her like the last one.