Fairytale Reader: Review: The Winners Curse by Marie Rutkoski

THE WINNERS CURSE BY MARIE RUTKOSKI
Publisher: Bloomsbury
Format: Paperback
Series: The Winners Trilogy #1
Pages: 359
Date Finished: 30.07.15
Rating: 3.5/5
Summary: Winning what you want may cost you everything you love.

As a general’s daughter in a vast empire that revels in war and enslaves those it conquers, seventeen-year-old Kestrel has two choices: she can join the military or get married. But Kestrel has other intentions. One day, she is startled to find a kindred spirit in a young slave up for auction.

Arin’s eyes seem to defy everything and everyone. Following her instinct, Kestrel buys him—with unexpected consequences. It’s not long before she has to hide her growing love for Arin. But he, too, has a secret, and Kestrel quickly learns that the price she paid for a fellow human is much higher than she ever could have imagined.

Set in a richly imagined new world, The Winner’s Curse by Marie Rutkoski is a story of deadly games where everything is at stake, and the gamble is whether you will keep your head or lose your heart.

I quite enjoyed The Winners Curse. Although it did take me a little while to get into it, I read the majority of the book in one sitting and I'm already on the Waterstones website trying to buy book two (except my internet connection is officially awful and determined to ruin my day). Saying all of that, I'm only giving it three and a half stars. Whilst I found the plot exciting and well crafted, I just wanted more.

“Happiness depends on being free, and freedom depends on being courageous.”

The Winners Curse follows Kestrel Trajan after she buys a slave and basically triggers a domino effect of events. The first thing I need to say is that I really do love the concept of this book. The plot unfolded so organically and everything just made sense. I love it when that happens. The world the story is set in is fascinating. This may just be my fantasy brain talking here, but I would have loved a map in the front. I don't know why but that would just have made the world building feel so much more real. Is that just me? I think so.

The characters were great (and they weren't annoyingly stupid, which is always a plus) but I just didn't feel an emotional connection to them. Kestrel seemed a lot like loads of other YA protagonists--I wanted to read about someone who really would stand out on the page. Neither Kestrel or Arin were bad characters, not by a long shot, but they didn't dazzle. One thing I did love, however, was that Kestrel was a 'strong' character without being physically so. It's nice to know that female characters don't need typically masculine traits to make them fleshed out.

He knew the law of such things: people in brightly lit places cannot see into the dark.”

There were also a bunch of supporting characters in this book. I hope this isn't much of a spoiler but lots of not-so-great things happen to these characters and if I'm honest I just didn't care as much as I should've. It wasn't because I didn't like them--Ronan and Jess in particular were actually a couple of my favourites--but I don't think Rutkoski gave them enough depth to really tug on my heartstrings.

Wanting more seems like a recurring theme in this review.

Whilst the romance between Kestrel and Arin was technically slow burning because of the time frame, it felt a little bit too much like instalove. Rutkoski always seemed to mention the months passing but I didn't see the evidence of it on the page. I didn't feel like the characters really got to know each other, and even if they did I didn't see enough evidence of it. There wasn't much chemistry or passion between them. Whilst I was rooting for them to get together (because I'm a hopeless romantic) it didn't bother me that much.

“Your promises are worth nothing.”

I feel like what this book needed was an extra hundred pages to flesh it out. Maybe then it would have more depth, or maybe then I'd care more about the characters.

I don't want the entirety of this review to be negative because I did really enjoy the book. It was fast paced and exciting, and I definitely am going to pick up the next book. Lets talk about something more positive?

“Isn't that what stories do, make real things fake, and fake things real?”

I really enjoy politics, especially in fiction, so much so that I'm taking Government and Politics for my A Levels next year. Call me boring or whatever, but because of that I absolutely loved the political intrigue in this book. It's so interesting to hear about the history of Valoria and Herran (yup, I'm also a huge history nerd) and I'm really looking forward to learning more about this and seeing the relations between the two places in the next book.

One of my favourite things about this book was that we got to see both sides of the situation. On one side we have the Herrani who had been enslaved for ten years, and on the other we got to see Kestrel and her feelings regarding to the events that unfold, particularly in the second half of the book. Whilst I completely agree that slavery is wrong I felt for both sides and actually understood them, something which doesn't happen often.

The prose was nice and there definitely were a few standout quotes, though on the whole the writing was good but not great. There wasn't that spark that writers like Sarah J Maas and Sara Raasch have. I often found myself accidentally skim reading some of the descriptions, but I think this is just me being nit picky.