Early Review – The Kiss of Deception (The Remnant Chronicles, Book 1) by Mary E. Pearson (4.5/5 stars)

Reading Level: Young Adult
Genre: Fantasy
Size: 496 pages
Publisher: Henry Holt and Co.
Release Date: July 8, 2014
ISBN: 978-0805099232
Stand Alone or Series: 1st book in the Remnant Chronicles series
Source: eGalley from NetGalley
Rating: 4.5/5 stars

I got a copy of this book to review through the Amazon Vine program. This was a wonderful high fantasy novel, full of adventure and intrigue.

Princess Lia is a First Daughter, her whole life it laid out for her. She is supposed to have the Sight, but doesn’t. However, her father has still arranged a marriage to a neighboring Prince for her. The morning of her wedding Lia flees along with her best friend. She settles into life in her best friend’s home town working at an inn, when two intriguing strangers enter her life. She becomes friends with both and is especially drawn to one of them. Little does she know one of these strangers is the assassin sent to kill her and the other is the very prince that she was supposed to marry.

I really enjoyed this high fantasy young adult novel by Pearson. It starts out a bit slow, but things really pick up as the story continues. There is intrigue, romance, and plenty of adventure too. I was surprised by how completely drawn in I was by the story and I really enjoyed all of the characters as well.

This story starts out as a somewhat typical princess novel…basically a princess flees an arranged marriage only to meet the man she was destined to marry in different surroundings, but she doesn’t know it because he is in disguise.

The story switches between Lia, the assassin, and the prince. It rotates between the three for most of the book. Then towards the end of the book we hear from Lia more often.

All of the characters are very engaging. Lia is determined to live her own life, but at first she doesn’t realize what that will cost the people of her kingdom. She is headstrong and intelligent, but at bit naive about the bigger picture. I enjoyed watching her adjust to “peasant” life and enjoyed watching her finally step up and take responsibility for her actions. As the book progresses she finally starts to see that she can do a lot of what she wants to with her life as a First Daughter and even make a lot more difference.

The two male leads are also very well done. For a while it is a bit confusing which character is the prince and which is the assassin, they both use false names in front of Lia. It is written in such a way that who is who is supposed to be something of a surprise at the end.

The side characters are all decently done too, they have depth and were engaging all on their own.

I enjoyed the writing style and found the story very engaging. The book ends on a cliffhanger, but I didn’t mind so much in this case. It ended at a good spot where the reader is kind of leaving one part of the story and transitioning into another.

Overall this was a wonderful read. The story is full of adventure, intrigue and romance. The book is very well written and very engaging. The story started a little bit slow, but quickly turned into a story full of twists and turns, intrigue and deceit. I can’t wait to read the next book in this series. Definitely recommended to fans of fantasy with adventure, intrigue and romance.

This book goes towards the following reading challenges:
– Ebook Reading Challenge
– Chunkster Reading Challenge (450+ pages)
– You Read How Many Books? Reading Challenge