Traitor's Blade ~ Sebastien de Castell (Greatcoats #1)

★★★★☆

"The world isn't a romantic stage play; it's not all love or glory."

The Writing and Worldbuilding

This was a fun, wish-fulfillment fantasy, with altogether too many swordfights but just the right amount of Brasti. The writing itself was probably the best part, though the plot was a bit too repetitive. For a debut, it's really good. I enjoyed it a lot!

The world was a bit confusing, and some of the more magical elements were introduced a bit too late in my opinion, but on the whole I liked it enough. For a fictional country, it felt real and I got a pretty good grasp on the land, the people, and the differing cultures.

The very ending was alright, albeit cliché. Kind of wished some things had remained in place, but I guess you can't have a series if it stayed as it was. Overall, it wasn't a particularly deep or original story, nor was it well plotted. But it had some fun characters and read like a mindless action movie. So I enjoyed it.

The Characters

Falcio: He was an impulsive idiot, but at least that was kinda recognized in the story. He was very much a Gary Stu but I liked him enough. Again, mindless action hero.

Aline: No action movie is complete without a young girl the male lead has to protect, and this book was no different! For the most part, she didn't have a personality and seemed to know things the plot said she didn't know, but she was fine.

Brasti and Kest: They may be on the cover, but they're barely in the book. I liked them though, especially Brasti. He's a riot.

The interchangeable hot women who are either daughter-like or lover-like, and there's basically no difference, which is disturbing but I try not to think about it: They're okay, I guess. They're usually almost villainous, which was odd. One of them quite literally comes out of nowhere and then promptly disappears. Like a good woman ought to 🙃

Tailor: She was an icon, honestly.

The villains: Were they really even a thing?

Conclusion

It was okay. I say if girls can get their mindless wish-fulfillment fantasy books, like Caraval, then boys should get them too.