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tinybluepixel 's review for:
Warrior Princess Assassin
by Brigid Kemmerer
adventurous
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
I received a free ARC of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Thank you!
Uh. ... Maybe?
This is sure to be a crowd pleaser, particular if the crowd is into romantasy. But in this recent year I've discovered that I really do need a bit more meat-and-potatoes to my books to enjoy them, and that I need plot. Warrior Princess Assassin has ... some ... plot, a bare whisper of plot, mostly forged to get the three main characters to get into situations that provide sexual tension.
I mean, that was the one thing I liked about this: That this is a threesome. A true "love triangle" if you will, where the two male parts also have the hots for one another. That's cool, I like that, in theory, but ... man, there really was nothing there except that. I'm actually pretty sure that's how the idea for this book came about - three hot people get into a love triangle. The "plot" was just there to nudge them along.
It's a shame in a book that basically only revolves around these three characters and nothing else that I intensely disliked two of them. Marjoriana (now that's a ridiculous fantasy name if I ever saw one!), the titular princess, is a naive pushover. Her only bit of bite she gives in the very first chapter quickly evaporates, and she chances allegiances to either of the men at a drop of a hat. She has no spine at all, and while I've seen other reviewers say that she grew into her power, I saw none of that. She's sheltered and gullible, and the only good characteristics I could see were that she actually listenes to poor people sometimes (emphasis on the sometimes).
ASHER, the one who's name is repeated such multitude of times that I literally break out in hives everytime it happens, is the worst assassin I've ever read about. He doesn't kill a single person on page. The only thing he can apparently do is hang around in rafters and bungle up fights. He also has the personality of a wet sock. Oh, sure, there is a tragic past, but that seems more to be a justification for some other things that just had to happen ... no spoilers, if I could manage to spoil the little plot that there is.
Anyway, I am SO SICK of "main female character is obsessed with childhood best friend". SO SICK OF IT. What is it with this trope that has authors in a chokehold these days? Do people simply not want to write a beginning relationship anymore? To imagine a world where these characters start out already loving each other, because if they wouldn't, they would not have a single thing in common with each other, nothing to lead to a potential friendship, because there's no logical reason for them to like each other - other than, of course, "HE IS MY CHILDHOOD BEST FRIEND AND I CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT HIM."
I am sick, sick, sick of this trope. If I have to read one again in the next couple of months, I'll scream and throw the book around, I promise.
The saving grace of this throuple was Ky, the warrior king. Not that I can understand how one man can fall in love with these other two assholes, but he was perfection. I love this specific combination of dangerous and gentle, full of rage and still kind. He had an actual motivation, that being saving his kingdom from hunger, and an interesting relationship with his sister, and his guard, and his people. He was just ... so interesting in comparison to the other two. Unfortunately, he is quite obsessed with both of them, which was his only big character flaw. Oh, well. I found myself wanting to know more about him, about his childhood, his growing up on the battle field, the relationship with his father - all the things that were briefly mentioned but never fleshed out. There is a lot of potential here, and maybe it will all come out in future installments, but tbh, I'm not sure whether I'm going to read those.
Yeah. I can see how people would like this, and I'm a little bit sorry I couldn't, but I think my one little opinion can change the potential success this book could find. It's not badly written at all; I just realized in reading this that my genre is less romantasy and more a fantasy with romance, and that maybe I wasn't the target audience for this one. And that's totally okay!
Uh. ... Maybe?
This is sure to be a crowd pleaser, particular if the crowd is into romantasy. But in this recent year I've discovered that I really do need a bit more meat-and-potatoes to my books to enjoy them, and that I need plot. Warrior Princess Assassin has ... some ... plot, a bare whisper of plot, mostly forged to get the three main characters to get into situations that provide sexual tension.
I mean, that was the one thing I liked about this: That this is a threesome. A true "love triangle" if you will, where the two male parts also have the hots for one another. That's cool, I like that, in theory, but ... man, there really was nothing there except that. I'm actually pretty sure that's how the idea for this book came about - three hot people get into a love triangle. The "plot" was just there to nudge them along.
It's a shame in a book that basically only revolves around these three characters and nothing else that I intensely disliked two of them. Marjoriana (now that's a ridiculous fantasy name if I ever saw one!), the titular princess, is a naive pushover. Her only bit of bite she gives in the very first chapter quickly evaporates, and she chances allegiances to either of the men at a drop of a hat. She has no spine at all, and while I've seen other reviewers say that she grew into her power, I saw none of that. She's sheltered and gullible, and the only good characteristics I could see were that she actually listenes to poor people sometimes (emphasis on the sometimes).
ASHER, the one who's name is repeated such multitude of times that I literally break out in hives everytime it happens, is the worst assassin I've ever read about. He doesn't kill a single person on page. The only thing he can apparently do is hang around in rafters and bungle up fights. He also has the personality of a wet sock. Oh, sure, there is a tragic past, but that seems more to be a justification for some other things that just had to happen ... no spoilers, if I could manage to spoil the little plot that there is.
Anyway, I am SO SICK of "main female character is obsessed with childhood best friend". SO SICK OF IT. What is it with this trope that has authors in a chokehold these days? Do people simply not want to write a beginning relationship anymore? To imagine a world where these characters start out already loving each other, because if they wouldn't, they would not have a single thing in common with each other, nothing to lead to a potential friendship, because there's no logical reason for them to like each other - other than, of course, "HE IS MY CHILDHOOD BEST FRIEND AND I CANNOT LIVE WITHOUT HIM."
I am sick, sick, sick of this trope. If I have to read one again in the next couple of months, I'll scream and throw the book around, I promise.
The saving grace of this throuple was Ky, the warrior king. Not that I can understand how one man can fall in love with these other two assholes, but he was perfection. I love this specific combination of dangerous and gentle, full of rage and still kind. He had an actual motivation, that being saving his kingdom from hunger, and an interesting relationship with his sister, and his guard, and his people. He was just ... so interesting in comparison to the other two. Unfortunately, he is quite obsessed with both of them, which was his only big character flaw. Oh, well. I found myself wanting to know more about him, about his childhood, his growing up on the battle field, the relationship with his father - all the things that were briefly mentioned but never fleshed out. There is a lot of potential here, and maybe it will all come out in future installments, but tbh, I'm not sure whether I'm going to read those.
Yeah. I can see how people would like this, and I'm a little bit sorry I couldn't, but I think my one little opinion can change the potential success this book could find. It's not badly written at all; I just realized in reading this that my genre is less romantasy and more a fantasy with romance, and that maybe I wasn't the target audience for this one. And that's totally okay!