Wicked Saints by Emily A Duncan Blog Tour
Friday, 29 March 2019
Something Dark and Holy #1
Published on 2 April 2019 by Wednesday Books
A girl who can speak to gods must save her people without destroying herself.
A prince in danger must decide who to trust.
A boy with a monstrous secret waits in the wings.
Together, they must assassinate the king and stop the war.
In a centuries-long war where beauty and brutality meet, their three paths entwine in a shadowy world of spilled blood and mysterious saints, where a forbidden romance threatens to tip the scales between dark and light. Wicked Saints is the thrilling start to Emily A. Duncan’s devastatingly Gothic Something Dark and Holy trilogy.
Let me start off by saying that Wicked Saints is a
roller coaster ride of emotions. You will love this book, you will shed tears
because of this book, you will gasp and you will take deities’ names in vain,
you will mourn and your heart will clench and break and there will be so many
emotions ripping through you that you will suffer emotional whiplash and sit
there for an actual hour after finishing the book, thinking to yourself “what
am I supposed to do with my life now that it’s over? How will I survive until
the next book comes out? Why did I have to read this?”
Before I lure you in with how much you should read
this book, I want to get the content
warning out of the way. Because this book has some triggering content and
y’all need to take care of yourselves. If you have any issues whatsoever with
self-harm, past or present or just get queasy at the idea of reading about
mages whose magic is blood-sourced, I strongly caution you about reading Wicked
Saints. I speak from experience when I say that it is hard to ignore the
temptation when you see it in media and this book centres around mages who use
their own blood for magic. Please, be careful in your reading if you choose to
read Wicked Saints.
Ms Duncan brings to life a rich and bloody world
that is brimming with bits of Eastern European beauty. I took a bit longer than
usual reading this simply because I wanted to be exact in my pronunciations of
names and I have, like, next to zero experience with Slavic languages. I know
maybe two words in Ukrainian and three in Russian and I learned them through
osmosis. Consequently, I was refreshingly challenged with Wicked Saints. I knew
very little about the language or how closely enmeshed religion is with
everything. I got to have a little enlightenment with my entertainment, which I
always welcome.
What we need to know first off is that Wicked Saints
takes place amid a century-long holy war between Nadya’s country of Kalyazin and Serefin and Malachiasz’s
country of Tranavia. Tranavia no
longer worships the gods and practises bloodmagic which isn’t okay to Kalyazin
or the edicts of their pantheon of deities. The Tranavians wanted to ‘eradicate’
the gods from Kalyazin like they had from their own country and the Kalyazi
wanted to bring the gods back to the ‘lost’ Tranavians and stop the profaning of
their deities (the practise of blood magic).
Wicked Saints has three principal characters. Nadezhda
Lapteva, or Nadya, is a cleric residing at a secluded mountain monastery. The
priests and priestesses of the monastery are trained in battle, but in the
event of an actual battle, Nadya was to be protected at all costs. Because she
could speak with the gods and work their magic. Serefin Meleski, the Tranavian High Prince and a powerful blood
mage. Serefin has so much going on, as is the per usual with royals, I feel
like somebody *cough* Ostiya *cough* needs to be there for him 24/7 to have his
back because dude. I worry for his
liver and I also want to hug him and bundle him up in a handknit afghan and
give him some tea, dude needs some TLC in the worst way. Serefin rose to the
rank of general, six months after going to battle at sixteen because his father sent him to the front
and his mum is too worried about her ownself to worry about her son. Serefin’s hard
and untrusting and scary and hurting and terrifyingly cruel and he is so tired
of fighting, and, oh yeah, his battalion (is that the word?) just invaded Nadya’s
monastery. And finally, Malachiasz
Czechowicz is a Tranavian deserter and not just any deserter, but a Vulture. Malachiasz showed so
much promise as a bloodmage that he was sent to become one of the elite
Vultures who are sect of Tranavians with a grotesque amount of power and this
guy defected. Malachiasz is wandering
Kalyazin with his two Akolan companions, when they encounter Nadya fleeing the
monastery battle. And the fate of their countries lie in their hands.
Wicked Saints switches POVs between Serefin and Nadezhda
throughout the story but is told primarily from Nadya’s view. Normally POV
changes bother me because the transitions are so haphazard within chapters and
the characters aren’t very distinguishable from each other. But not so with Ms
Duncan. The transitions are well-timed and each chapter is labelled with the
character whose POV it’s written in. That is so thoughtful! Ms Duncan pulls
off differing POVs beautifully. Nadya’s POV and Serefin’s POV have vastly different
‘voices’, you won’t mistake whose POV you’re reading.
I enjoyed the interactions between Nadya and Malachiasz,
there were the Kalyazi-Tranavian vibes where they butt heads over their beliefs
but there’s also the friendship that slowly forms between them and the slow sparks
that start showing up along the way. And then, you toss in their magics melding
and working together as the book progresses and I squee. I don’t care if squee
isn’t a word. It’s there. The end.
