I REALLY REALLY wanted to love that book. It has been one of my most anticipated books of the year. <b> I mean look at the cover
Unfortunately, the author got too caught up in describing history which made the first 75% really quite boring. We get how this society works about 20% of the way through. We didn't need to keep continuing the repetitive history. Yes the people of Hungary love their country. Yes, the Romani (gypsies) are treated poorly. I GET IT. Literally nothing happened to move the book forward. It was honestly just a repeat of different way of proving those ideas I just mentioned
For the most part, Anna really didn't have a personality. She was literally a Jane Doe who used old language that just didn't really fit with the book's style of writing. Like old language was just thrown in there like m&ms and let me tell you, it was not working. She also never knows what she actually wants. She kept on switching back and forth on big decisions based on other people's opinions and that annoyed the crap on me.
The saving grace of this book was the last 25%. Anna finally got her shit together and made a decision about what she wanted to do based on her thoughts and beliefs. AND THEN SHE TOOK ACTION. FINALLY!! It was also heart-wrenching. Secrets are revealed and there is really no right answer for what she has to do. Is it right? Is it wrong? There's really no saying. We lose characters we come to love and it hurts. I didn't think this book could pull that off the emotions in brought up in me, but it did.
Also what happened between William and Anna's cousin? There's such strong emotion and at the end, nothing is explained and everything is hunky dory? I don't actually know if that's what it was. I was just confused.
Will I read the next book? I honestly don't know. MAYBE.
Do I recommend it? Perhaps if you're a history and fantasy buff you might enjoy it more than I did.