By SenLinYu

SPOILERS

REVIEW

THEMES: FANTASY, EMOTIONAL, TENSE, DARK ACADEMIA, SLOW-PACED.

Helena Marino is a prisoner being held by the enemy she once fought against. She is imprisoned in the residence of the High Reeve who is notorious for his murderous rampages. Even though her records show she is nothing more than a healer, she possesses something they want. The issue is, it is hidden within her mind and neither they nor Helena can access it. Helena must dig deep to reveal what is being hidden within her, though that raises the question… is it hidden for a reason? And will uncovering it save or doom her?

TW: Sexual assault, gore, torture, intense violence and much more.

Does this book need to be this long?

No. It really and truly does not. This could have been 500 pages.

The plot of the story is strong; the settings are described in detail, and I could clearly picture every place described. There is no misconception that SenLinYu is a talented writer. There were multiple points where I was looking forward to coming back to the story.

Whilst I did enjoy aspects of the book, the characters fell entirely flat.

Rant incoming.

I remember once I saw someone say that women often have to prove their greatness, whereas men do not. Helena and Luke are perfect examples. Luke is described as this incredible and selfless person, yet I never really see it. Helena sacrifices herself to the point of becoming a martyr, just for a measly pat on the back. Luke is simply decent – which is rather easy when you are from a privileged family!

You are kind of beaten over the head with how selfless Helena is. It gets to a point where she is just naive. I could never relate to someone who will ruin themselves for people who could care less, so maybe that is why I dislike her.

There are other bland and unrelatable characters throughout the book, but these are things I can get past.

What I can’t get past is normalising abuse. Just because this book is set in a time of war, where everything is dark and dreadful does not mean you can minimise what Kaine does to Helena. Kaine literally beats Helena senseless, violates her and humiliates her for about 500 pages. These instances are ‘mitigated’ by the fact that Helena is persevering because she is secretly trying to gain his trust. Although, conveniently when the time comes to use this secret ammunition, she has grown too fond of him. Shocker. All of this is simply because he cried about his dead mum and got hurt by his own alliance. Apparently, this wipes away all his horrendous abuse. The kicker is that he justifies it by saying he was doing it all to deter her… as if it was for her own good. After this point, he is romanticized – or their relationship is.

This continues to spread the message; ‘Ladies, if he is horrible to you just try a little harder because at some point, he may reward you with affection!’ And its harmful.

What gets me the most, is in the end, he is made out to be this misunderstood and valiant person. He literally murdered hundreds of innocent people to find a woman who he treats as more of a possession than anything else. I felt violated reading as Helena slowly and reluctantly gave into his advances.

I also just found out that this is a Hermione-Draco fanfiction come to life. I am officially turned off.

Sidenote: Crowther reminded me of Little Finger from GOT.

I will end this rant, even though I have more to say, but I don’t want to come off as a complete buzzkill.

In saying all this, I am not a big fan of ‘dark academia/fantasy’, so that definitely contributes to my rating.

From a fantasy reader (or just a reader), I would give this one a miss.

Click link below for Storygraph overview, which includes general rating, summary (same as above) and other reviews.

LINK TO STORYGRAPH PROFILE