Celaena Sardothien is a trained assassin, the most notorious. She was betrayed, caught, and now in prison. Prince Dorian and his friend Chaol Westfall, captain of the royal guard take her out of prison and to the palace, where she is charged with winning a contest against miscellaneous thugs, thieves and cutthroats, the prize being the position of KIng’s Assassin.
She survives every test and wins every contest against the remaining opponents, while a mysterious force seems to be attacking and mutilating the contestants at random. The final test against the powerful Cain is the hardest, not least because she is drugged before the contest. There are also multiple subplots involving
- a love triangle between Celaena, Dorian and Westfall,
- a certain princess Nehemia from the neighbouring kingdom
- a Lady Kaltain Rompier, a typical lady-in-waiting
- an ancient Queen Elena whose ghost appears in Celaena’s dreams.
It’s a world filled with a confusing plethora of characters with machiavellian intentions. Celaena is also rather vain and self-obsessed, maybe designed that way to show growth in later books, but it does not make her appealing. The world building is patchy, since there is a deeper world alluded to, which is filled with magic and mysterious power, but it seems out of reach of everyone. There is also some side plot involving an ancient runic language called Wyrdmarks, but that seemed like one too many concept for the book. I struggled to finish this book, and would not recommend this.