“Choose the path that's right by you. Always. It may end in misery -a small price to pay. No amount of hardship compares to the emptiness of regret. Of never having lived at all.”

Hello book world. I was kind of scared to pick this one up. I’ve been watching Moreci for a bit on YouTube but it’s one thing to talk about writing and another to pull it off well. So eventually I figured I needed to see what she was made of. Could she do as she preached?

I jumped, feet first, into her second book The Savior’s Choice.

In a world where a Savior brings fertility to the land, all men of competing age may try to win her hand in marriage and become the Sovereign. And many want to… just not Tobias. The thought of killing 19 other men for supposed love sends his stomach churning. He keeps refusing to enter until he no longer has a choice. His sister, crippled from an accident, needs more help then his feeble income can provide. So he enters, risking all, but assuming that he won’t make it far; all for the coin purse handed to the selected’s family. Once in the maze, fate has a different idea for Tobias, sending him on a wild journey that may get him out alive.

Romance, palace intrigue, blood, guts…. What more could I want in a story? With the perfect balance of everything, including the kitchen sink, I was immediately lost to the labyrinth and everything held within its walls. Moreci sets the tone in the first scene by opening with the brutal killing of the current Savior. By doing this, Moreci makes a promise to her readers, showing them upfront what they can expect. .

Next we meet the main protagonist. How Moreci pulled off writing from the mind of a male protagonist, I have no idea. Her grasp of internal dialogue, thoughts, and actions was superb. Reader’s weren’t handed the perfect male specimen from our dreams, but an honest guy with his own faults. Just one that we can stand behind. His actions throughout the story make sense. We aren’t given this overwhelming good boy act. Maybe just a nice little hero to make every girl swoon for.

“You are the strongest man I've ever known. And you are kind. And you are good. You are bruised by this tournament, but you are not broken.”

Which leads me right into a very important point - that does not mean that Moreci’s female characters were weak or needed saving. Quite the opposite. Moreci created a female cast that was strong in every way possible without losing their femininity. Instead of the man coming to save the woman, we got a woman who could save herself, and did so on many occasions, but decided to team up with a man. Reader’s were still gifted with the strong man scenes, but got a better story when the woman could stand right beside him in the fight.

Sadly, not all of Moreci’s characters were this well done. One of my biggest issues with the book, I only have two, is that the bad guys were made to be very bad. They were too easy to hate and, at times, felt evil just to move the story along. There was no guilt from the decision Tobias had to make. You eventually wanted something bad to happen to them. Overall, every antagonist or negative character in Tobias and Leila’s way, fell flat. Every character in a book needs to be fully realized, and come across as human, even if we, as the writer, don’t like them. Don’t make it easy for the reader to hate them. It takes out a large emotional factor from the story. Look at the Darkling in the Grisha Verse. That’s an excellent example of a fully developed antagonist.

And I might as well let you know the other issue. Even though the dialogue was superb, bordering on genius, there were some points when the quips and back and forth felt a little too modern for the world. I’m not looking for old English, but I don’t want to hear Joe from down the street when this story is set in some other universe not contemporary to ours.

Ok, hard part is over.

“If everything looks good and pure, then nothing's truly beautiful. The ugliness is what makes beauty so distinct.”

Still, Moreci’s art is in her dialogue. Seriously. You need to work on that in your writing… here’s your textbook.

What I think sets this book above all others was Moreci’s work with sex and her ability to make what many deem to be inappropriate, natural. She broke boundaries and showed a natural side to human nature. Instead of hiding the male anatomy, she placed it front and center in a respectful, story important way. This isn’t some romance, sexually explicit book. Every sex reference felt vital to the story and worked to create an atmosphere of what competing in the tournament would be like. This includes the same sex relationships as well.

I think what took me on the biggest ride was the imagination in each section of the tournament. I really don’t want to see inside Moreci’s mind because I have no idea how she came up with all of the challenges. Each one was unique and interesting, and kept the reader on their toes. Each scene was well constructed to not leave the reader lost in the what was happening. If you’ve read some of my other reviews, you know I hate when writers don’t craft well choreographed fight scenes. Most of the time I’m lost, which loses the whole point of the fight scene.

If you haven’t guessed it… I’m giving this book 5 stars. Man it was amazing. I was left with some serious book hangover. I need a reread, but to do that, I need to actually own the book. Well, my birthday is coming up. Fingers crossed.

Happy Reading.

Love Kait.

Reading Challenge: 97/100