Slaying the Vampire Conqueror A Crowns Of Nyaxia Novel

Readable as a standalone or as a nice little treat in the Nyaxia series!

Bewertung am 09.05.2025
Bewertungsnummer: 2486619
Bewertet: Buch (Taschenbuch)

Thanks NetGalley and Pan Macmillan for sending me this arc! I love Carissa Broadbents writing and if you are considering reading this one, you probably do, too. This novel is set in the familiar world of the crowns of Nyaxia series - reading this series, however, is not necessary to enjoy the book, it just gives you a bit more context. Sylina is a devoted follower of Acaeja, goddess of fate. After a traumatizing childhood she has dedicated her life to the goddess and joined the Arachessen, a cult-like following of Aceaja which follows the goal of making sure fate turns into reality. Joining this sisterhood demands sacrifices to prove loyalty to the goddess, which is the reason Sylina had to give up her eyesight as well as her past identity. Now, Sylina navigates the world by sensing threads and using these connections of fate and information to be able to "see" things her past self would have never been able to. This makes her a perfect assassin, now tasked with one big goal: to kill the Vampire conqueror who strives to take over her Sylinas native country of Galea. Her task seems simple: infiltrate the army as a seer, earn the conquerors trust and get close enough to kill him when the time arises. However, as she joins Atrius' forces, she cannot help but notice that this brutal solider may not be the villain she expected. The once clear cut mission of killing Atrius is threatened not only by Sylinas connection to him, but more so by the unexpected moral questions that arise with their progress through the country. But the Arachessen are not tasked with moral judgement but with following the instructions of their goddess without questioning her motives. This forces Sylina to make a difficult decision: trust the goddess of fate she dedicated her whole life to or make a moral judgment of her own based on the facts presented to her. Either way, the decision may cost her dearly - maybe even her life. I love Carissa Broadbents writing, so absolutely no notes on that. Sylina is a complex and interesting character with a lot of backstory. We may not immediately understand every decision of hers, but her cult-like upbringing is a fascinating aspect of her character. Sylina is skilled, deeply flawed and has immense personal growth in this novel. Atrius is pretty similar to the other love interests we met in Broadbents books. He is tall, handsome and has a disturbing past which leads him to the decisions he makes now. Whilst I do get his reasoning and am impressed with his moral code, his openness to critique and his reluctance to certain things, he still is a conqueror of another country. Again, I get his reasons and I kinda am a sucker for the "it pains me deeply but I have to do this" character but the conqueror-citizen of conquered state-dynamic is one I just don't feel comfortable with. Relationship whise, I enjoyed following Sylina and Atrius whilst wishing we could have spent more time with them, seeing as there were lots of time skips. The overall plot was good. I did not expect this outcome and was pleasantly shocked by it. The resolution to it made sense. I liked the structure of a moving army and the tactics behind it. I was especially pleased with the fact that vampirism was not really a plot point - it made sense for the overarching plot but the discussion of vampires-humans in the setting and relationship would have felt forced and is something we've read countless times before. The world building was absolutely stunning. I really don't know how she does it every time. The magic system of the Arachessen, as was with every fellowship of the gods we saw in this series, was innovative, fun to read, unique to the goddess of fate and a great way to experience the story - not through Sylinas eyes, but through her magical senses. The world of Galea may be a bit overdone, which goes hand in hand with the "the conqueror is actually maybe not the bad guy" thing I already criticized, but I adored the dystopian settings of the different cities, the detailed descriptions of the buildings and the relationship between the citizens and its rulers. There is a lot of world building in this book and still I wished it to be more, it was, as always, breathtaking. I cannot wait for the release to go looking for fan art for it. So why did I not give 5 stars? Well, the conqueror thing made me uncomfortable, but that is personal preference I guess. Additionally, I found some of the dynamics between Sylina and Atrius repetitive of those of other couples in the series. I know there are only so many ways one can write a vampire-human dynamic in a war-like setting and don't get me wrong, I still really enjoyed it, but it just felt pretty reminiscent at this point. Overall thoughts: Stunning world building, unique magic system, solid relationship and a great writing style. You can enjoy this book with the added context of the crowns of Nyaxia series, which will probably reference the characters of this one in the third duet concerning the house of blood, or read it as a standalone. I definitely recommend picking this one up if you love romantasy, intricate world building and a great time!

Anything for the sake of the plot

Aylin am 28.07.2025
Bewertungsnummer: 2552400
Bewertet: Buch (Taschenbuch)

I liked a lot of Broadbent's book, but starting with this one, her characters and stories are getting extremely repetitive. Evil dark guy (who never actually does ANYTHING evil or even morally grey, really, but is just constantly described as such) and a woman set against him, who falls in love with him so quickly her initial job is easily forgotten (cue title of the book.) A vampire conqueror that treats people much better than the human warlords (who are so comically evil and lacking substance they may as well be carton cutouts of Lord Voldemort). So there's no conflict - evil vampire guy is actually basically Daenerys Targaryen (before season 8) freeing people and our wannabe assassin quickly jumps from a prologue of "I will kill him" to "oh wait never mind he's not actually doing anything bad". Well, and our wannabe assassin sacrificed her eyesight "piece by piece" in the physical sense to appease her goddess - but the author does nothing with that. Sylina sees "threads", which equals to facial expressions, magic thoughts, emotions, of people hundreds of meters away from her. What I thought could be an interesting subject to tackle - how does a character who is blind perceive the world? - the author instead used as a Mary Sue power, really. She sees everything and a thousand things more. And the sacrificing of her eyes in the physical sense? Apparently there was still enough left to see the frame of her beloved later. How that works biologically? Please do ask Carissa... If you like the descriptions and the actions of your books to add up, this one is not for you. The ending was one bad plot twist and one bad warping of a character to suddenly turn them from omniscient to stupid so we could have our happy ending. I honestly could barely get through it. 2 stars for... effort?