The Kiss of Deception by Mary E. Pearson Review

This review will contain spoilers!

The Kiss of Deception by Mary E. Pearson

Genre: Fantasy/Young Adult

Publisher: Henry Holt

Pages: 492

Recommended Age: 13 and up

Summary:

A princess must find her place in a reborn world.

She flees on her wedding day.

She steals ancient documents from the Chancellor's secret collection.

She is pursued by bounty hunters sent by her own father.

She is Princess Lia, seventeen, First Daughter of the House of Morrighan.

The Kingdom of Morrighan is steeped in tradition and the stories of a bygone world, but some traditions Lia can't abide. Like having to marry someone she's never met to secure a political alliance.

Fed up and ready for a new life, Lia flees to a distant village on the morning of her wedding. She settles in among the common folk, intrigued when two mysterious and handsome strangers arrive—and unaware that one is the jilted prince and the other an assassin sent to kill her. Deceptions swirl and Lia finds herself on the brink of unlocking perilous secrets—secrets that may unravel her world—even as she feels herself falling in love.

Review:

When many people recommended this book to me I was like “Okay, I guess I could give this a try.”

Lia is fierce and DOES NOT want to be forced into a marriage alliance with someone she has never seen before.

Everything about this book was:

I am often struggling to find time to read and it is very problematic. I really wanted to read this book all at once so I read it whenever I could.

I loved this book so much:

It is basically a mix of historical fantasy:

And then a quest like story:

There was also a love triangle but it was better than most:

And the love interests were both swoon-worthy:

And for some reason I like Kaden better than Rafe. He’s just bad boy material:

Over all this book was AWESOME!

Now on to the REAL Review:

I’d never read one of her books before so I wasn’t really sure what to expect but from what people had said, I knew this book was the type of book I like to read. I had high expectations for this book and I really can’t say that I was disappointed.  The plot was well developed as was the world. The characters were also wonderful and well done.

Lia is a heroine through and through. She is fierce, determined, and willing to do the unthinkable for what she wants. She doesn’t want to be forced into an arranged marriage so she runs away with her best friend to a small rural village where she then works in a tavern.

For the first half of the novel, the characters were developed and so was the world. We got to know the main characters fairly well before the action began. I didn’t really expect it to suddenly turn into a quest like atmosphere for the second half of the novel.

This novel was wonderful. I was surprised she didn’t actually put magic into the novel. There was talk of it but nothing ever came close to magic.

I also didn’t mind the love triangle as it wasn’t distracting and annoying. It was well crafted and you kind of knew she wasn’t going to trifle with one of them. The two guys are perfection. Rafe is a handsome ‘farm-hand’ whom Lia seems to like at once. And then Kaden is more of a dark mysterious handsome person. He was my favorite even though he’s the one who (SPOILER ALERT!) betrays her. I wasn’t expecting him to betray her as he was pretty sweet and seemed to actually have an interest in her as a person.

At the end of the book, you don’t know what’s going to happen in the next one but you can guess that something terrible will happen to one of the main characters. I am so worried that she will kill of Rafe or Kaden.

I can’t wait to read the next book soon and I am sure it is going to be the most wonderful sequel.

If you don’t have this book on your TBR, rethink that decision. Pick this up from your local library, buy it from a bookstore or borrow it from a friend ‘cause this is seriously a book worth reading. I can’t recommend it enough and I am actually thinking about re-reading this soon or buying it!