Review: The Assassin's Curse

Author: Cassandra Rose Clarke
Series: The Assassin's Curse, #1
Published: October 2nd 2012
Publisher: Strange Chemistry
Paperback, 320 pages
Buy: The Book Depository


The Assassin’s Curse, Cassandra Rose Clarke’s debut novel, is an exciting and unusual adventure filled with pirates, magic and, of course, assassins. It’s a must read for everyone who’s grown a bit tired of the same old, formulaic stories. This book could never have a girl in a pretty dress on its cover.

Here’s something I’ve noticed in Clarke’s adult book (The Mad Scientist’s Daughter), and it’s even more pronounced here: she tends to write slow-developing, complicated and subtle romances. Sometimes they’re so subtle, in fact, that you can’t even be sure they’re there. She doesn’t hesitate to throw a third, fourth or even a fifth person into the mix, and she doesn’t hesitate to let that third (fourth, fifth, you get the picture) person win. While I recognize and even appreciate the originality, I don’t always like it. Call it a personal flaw if you will.

Now, in the interest of full disclosure (and please take into consideration that I’m risking my life by writing this down because there will be quite a few bloggers willing to come for me with torches and pitchforks), I must admit I didn’t like Naji all that much. I understand why a girl like Ananna would be drawn to him after growing up in such unusual circumstances, but I guess that, somewhere along the line, I’ve outgrown characters like him.

”Yeah,” I said. “This is Naji.”
“I was expecting a little boy,” Marjani said.
“He acts like one sometimes.”

And he does. For a trained assassin, Naji acts far too much like a twelve-year-old boy, and his behavior was just too off-putting for me. He takes the whole broody-and-mysterious thing just a bit too far. I like a dark, quiet hero as much as the next girl, but for me, there really wasn’t much to like about him.

In terms of plot, The Assassin’s Curse is seriously underdeveloped. After an excellent introduction in which our heroine, Ananna, escapes an arranged marriage on a stolen camel of all things, the usual narrative structure quickly becomes neglected, if not altogether abandoned. Even the ending wasn’t the cliffhanger I’d expected. Instead, the book just sort of ended at a pretty random place, there was no real climax and the resolution never came. A few questions were answered, but nothing was actually resolved.

What I really did like about The Assassin’s Curse was the language. A lot of people thought it was inferior to Moira Young’s writing, i.e. the dialect she used for Saba, but I think the two were created with different things in mind. They serve different purposes, and they are both excellent, each in its own way. Ananna’s language use cleverly emphasizes her lack of education and social finesse without disrupting the fluidity of Clarke’s prose or taking away from the reader’s enjoyment. In other words, it is different and useful, but by no means impenetrable.

Considering that this is the only positive thing I’ve written so far, I wouldn’t blame you for thinking that I didn’t like this book, but I honestly did. I just felt that there were enough positive reviews out there and that I could afford to be brutally honest and critical. The Assassin’s Curse is certainly worth your time and I hope you’ll give it a chance.