DNF Review: Grave Mercy by Robin LaFevers

Posted by Jessi (Geo) on March 10, 2012 | 1 Comment


DNF Review: Grave Mercy by Robin LaFeversGrave Mercy by Robin LaFevers
Series: His Fair Assassin #1
Published by Houghton Mifflin (4.3.2012)
Genres: Historical Fiction, Young Adult
Format: eARC, 564 pages
Source: NetGalley
Buy on Amazon


 Stars

Why be the sheep, when you can be the wolf?

Seventeen-year-old Ismae escapes from the brutality of an arranged marriage into the sanctuary of the convent of St. Mortain, where the sisters still serve the gods of old. Here she learns that the god of Death Himself has blessed her with dangerous gifts—and a violent destiny. If she chooses to stay at the convent, she will be trained as an assassin and serve as a handmaiden to Death. To claim her new life, she must destroy the lives of others.

Ismae’s most important assignment takes her straight into the high court of Brittany—where she finds herself woefully under prepared—not only for the deadly games of intrigue and treason, but for the impossible choices she must make. For how can she deliver Death’s vengeance upon a target who, against her will, has stolen her heart?

My thoughts

I may get flogged for this…but I couldn’t even bear to finish this one. There was so much hype and sooo many people marked this as 4 or 5 stars – which, frankly, I can’t see why – but it just was not for me. I knew going in that it was historical fiction, but decided to give it a try anyway (even though I hate anything historical), because it had such great reviews and ratings. But, after about 200 pages, I think it’s time for me to put it down and move on to something else.

Things I did not like about this book:
1. The politics. Good Lord, I was so bored by this part that I had random and merciless attacks of narcolepsy. I didn’t give a damn what was happening in the Duchies or with France so I couldn’t get interested. If I saw that the paragraph was getting into politics, I skimmed. And because of that, I didn’t really know what the hell was going on.
2. The characters. a) There were far too many and I just couldn’t keep up with which baron was which and who was bad and who was good. The names were just a jumble of capitalized words and I had no picture in my head of what anyone looked like because the book didn’t even bother with an introduction before moving on to the next name. b) They had no depth at all. They all seemed robotic to me, without any personality to speak of. The main character, Ismae, was especially uninteresting and uninspiring.
3. The prose. It was dry and flat and seemed rather sophomoric to me. It bored me almost as much as the politics did. I couldn’t conjure up any feeling or excitement at all for anything because of it.
4. The sex. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind sex in the least bit. But I really don’t see how this was labeled as YA. There was way too much talk about women’s “charms” – aka THEIR BREASTS- and seducing men. Also, how come every man she meets is a chauvinist pig who just wants to beat and rape her (except Duval)? I mean, I understand it’s historical and women didn’t have any rights, but come on.

Things I did like:
1. Assassin nuns. Come on, how awesometastic is that?!
2. The idea. I loved the whole ‘daughter of Death’ thing involving Mortain and how the traitors were ‘marqued.’ That could have made for a great story. Could have.

assessment
Plot: 2/5
Those 2 stars are for the originality of Mortain and the assassins.
Writing style: 1/5
Novice and no humor.
Characters: 1/5
Pace: 1/5
Cover: 4.5/5
Maybe if I just sit and stare at the cover it will make it all better. =/
 
Overall rating: Do not finish
I couldn’t connect with the story at all and was bored to tears.
Jessi (Geo)

Posted in: Book Reviews | Tags: , , , ,

Subscribe to Novel Heartbeat to get more posts like this!

One response to “DNF Review: Grave Mercy by Robin LaFevers

  1. Thanks for the frank review. I picked this up as an ARC as well, and have not yet tried it. I do like historical fiction, but to a point. I will give it a ‘go’ and see if I can make it passed the first 200 pages.

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.