⭐️ ⭐️

The Betrothed (The Betrothed, Book 1) by Kiera Cass

Haunted by the ghost of Eadlyn 👻

*IN MY OPINION*
It is more important to make your characters likable, rather than relatable. Likable characters are unique and fleshed out people with their own little quirks and personality traits that could easily be seen in the real world. When authors try to make their characters more relatable, it's always in an attempt to include as many readers as possible. This leads to characters becoming many shades of gray, and emotional blank slates that cause readers to project their own personality on to the character, and trick themselves into thinking the main character is just like them (no, that's just bad character development).

This was a huge issue at the end of The Selection series, and it seems to have continued into this one. For further elaboration, see my review of The Crown.

The bottom line is that Hollis is boring and bland, and I don’t care about her. Delia Grace is easily the best character, simply because she's the most developed. In a single chapter you learn more about her than you do about Hollis throughout the entire book. She has much more personality, depth and drive than Hollis, who is just a blank slate of a character. Hollis has no personality, no nuances, nothing to make her stand out in a memorable way other than just being the main character. Which highlights another trend that continued from the end of The Selection, in that we're given another main character with no goal or purpose.

However, in conjunction with The Selection series, I have formed the opinion that Kiera Cass is weirdly good at world building (while her worlds aren't very original, they're effective 👍). I stopped caring about the romance because it was dull, boring and had a lot of missing pieces that should have been explained, but weren’t. The most interesting part became the political aspects of the story, and how all these relationships, betrothals and love triangles affected the balance of power among the various countries, which the ending only multiplied.

The ending is The Betrothed's saving grace (the fact that I like the ending probably says more about me than it does the book 😈). In an attempt to keep this spoiler free, I will simply say that the book ends on a tragedy. But in terms of character development, it's the best thing that could've happened 👏👏👏👏👏. Our main character has now gone through a tragedy, she now has a defining moment that is unique to her, one that should shape her for years to come (SHOULD). Equally as important, Hollis no has motivation and purpose going into the next book.