Review: The Queen's Assassin, by Melissa de la Cruz

"Caledon Holt is the Kingdom of Renovia's deadliest weapon. No one alive can best him in brawn or brains, which is why he's the Guild's most dangerous member and the Queen's one and only assassin. He's also bound to the Queen by an impossible vow–to find the missing Deian Scrolls, the fount of all magical history and knowledge, stolen years ago by a nefarious sect called the Aphrasians.

"Shadow has been training all her life to follow in the footsteps of her mother and aunts–to become skilled enough to join the ranks of the Guild. Though magic has been forbidden since the Aphrasian uprising, Shadow has been learning to control her powers in secret, hoping that one day she'll become an assassin as feared and revered as Caledon Holt.

"When a surprise attack brings Shadow and Cal together, they're forced to team up as assassin and apprentice to hunt down a new sinister threat to Renovia. But as Cal and Shadow grow closer, they'll uncover a shocking web of lies and secrets that may destroy everything they hold dear. With war on the horizon and true love at risk, they'll stop at nothing to protect each other and their kingdom in this stunning first novel in the Queen's Secret series." (From Goodreads)

★★

Confession time: I would not have finished this book had it not been my read for Filipino American History Month. In the book's defense, I probably should have read a nonfiction, not a fantasy, for Filipino American History Month. However, I chose this book because it was already on my TBR and the author is Filipina-American. It was the perfect pick! Or so I thought ... until I started reading. The book ended up annoying me so much that I started calling it Assassin to the Queen (to poke fun at another book which I reviewed here).

If you've read a few of my reviews, you've probably caught on to the fact that I tend to review books I don't like (this book being the exception). I just have so much more to say about them! And I took notes on this one, so buckle up for some serious nitpicking.

The best word I can come up with to describe The Queen's Assassin is "unoriginal". Case in point: you know that scene in the movie Tangled where Flynn rips a wanted poster off a tree and says, "Oh no. No no no no no no no. This is bad, this is very, very bad, this is really bad. They just can't get my nose right." (Yes, I did find a clip of that scene on YouTube so I could quote it exactly.) That scene was replicated in the book:

"There are two crude charcoal sketches on the poster. One shows a man with an exaggerated upturned nose and bulging eyes over a wild mane of uneven hair and a patchy beard. Underneath the drawing it says, CALEDON HOLT, ARMED AND DANGEROUS. 'Terrible likeness,' Cal says, frowning. 'Ears are all wrong.'"

I mean, it wasn't totally unoriginal. The book had glimmers of merit, but we'll get to those later. Right now, let's get into the things I thought could be done (a lot) better.

1. The World

I love a well-developed fantasy world. But I don't love the development delivered in barely concealed exposition. I mean, it took sixteen pages to get to chapter one (and the main character)!!! The backstory that took up those sixteen pages was interesting, but I felt like there was a better way to weave it into the story than info dumping it all in the prologue. The first few pages of a story should draw the reader in and hook them on the story. Well, I wasn't hooked until somewhere around page 200. In addition, there were unsubtle reminders of all that exposition (plus more exposition in the form of characters thinking about/telling each other myths and history) throughout the book. 

Info dumping aside, the world felt very jumbled. We had white as the mourning color, which is an East Asian tradition, we had a jaguar stalking Shadow in the forest at the very beginning, and we had one brief mention of Gunnera leaves, but other than that, the setting of Renovia felt very much like nineteenth century Britain to me (e.g. "Breakfast, dinner, supper", Crumpets and Cravats), and Montrice was very reminiscent of eighteenth century France (I'm looking at you, Louis XVI). As a whole, the world was not cohesive at all.

Glimmer: The point I became interested in the story was when Shadow and Cal visited the grand vizier in Montrice. He was such an interesting character right off the bat with his taxidermy animals and things in jars, and I think it was implied that he had dwarfism, but I'm not sure? And how he just outright lied about remembering their "grandfather". Anyway, I was disappointed he didn't play a bigger role in the story. But I liked the contrast of Montrice vs. Renovia, e.g. how the architecture is different in Montrice and why.

