(I received a free copy of this book in exchange for a review).
(This review may contain spoilers).
I’d ideally give this book 3.5 stars out of 5. I was drawn into the storyline, but I did have a lot of confusion while I was reading it. In many ways, I felt like I was being thrown into the middle of a plot… and it took a while before I could figure out exactly what was going on with all of the characters.
While it was interesting to see the different characters and how their storylines came together, it did seem a bit disjointed at first. I did think Marcus was an intriguing character, though I would have liked a bit more detail about his history. I was confused about just why Marcus and his knight had magic, though… and although Shyla was an interesting character during her first appearance, I did kind of go off her quite a bit when the storyline switched to her perspective.
There were a lot of things in the book that I felt weren’t expanded. While some of the characters’ motivations were explored, there were too many of them for me to be able to get to know the secondary characters very well.
I thought this book was quite short and while it was easy to read, I do think it could have done with being longer. There were some elements of foreshadowing I felt could have been utilised that weren’t.
I did find it interesting to see the different kinds of magic and I would have liked to know a bit more about how it all worked. I really didn’t like the witch who Kenthal went to see… but I found it hard to care much about the queen, especially given what was revealed later on.
There were some good elements of tension in this book and towards the end, there was a lot of good action and fighting, although I found it hard to care about many of the characters who died, since I couldn’t get to know many of them.
I’m not sure I’d read a sequel to this book, though I might read other books by this same author in the future, depending on the plotline. I wouldn’t read this book again, I have to say.
Ink of Blood 