The Sin Eater's Daughter by Melinda Salisbury Series: The Sin Eater's Daughter #1
Published by Scholastic Press on February 24th, 2015
Genres: Fantasy, Fantasy & Magic
Goodreads
I am the perfect weapon.
I kill with a single touch.Twylla is blessed. The Gods have chosen her to marry a prince, and rule the kingdom. But the favour of the Gods has it's price. A deadly poison infuses her skin. Those who anger the queen must die under Twylla's fatal touch.
Only Lief, an outspoken new guard, can see past Twylla's chilling role to the girls she truly is.
Yet in a court as dangerous as the queen's, some truths should not be told...
Want to know something scary and horribly sad? It is already mid March and The Sin Eater’s Daughter is the FIRST YA book I have completed this year. Sure I’ve started others (Velvet, Princess of Thorns, Save Me) but I reach a point (in Velvet I only had 100 pages to go!) and all interest is lost. Nothing compels me to finish and honestly I start to resent reading which is a big no in my book.
Then I got a super awesome box from my beautiful best friend Crystal for Christmas (yes it was late but it was AWESOME). In that box was her ARC of The Sin Eater’s Daughter and I immediately jumped right in. Now I know this is usually the part in the story where I say “I couldn’t put it down” or “I read it in one sitting” but truth is it took me a little over a week to finish. Not because it was bad or slow (more on that soon) I was just really busy and I didn’t want it to end!
Salisbury has created characters that I loved, hated, distrusted and full on wished to a fiery hell. Not just Twylla, or “kill with a touch” MC but every single character. From the (occasionally) arrogant prince to the “too much to soon” Lief to the “kill that crazy ***** NOW” Queen down to the servant girl. Every single character made me feel SOME emotion and I feel like that is such a huge deal in a book. How often can we really say the minor, four/five line having characters moved us? Made us feel compassion or pity or full on rage? Hats off to Salisbury for that!
I will admit the pace was…it wasn’t slow per se but it wasn’t action packed “lets chop off some heads and ride off into the sunset” either. THINGS were happening but they happened behind the scenes. They happened with the help of stealth, deceit and “mystery” and I know this is something a lot of people will not like but I feel that overall Salisbury timed everything perfectly. You never felt like the story was rushed and you knew that with each conversation, even the mundane, you were being given a small glimpse into the near future for our characters. On top off all that the plot was original and captivating and, if I’m being honest, a bit scatterbrained (seemingly 😉 ) from page one to the very end!
The idea of a Sin Eater is one I’ve never heard of, but it was the world, the reasoning behind the…THINGS, the way it all unfolded and the growth of the characters that really held my attention and made me anxious to finish in the most beautiful way possible. It’s an added bonus that the cover is just as beautiful as the story.
