Hailey Turner - The Prince's Poisoned Vow

Every country is built on revolution.
THE WARDEN. Soren is a nameless, stateless man, tasked with keeping watch over Maricol’s borders.
He isn’t meant for politics, only dealing with the dead. His past was buried in the poison fields, but after a fateful encounter with a prince, Soren comes to realize he can’t keep what magic burns inside him hidden forever.
THE PRINCE. Vanya Sa’Liandel was the spare who survived the Houses’ murderous games to become the Imperial crown prince of Solaria. He has a duty to his country, but he’ll owe his life to the wardens. Payment of any kind is costly, especially when he’s at risk of losing his heart to the man who saved his life.
THE COG. Caris Dhemlan hears the siren song of clarion crystals better than anyone in Ashion. That skill for inventing has enriched her bloodline, but it’s who she can become that will ultimately entangle her with the Clockwork Brigade.
THE PRINCESS. Eimarille Rourke should have been raised to be queen of one country; instead, she is prisoner of another. Guided by a star god, Eimarille bides her time in a gilded cage, spinning a political web to gain a throne and start a war the world isn’t ready for.

Comment: In the last three years I've managed to read the Metahuman series by this author, a sci-fi military plot with romance elements, which I liked a lot. I'm determined to read the author's other work and saw her Soulbound series has seven full length installments and I confess I wasn't too keen on starting that series right away. That means I turned to her other series, the Infernal War Saga, which is a trilogy (so far/already finished?).

In this book we meet a huge cast of characters, in a world of magic and paranormal elements, but whose vibe goes more along the lines of what we might see as steampunk and fantasy. When the story begins, everyone is dealing with the shock of a terrible war, and in this world where six gods rule over different reigns, plans are in motion to place those they favor on the throne of their influence. Although each country is independent, they all have commerce and one of these countries uses debt bondage (= slavery) as an important part of the economy. One of the gods plans for his champion to take over more than one country, no matter the cost, but there are secrets to maintain until it's time for the truth of what happened to be revealed. Will everyone make the right decisions until that happens?

Well. This was truly an epic-styled story, in which we follow everyone and someone else, it seems, as all characters follow their destiny - or the plans of the gods. I'm still unsure if these gods are really manipulative for personal reasons, such as any big scheme we cannot yet understand, or if the whole thing is planned by them from the start so that the human characters can do what they are supposed to.

I should say that the edition I've read had almost 600 pages and this was truly immersive and detailed and we have the POV of countless characters. Until the very end I can say that it didn't feel as if there was an obvious villain. Some characters do unsavory things but it felt their reasons (or "help" from the gods) always had some specific necessary base and at any point their actions might not have such a bad result, which clearly wasn't the case when the last chapters came in. Now, I do feel I know who the bad guys are, and they do truly despicable things in the big scheme of things, but do I hate them? Not completely, even though one character I came to like suffered a lot at the very end as a consequence.

I think to myself, how long must have taken for the author to plan and write all this? And there are two more books, which I assume might have similar page counts? Really impressive... and the development reminded me of stories like Game of Thrones, which I have not read nor watched but know enough about it, culturally speaking, to be able to compare. Everything in this world is connected and layered and at the same time I felt frustrated over some decisions or some scenes, it felt things were following a quiet and unassuming way, I even wondered why so many pages, what more could happen, but when I realized what was going on, the author had already taken things into an impossible situation!

I'm now thinking about this book from time to time, wondering what will happen next, considering how shocking this installment ended, and what will be the characters' next step. I'm especially thinking about a few characters and what will they do once they learn a few truths... I really need to get my hands on the next book, although I'm dreading possible heartbreak too, since  some characters' decisions are clearly leading to problems and hard roads.

To summarize a little, and from what I understood, there was a queen in one of the countries who was driven to end the businesses which dealt with debt bondage. This caused a rift and the country which depends on it attacked. The gods took the opportunity to save the children of that queen, who were not only rightful heirs, of noble lineage, but who also have the starfire power, the magical ability to use a special type of fire without being affected. 

The oldest child, Eimarille, was placed among the royal family of the country which attacked hers, as a sort of hostage, and adult Eimarille is bent on getting her throne back, but on her own terms. The middle child Alesainder was placed with the Wardens, a group independent of the countries, which takes over the battle against the revenants (because, of course, zombies). And the youngest child, baby Caris was placed with a noble couple, in exchange with their own daughter, so she could grow up undetected.

I know it sounds vague said this way, but the lives of these three as adults (well a teenager Caris) are as complex and busy as one can imagine, and even more so after they start making their own plans or after they meet specific people. I'm especially fond of Alesainder - now with a different name - and the person he falls in love with, because their romance is the one I'm more invested in and I 

just.cannot.wait

to see how his intended will react when he learns who Aleisander (now Soren) truly is. The siblings don't know about each other, and many secondary characters don't know either, but as the story progresses, some clues start to come out, and that information can be good and bad, depending on who knows.

I could go on and on, but this is too complex and complicated to explain properly, at least without many spoilers for context, but I admit I was not expecting such an elaborated plot and world building. What I had read before by the author had been great, but this is another level. I'll have to bite the bullet and read the other series too, perhaps next year. I think this is a truly talented writer, and unless the content really doesn't appeal, in terms of skill and execution, five stars for certain.

Grade: 8/10