Book Title: The Winner's Curse
Author: Marie Rutkoski
Series: The Winner's Trilogy #1
Date Started: May 5th 2014
Date Completed: May 7th 2014
Genres: Romance, Adventure, Action
Rating: Five stars
Review:
The Winner's Curse has been getting a lot of hype on booktube recently, and though it's not the typical genre I would be interested in, the recommendations intrigued me and finally attracted me to read it. I have very glad I did.
Kestrel is the general's daughter, and as such is expected to be a solider. But despite her strategist's talents, she despises the idea of war. Then, when she visits the market and impulsively purchases a Herrani slave, her options become more complicated, and the fragile trust built with the boy she can never be with is shattered in betrayal.
Rutkoski's writing is so easy to get lost in. It's rare that I read a book and deliberately slow down to enjoy the story and writing and avoid the inevitable last pages. The flow of words was so natural that I didn't even notice until finishing the book how hard it had been to put it down.
Another thing the author does very well is to create such genuine characters: the cleverness and sly nature of the people in this book surprised me, and convinced me that Rutkoski herself must be quite like her characters to be able to portray them as she does.
The first thing that grabbed me about this book was the fantasy-style world it is set in. Although there is no fantastical element in the story itself, the historical, exotic kind of setting let me slip into the story much faster, as I've always loved those places.
A brilliant element was the politics involved in the story. It was unavoidable when having a plot involving slaves and a recent war to not have some slivers of politics in the book, but having the main character almost at the heart of the military really brought out a chance to explain and explore what this society had gone through. I thought this was really key in setting up the reader for what happens throughout the book, and added a nice part to make my mind work as I was enjoying the main story.
The gradual development on the love was one of the biggest successes of the book for me. I'm always dubious, when reading a romance novel, at how easy it is for the romance to overpower the rest of the story, but actually the balance was perfect. It was great how the trust between the two characters improved and then get worse, then better and then was shattered, and then grown again etc. It was realistic and enjoyable and I loved it.
The ending wasn't at all what I expected it to be, and that was partly what made it so amazing. I was really happy that The Winner's Curse was it's own book, but will be followed by two sequels, because the story has so much further to go.
The characters in this book were realistic, had completely understandable and relatable emotions and developed incredibly over the course of actually quite a short book.
Kestrel was such an amazing protagonist. I connected with her almost instantly, despite her situation being very different a lot of other stories. I loved her torn choices between the way she has been brought up and her own culture, and then what she actually wanted. But, by far her best quality, was the fact that she was adamant she didn't want to fight and was still an incredibly strong character. It shoved the female stereotypes even further back with a character that wasn't kick-ass still wouldn't let anyone push her around.
Arin was another amazing character because he had so many different sides, some good, some bad and was realistic and wonderful and lovely and I think I have a new favourite male interest.
The pace was perfect for me as the development grew gradually. Rutkoski wasn't afraid to take her time with the story and the balance between action, romance, politics and climaxes was well thought-through.
I would recommend The Winner's Curse to anyone who enjoys romance, but also anyone who appreciates character development and fantasy-style politics amongst other plot lines. I loved the whole book, despite the main genre being romance, because it's very well written and developed.
Image Source: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19415228-the-winner-s-curse
The Winner's Curse has been getting a lot of hype on booktube recently, and though it's not the typical genre I would be interested in, the recommendations intrigued me and finally attracted me to read it. I have very glad I did.
Kestrel is the general's daughter, and as such is expected to be a solider. But despite her strategist's talents, she despises the idea of war. Then, when she visits the market and impulsively purchases a Herrani slave, her options become more complicated, and the fragile trust built with the boy she can never be with is shattered in betrayal.
Rutkoski's writing is so easy to get lost in. It's rare that I read a book and deliberately slow down to enjoy the story and writing and avoid the inevitable last pages. The flow of words was so natural that I didn't even notice until finishing the book how hard it had been to put it down.
Another thing the author does very well is to create such genuine characters: the cleverness and sly nature of the people in this book surprised me, and convinced me that Rutkoski herself must be quite like her characters to be able to portray them as she does.
The first thing that grabbed me about this book was the fantasy-style world it is set in. Although there is no fantastical element in the story itself, the historical, exotic kind of setting let me slip into the story much faster, as I've always loved those places.
A brilliant element was the politics involved in the story. It was unavoidable when having a plot involving slaves and a recent war to not have some slivers of politics in the book, but having the main character almost at the heart of the military really brought out a chance to explain and explore what this society had gone through. I thought this was really key in setting up the reader for what happens throughout the book, and added a nice part to make my mind work as I was enjoying the main story.
The gradual development on the love was one of the biggest successes of the book for me. I'm always dubious, when reading a romance novel, at how easy it is for the romance to overpower the rest of the story, but actually the balance was perfect. It was great how the trust between the two characters improved and then get worse, then better and then was shattered, and then grown again etc. It was realistic and enjoyable and I loved it.
The ending wasn't at all what I expected it to be, and that was partly what made it so amazing. I was really happy that The Winner's Curse was it's own book, but will be followed by two sequels, because the story has so much further to go.
The characters in this book were realistic, had completely understandable and relatable emotions and developed incredibly over the course of actually quite a short book.
Kestrel was such an amazing protagonist. I connected with her almost instantly, despite her situation being very different a lot of other stories. I loved her torn choices between the way she has been brought up and her own culture, and then what she actually wanted. But, by far her best quality, was the fact that she was adamant she didn't want to fight and was still an incredibly strong character. It shoved the female stereotypes even further back with a character that wasn't kick-ass still wouldn't let anyone push her around.
Arin was another amazing character because he had so many different sides, some good, some bad and was realistic and wonderful and lovely and I think I have a new favourite male interest.
The pace was perfect for me as the development grew gradually. Rutkoski wasn't afraid to take her time with the story and the balance between action, romance, politics and climaxes was well thought-through.
I would recommend The Winner's Curse to anyone who enjoys romance, but also anyone who appreciates character development and fantasy-style politics amongst other plot lines. I loved the whole book, despite the main genre being romance, because it's very well written and developed.
Image Source: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/19415228-the-winner-s-curse
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