Hello hello and welcome or welcome back to my little bookish corner of the internet. Today I’m sharing my review of The Six Deaths of the Saint, the third book in the Into Shadow collection. You can find my reviews of the first two books below:
#1 – The Garden
#2 – Persephone
Synopsis
The Saint of War spares the life of a servant girl so she can fulfill her destiny as the kingdom’s greatest warrior in this short story of love and loyalty by New York Times bestselling author Alix E. Harrow.
Always mindful of the debt she owes, the girl finds her worth as a weapon in the hand of the Prince. Her victories make him a king, then an emperor. The bards sing her name and her enemies fear it. But the war never ends and the cost keeps rising—how many times will she repeat her own story?
Review
Despite this being a short story, it ended up being one of my favourite reads of the year. It’s hard to review a short story without the review ending up longer than the book itself, but in this case I wouldn’t feel bad if it did.
The character of the Saint of War is captured in a different way following each death we are privy to. The relationship between her and the King is painful to watch, seeing how she is treated, and you find yourself crying out mentally, wanting to protect this character. Each time she is pushed that bit more, and you have to wonder how much more she can cope with.
It’s a wonderful example of writing when it comes to character development, with a really unique take on it. And it’s also a wonderful example of how a short story can captivate you more than a full length novel: the sheer skill of the author in action outweighs the number of words.
There are only a few characters in this tale, and only one, really, who matters. And it isn’t the saint. It’s the person who helps the saint see her worth, see what she is worthy of, see what she deserves. It’s a beautiful, stunning book, that I cannot praise enough, and fully deserving of all the praise it gets.
Thanks so much for stopping by for this short story review. In case you didn’t guess, I loved this book! If you’re looking for more from Alix E. Harrow, you can find my review of her debut novel The Ten Thousand Doors of January here, and my review of The Once and Future Witches is upcoming.
And On She Reads 