2. The Plot

All the major plot points felt very obvious to me (maybe that's because I'm a writer?). Like, "Here is the fight and the accident that draws Shadow and Cal closer together and marks the turning point from enemies to lovers". And of course, since this is an enemies-to-lovers romantasy, we had to have the "only one bed at the inn" trope. It felt like de la Cruz had a checklist of tropes that she was marking off as she went. Another trope (not structural, but annoying nonetheless): "As soon as he walks away, I exhale a breath I didn't even realize I was holding." (Page 249)

I did NOT like the "big reveal" at the end. Plot twists are supposed to leave you thinking, "Oh my gosh, I didn't see that coming but that fits in perfectly", not, "Huh?! That's so contrived and makes no sense." In this book, we had a big reveal and then Shadow explained the big reveal twice, first to the reader and then to Cal, to smooth away all the plot holes. And then we got a HUGE reveal about who the VILLAIN of the ENTIRE story is and it's just one little throwaway line: "Oh yeah, I just remembered where I've seen that dude before, he's an undead king who was alive hundreds of years ago. Lol. Let's keep looking for these scrolls, mate."

There's another little plot thing I was annoyed about, but it's a bit spoilery, so I'll put a warning around it: *SPOILER* Why didn't Cal go straight to the weird picture frame he was about to explore when they went back to the Duke's study?! It was mentioned later in another throwaway line, like, "Oh yeah, we found this super important key behind a picture in the Duke's study. Here you go, Cal." *END OF SPOILER*

Glimmer: I really can't find a glimmer here, I'm sorry.

3. The Characters

Shadow and Cal annoyed me. (Shocker by this point, right?) I usually love enemies-to-lovers romances, and they had some good banter, so I'm not sure why I wanted to bang my head against a tree by the time I finished the book. Just ... why can't you guys just communicate?!

It also bothered me that the chapters switched between Shadow's POV in first person and Cal's POV in third person. If their voices had been more distinct, I don't think it would have been a problem to have them both narrating in first person or both in third person. I guess it did emphasize the fact that Shadow was the MAIN CHARACTER, but that also just makes Cal's narration feel a little unnecessary.

Glimmer: The Duchess of Girt was probably my favorite character. I want to know more about her. Obviously, there was a lot more to her than met the eye, but we didn't really get to see any of that. And, as I mentioned before, I wanted more of the grand vizier too. So basically, my favorite characters were minor plot pawns. That's disappointing.

4. The ... Herbalism?

One little, random thing that drove me crazy: they kept calling Cal's healing poultice a salve. Here is a little excerpt from Juliet Blankespoor's The Healing Garden: "Poultices are prepared by blending herbs (fresh or dried) into a green slurry or paste and applying the paste to the affected area. ... Cover the paste with a clean, dry cloth or bandaging material." It goes on to mention that "Adding a binder such as clay [...] makes it easier to apply and stay put." Whereas a salve, says The Healing Garden, uses an herb-infused oil as its base and requires heat and other fats (such as beeswax) to make. Here is the quote from the book about Cal's "salve"; I'll let you judge for yourself: "He gathers some herbs, clay, and fresh water from a mountain spring near the cave and brings it back to set Shadow's wound." 

This bothered me way more than it should have.

I really wanted to like this book, but as you can probably tell by now, I didn't. I feel like I've been a little (okay, maybe a lot) mean and I just want to end this scathing review by saying that as a writer, I know how difficult it can be to craft a cohesive world and a fresh plot and a compelling first person character. Getting published is a huge accomplishment, and something I haven't been able to do yet, so I don't really have much ground to stand on here. I'm sure there are plenty of people out there who love The Queen's Assassin, and if you're one of those people, I hope I didn't just ruin it for you! (Or make you mad at me.) These are just my personal opinions.

Have you read The Queen's Assassin? Have you read anything else by Melissa de la Cruz? What are your least favorite romantasy tropes?