I sped through Wicked Saints because I had
to know what was next in store for our principal triad and I was on the edge of
my seat the entire time. There was torture and there were battles and court
deceptions and a betrothal battle because that’s a Tranavian custom that I am
totally here for and there is a library that I would sacrifice my
nephew for (the problem child one, he’d understand, he’s a bookworm), and a cathedral
and I love cathedrals so much. They’re
pretty and they’re spooky in the dark, okay? Anyways my heart was all over
this book and I need to get my hands on the next book, like, yesterday because
this is a trilogy and you cannot leave me like you did. I have feelings, y’know!
I’m not going to lie. None of these characters
are going to be nominated for the Humanitarian of the Year or anything, but I’m
going to fangirl over Nadya and Malachiasz and Serefin because they were written
as flawed and they’re gritty and they are so fed up with the status quo and something has to change and they each
have the ability to do something so why not try? Also, I was curious so I went
and found out that ‘Nadezhda’ means hope.
Excuse the tears but I am having emotions and I cannot control the feelings.
NADEZHDA MEANS HOPE.
I’m giving Wicked Saints 5 stars because I loved
this book so much and it tore me apart, glued all of my pieces back together,
and I still asked for more at the end. I have so much more to say on this book
but I’m closing in on the 1500 mark and I am not writing an essay on this book,
dang it! I want to thank Meghan H. from Wednesday Books/St. Martin’s Press who
decided to include me in the bloggers approached about participating in the
Wicked Saints launch tour, I’m truly over-the-moon ecstatic and honoured to
have been included in this endeavour. I hope I’ve done justice to it.
What's Being Said By Other Authors
“Prepare for a snow frosted, blood drenched
fairy tale where the monsters steal your heart and love ends up being the
nightmare. Utterly absorbing.” - Roshani Chokshi, New York Times bestselling
author of The Star-Touched Queen
"Full of blood and monsters and magic—this book destroyed me and I
adored it. Emily is a wicked storyteller, she’s not afraid to hurt her
characters or her readers. If you’ve ever fallen in love with a villain you
will fall hard for this book." && “This
book destroyed me and I adored it.”- Stephanie Garber, New York
Times bestselling author of Caraval
"This is the novel of dark theology and eldritch blood-magic that I’ve
been waiting for all my life. It’s got a world at once brutal and beautiful,
filled with characters who are wounded, lovable, and ferocious enough to break
your heart. A shattering, utterly satisfying read." - Rosamund Hodge,
author of Cruel Beauty and Bright Smoke, Cold Fire
“Wicked Saints is a lush, brutal, compelling fantasy that is dark,
deep, and bloody—absolutely riveting! With a boy who is both man and monster,
mysterious saints with uncertain motives, and a girl filled with holy magic who
is just beginning to understand the full reaches of her power, this gothic
jewel of a story will sink its visceral iron claws into you, never letting go
until you’ve turned the last page. And truthfully, not even then -the explosive
ending will haunt you for days! ” - Robin LaFevers, New York
Times bestselling author of the His Fair Assassin trilogy
“Dark, bloody, and monstrously romantic. This is the villain love interest that
we've all been waiting for.” - Margaret Rogerson, New York Times bestselling
author of An Enchantment of Ravens
"Seductively dark and enchanting, Wicked Saints is a
trance you won’t want to wake from. Duncan has skillfully erected a world like
no other, complete with provocative magic, sinister creatures, and a plot that
keeps you guessing. This spellbinding YA fantasy will bewitch readers to the
very last page." - Adrienne Young, New York Times bestselling
author of Sky in the Deep
Her public social media links are ::
Now, as I said before, I struggled with the names in Wicked Saints because none of my languages are Slavic, and I stumbled across this handy dandy pronunciation guide after I'd finished reading the book. Yes, I read the entire book with a pronunciation aid app on hand, because I do things the hard way. But for those of you who are reading this, you're blessed with the pronunciation guide before you read the book.
There's already a few amazing artists out there picking up their instruments of choice and making fanart in homage to Wicked Saints and my favourite so far is the one of Nadya in this trio posted by Nicole.Deal.Art on Instagram. I love it so very much!
I had no real idea of where to put this excerpt because I wanted to include the lovely damask pattern on the edge of the chapter page. Look at that gorgeous thing! It's not in the ARC I have, but I'm picking up a copy at my local Barnes & Noble (we don't have an indie store locally) just so I can have that lovely pattern on my shelf. I love damask patterns. They're everything good in this world. Okay, I'm closing out my talking portion of this post and leaving you for the excerpt.
My charity for this post is the Autistic Self Advocacy Network because Autism Pride Month is next month and I'm dreading the deluge of 'light it up blue' idiocy where people think Autism $peaks is a wonderful organisation that doesn't promote torturing autistic children in 'therapy'. Unlike Autism $peaks, ASAN is run by autistic individuals for autistic individuals of all ages. Anyways, Don't light it up blue for April we want red instead for acceptance. Until next time, have a happily ever after! (Don't forget to keep reading for the excerpt!!)
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