Review: Not worth the pain
Rating: 1 out of 5
Date: 06 28, 2013
I couldn't gather the will to continue reading beyond the halfway point. There are no likable characters. The plot might turn out to be interesting, but so far it's driving me crazy. The main character -- a prince of dubious moral character -- is always insulting the ruling class (the nobles) and acting like he's a good guy, though he's not (and he even realizes this), that's a bit interesting but also just annoying.Their religion tells of the return of their gods (or angels) when the kingdom of man once again needs to be, uh, reformed, and frankly they would do well to show up now and wipe these people out. The prince sees room for redemption (or, he said he does, I don't think he does) but I don't.I made it halfway. The battle might interest me, but the characters don't, the courtesan-centric court doesn't, the 'intrigue' doesn't, and the writing doesn't. Some irritating info-dumps, like when the king reports on the war he was fighting, he explains it all from the beginning. Then the council is shocked... even though letters were mentioned, so you'd think along with (unread) letters to his (ingrate) son he'd have sent some to his council. Guess not. Not that it wasn't interesting, it just didn't fit. Maybe if the king were the main character it would be more my type of book.I'm guessing the prince goes through character changes and becomes a better man, the problem is the author did only too-well a job of making him an irritating jerk.(Read on a Kindle.)