A review by libraryofthieves
A Sword of Shadow and Deceit by Lucinda Dark, Lucy Smoke

1.0

This book had a really interesting concept but the execution was just so bad.

My biggest complaint is that nothing happened. Like the main character is supposed to be an assassin and yet that plot didn’t progress at all throughout the book. The most interesting plot was whatever was going on with the boys and we barely got any of that.

Which brings me to my second complaint which is that the boys’ chapters felt so thrown in. We didn’t get nearly enough plot from their perspectives so either they needed to be fleshed out a lot more or cut entirely so that Kiera’s plot could move more.

Third issue is that the romance wasn’t even good. For a why choose book, this had so little romance. When we finally did get something, it felt like there was no proper buildup and the smut wasn’t even good…

Lastly, I just did not like Kiera’s character. At all. She was so annoying and kept making stupid decisions because of her pride. It didn’t even feel like a character flaw, where it’s just part of who she is and the story. She’s supposed to be an assassin and yet…it seems like she’s just a really bad assassin? Everything bad that happened to her was because she had no self control and let her pride get in the way. Purely contrived and doesn’t make sense for the story. Like first thing she does undercover is refuse to wear a dress so she immediately stands out?? How is that being a good assassin??

I try to be pretty forgiving about books I didn’t like but I actually have almost nothing good to say about this. The spider thing was cool I guess.