Read this if you like Robin Hobb. I personally don't. This strikes me as being tragedy porn. Terrible things happen to our heroes, both in the past and the present because it is being told non-linearly. Two of the characters are a magical macguffins. This is tagged as romance, and it has two people that love each other a lot in it, but in my opinion that is different from a romance, especially if you read Romance with a capital R. But I will acknowledge that it is well written, even though it is told from the 1st person pov, which, in my opinion is the worst pov. ( )

Slightly difficult to start off with, but soon becomes an engaging story ( )

Summer13:

Characters: A strong standout. Good leads and good villains.

Plot: Another strong standout actually. Made sense and moved along.

Style: Maybe a little pretentious, but you need that for high fantasy. ( )

I liked this book, but it felt like the author bit off more than she could chew: too many "clever" things that didn't pull off all that well. A lot of summary descriptions instead of scenes. However, reading it was fascinating--comparing her new work with this was an education. ( )

This book is so full of fantasy cliches that, considered in the abstract, I feel I should hate it. And yet, Berg is so good, that aside from occasional moments, I was able to suspend my disbelief or annoyance with the cliches and enjoy a story well-told. This book is, if nothing else, a page-turner and I stayed up waaaay too late finishing it. Even though I figured out the hero's Big! Secret! long before the heroine, I wanted to see how they were going to get there and how it would all turn out. It's the first book of the series, and I was especially grateful for the lack of cliffhangers to carry over to book 2. ( )