Review for "King of Scars" by Leigh Bardugo

Remember, he told himself, remember who you are. He felt his claws emerge, his teeth grow long. I am Nikolai Lantsov, privateer and king.



Rating: ★★★☆☆

Two books disguised as one, what a deal! This book is the continuation of the Shadow and Bone trilogy and the Six of Crows duology. And it was sort of a letdown!

Ravka was his first love, an infatuation that had begun in his early boyhood and that had only deepened with age. Whatever it demanded, he knew he would give.

I'm giving this 3 stars, which I feel like is pretty generous. I liked the emotion, and I love the parallels between Nikolai having a monster inside him and like how that relates to fighting inner demons (mental illness). I don't know if that is a crude/weird connection to make, but personally it helped me relate to Nikolai's character a lot. Which was needed because I didn't like Nikolai near as much as I did in Siege and Storm or Crooked Kingdom. I think that's because he was more serious, but I was able to still feel a connection to him. I just thought that based on his charm/wit from previous books, his inner monologue would be more witty/charming, but it wasn't really. Honestly I thought the Nikolai perspective was the most boring. But I digress. Another thing I liked in this book was Zoya's perspective, I thought the background added depth to her character and I just love seeing beyond her harsh facade. It's mentioned that men often think she's soft underneath, and the point of her POV is to say, no I'm not soft, I'm actually this cold and I'm powerful, deal with it. Speaking of soft: I loved reading Nina's inner thoughts about Matthias, and how he had a lasting impact on her. Last thing - I liked the addition of Hanne. I think she has a lot of potential for development in the next book.

So first of all, the obvious critique that I'd heard before I started the book: it's tediously slow-paced. I just don't know why. It feels like so little happened in 524 pages. It is just really frustrating.

Second of all, why were there two plotlines? I really thought they would collide at the end and that would make for a really grand finale, but no. The Zoya-Nikolai-Isaak story was literally complete separate from the Nina story, and they were even separated by an entire country. Other than Nina mentioning Nikolai a few times, and Nikolai mentioning Nina a few times, I'm tempted to say the plotlines were so separate they could've been just two entirely different novels. My assumption is that they will come together in the final book, but I just wish we had gotten a little more of the connection before that.

One small thing that bothered me was kind of the cheesiness/implausibility of certain plot points. The main one that comes to mind is Trassel. Like, really out of the ENTIRE country of Fjerda (Fjerda is big), Nina just happens to stumble upon Matthias's old wolf? Seems unlikely, and I think the Nina-Matthias emotional moments of this book were sufficient without the addition. Somehow though, even though I know it's unlikely and corny, it still makes me smile.

I really did not like the Saints plot of the story. I guess I just didn't really get it/the mythology is starting to seem a little bit too extravagant. I don't know. It just did not work for me.

I think the number one issue I had with this book is the blatant recycling of ideas. It seems like a good idea to continuously make books in the same fantasy world... until all the plots start to look the same. First of all, we have the Nikolai battling his inner demon plot, which I'm pretty sure was resolved at the end of Ruin and Rising so it kind of seems like the author ran out of ideas and just defaulted to that when she brought it back. And also why the Darkling. Why bring him back. I won't even dignify these questions with question marks. I am so over the Darkling. And it's kind of like, what was the point of the entire Shadow and Bone trilogy and Alina and Mal's sacrifices if he's just going to come back. I never liked the Darkling as a villain, and I just feel like it's lazy writing to bring him back instead of crafting a new villain. I'm over it. The last aspect I felt was recycled was the power build up. Every book it's like, ooh a new thing happened/a new thing was acquired and now I'm extra OP! Like in Shadow and Bone it happened when Alina realized the power of the stag belonged to her and not the Darkling, in Ruin and Rising it was when she killed Mal, and in this book it's when Zoya kills Juris to gain his power. There's just always another secret level of power to get to, and it makes the entire hierarchy of power useless. I just want the author to create a system of magic, explain it, and stick to it. This book has just been the author breaking the previously established rules of the magic system, and not in a creative way but in a lazy way.

I'm so over the Darkling, I'm not sure if I'll read the next book. I might read it just for the Nina/Hanne bits, but it honestly might depend on how long it is (how much time I would have to invest in it).