A book about making mistakes. A book about repentance. A book about learning from our mistakes. A book about being our best versions with an incredible plot. The story of Selene, the king's poisoner.
“Who would we be without our scars? Who would we become without our scars.”
–S.G. Prince
What Is It About?
Selene is the youngest daughter in a gifted line of healers, born to serve as the king's royal physician. Yet when Selene's mother Persaphe embroils her in a plot to kill the king, Selene finds herself poisoning the very man she is sworn to protect.
Things seem bleak, but there is another problem—the poison doesn’t work, and the king doesn’t die. Rather, he awakes from his coma paralyzed, aware of the attempt on his life, and furious.
With the palace in a state of upheaval and everyone hunting the king's poisoner, Persaphe flees, leaving Selene the task of rehabilitating the man she aimed to kill, all while hiding her true role in his demise. What follows is a journey spanning years and continents, as a king and his servant develop into unlikely friends… and more. Yet the closer Selene grows to the king, the more her secret weighs on her, as does her growing fear that Persaphe—having failed to kill him once—might return to try again.
My Opinion
4/5⭐
This book is well-written and has a nice flow. Even though the first third of the book had me confused with the timelines, going between past and present (and a bit in the future), and the way Selene told her story, the writing style felt poetic, had nice and easy descriptions of how the worldbuilding and magic system work in Isla, a kingdom with a sullen King who is tried to be poisoned by Selene, the daughter of the royal Healer. Turning the lives of both the king and Selene upside down. This story is full of slow-burn love, intricate plot, and intriguing characters.
One important thing about this standalone is that, even if the romance in the book is almost nonexistent, there is something in it, that had me giggling and pinning the entire book. I was so invested in finishing. I genuinely recommend this book if you want something with a bit of magic, fantasy, a quest, and a good plot. Just keep an eye, and be careful with the TW, as it talks about some delicate subjects.
Selene is the daughter of the royal Healer. But because she is different from society and has an extraordinary ability to make potions and remedies, society labels her as a witch. Just because she looks and acts differently. That story sounds so familiar… I related to Selene in so many ways, and I truly liked how she grew into a woman who owns her mind. Besides her imperfections, she starts a journey to accept herself as she is. How important is this? How I desire to obtain that. Book characters like these are the ones who make me take a step back in my life and see what I should change to become the better version of myself.
I believe the main focus of this book is: to accept yourself as you are, even with your mistakes. The good, the bad, and the dark parts you have. All of it it's who you are. I believe this struck home harder than intended. For so long, I have seen my inner scars, my insecurities, and my imperfection in the mirror. Never liking the reflection I see. And I ask myself, why? Or, more importantly, when did I start to see this body as imperfection? I have a few theories of when too many social traumas to count.
I few months ago, I wrote a post about wishes and doubts in books. Talking about what would happen if we could make a wish and change something about our lives. The short answer? We would not be what we are today. We would not be doing the things that we like today, even if we eliminated what we do not want from our lives. The moral of the post and this book is: we could regret many, many things, but without our mistakes and scars, we wouldn't be the person we are today. Even if we hate some choices from our past, I believe everything happens for a reason. A perfect example would be that if I hadn't made the decisions I did, some of which I still regret, I probably wouldn't have found this community I love so much.
The point in all of this is that just like Selene, our lives are full of mistakes. Some small and some much bigger. But I think this book reminded me of the importance to know how to overcome them, not ignore them, but learn from them. If there's one thing I see in Selene and myself, it's the resilience we have to learn from our mistakes. And I have to be honest, that makes me proud of both.
P.S.: I received an ARC of this book from the author in exchange for an honest review :)
Comments