The Winner’s Curse- Review

Title: The Winner’s Curse

Author: Marie Rutkoski

Genre: YA, Fantasy, Romance

Pages: 355

My rating: 4/5

Goodreads Link

My opinion:    

I had very high expectations for this book, since there was so much hype surrounding it. And I’m really happy to say that I really enjoyed this book! The world in this book is very fascinating and though it is not an extremely original idea (superior people ruling over slaves), Rutkoski puts her on unique twist on it. I loved learning about the world the author crafted, and I hope our knowledge of it expands in the sequel. I was also intrigued by the concept of the “Winner’s Curse”, which is basically saying that the winner of an auction has also lost, because he/she has won by paying more than what the majority of the other bidders thought the item was worth. It fascinated me how Rutkoski got the idea for the novel by that concept.        

Winning what you want, may cost you everything you love

The main character, Kestrel (or “Casserole” as I called her for the first few chapters. I might have just been really hungry) is a very snarky and intelligent girl. She’s not an expert at combat, but she has amazing and well thought out strategies. She’s basically a smartass, but in a good way. She’s sometimes a bit bossy, but I really liked reading from her perspective.
The main male protagonist is Arin. I didn’t like Arin in the beginning of the book, because he just seemed very bitter and arrogant. But as the story progressed, I began to understand why he’s the way he is. I’m still not a very big fan of him, but I appreciate him more now than before.

Now, this book has a major deal of forbidden love. It didn’t seem very believable to me that such a straight thinking and guarded girl, like Kestrel, could so easily fall for Arin. And it seemed to happen rather quickly (which really shouldn’t surprise me since it’s a YA book). But what I did appreciate in this whole forbidden love ordeal is that they both still knew where their loyalties lie (more so Arin than Kestrel).

Overall:
There is a whole lot of betrayal, mystery and romance in this novel and if you like all those things then I believe this is the book for you!
I’m eagerly awaiting the publication of the sequel, The Winner’s Crime, because I can’t wait to continue Kestrel and Arin’s story.

Hope you all had a lovely day and I’ll see you in my next post ♥