Review : Kiss of Deception by Mary E. Pearson

Summary (from Goodreads) 

Title : Kiss of Deception (The Remnant Chronicles #1)
Author : Mary E. Pearson
Publication Date : July 8th 2014
Publisher : Henry Holt
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In this timeless new trilogy about love and sacrifice, a princess must find her place in a reborn world.

In a society steeped in tradition, Princess Lia’s life follows a preordained course. As First Daughter, she is expected to have the revered gift of sight—but she doesn’t—and she knows her parents are perpetrating a sham when they arrange her marriage to secure an alliance with a neighboring kingdom—to a prince she has never met.

On the morning of her wedding, Lia flees to a distant village. She settles into a new life, hopeful when two mysterious and handsome strangers arrive—and unaware that one is the jilted prince and the other an assassin sent to kill her. Deception abounds, and Lia finds herself on the brink of unlocking perilous secrets—even as she finds herself falling in love.
Personal Thoughts

Kiss of Deception is one of those books that had a lot of potential, but because of its focus on useless elements such as the romance, the plot line and the world-building are left to develop at the sidelines, ultimately resulting in a mediocre book. I knew going into Kiss of Deception that there was a full-blown love triangle, but I hoped that the plot in itself would be enough to make this a strong read for me. Unfortunately, I was left rather let down by it and I blame no one but my high expectations.

One issue that I had with Kiss of Deception was the telling instead of showing, especially when it came to the characters. The reader is told all these characteristics belonging to Lia, the protagonist, but we are really shown her portraying these characteristics. The only instance she showed any significant sign of bravery was when she ran away from her wedding to the Prince. Lia wasn't an unlikeable character by any means, but I had a hard time forming an emotional connection with her for some reason, which consequently lead me to feeling more or less indifferent towards anything that happened to her. This was also the case with the multiple POVs of Kaden and Rafe. There was a spark of something missing from the points of views that made it hard for me to become emotionally in-synch with them. I wanted to feel any kind of emotion towards them, even anger or frustration, but I was pretty much passionless. The one character that I actually enjoyed, Pauline, Lia's friend, didn't have a major role in the book. An event occurs to her which basically leads to her disappearance from the book for a long time.

I should have known better than to start a series with a love triangle, but that's entirely my fault. I still held on to the hopes that the plot and the world-building would be enough to satisfy the YA fantasy fan in me. The love triangle wasn't as bad with the girl fluctuating throughout the entire book about her feelings for the two guys, but it was frustrating with Lia constantly thinking about the two of them. In fact, it's the entire plot line for about 75% of the book. She makes up her mind about whom she has a preference for, but I'm not convinced that the love triangle will not rear its ugly head in the subsequent books. The L-word also comes out quite fast and that just added to the things that didn't particularly work for me. Nothing interesting happens until Lia winds up getting kidnapped. After a while, the lack of movement in the plot got old and I just wanted something, anything to happen. The world was interesting and there was so much I wanted to know, but we're all given a few meager, disappointing bits and pieces of information about it. I'll admit that I found myself really enjoying the last quarter when more revelations about the world building and the politics behind the setting in Kiss of Deception were made. Despite my many issues with this book, I will admit that Kiss of Deception had a quality to its writing that made it easy to read. Mary E. Pearson has some interesting ideas and concepts that could really elevate this series as a whole, but I definitely think the focus on the love triangle and the romance needs to go away.

Kiss of Deception has been a success with a lot of readers, so don't take my opinion of it as a done-deal if you're deciding whether to read this book or not. As a first book though, this was a weak YA fantasy book in my opinion. It's a romance novel in the disguise of a YA fantasy story. It's a book with a lot of potential and if explored tactfully, this series could become one of the strongest YA fantasy series out there.

Rating 

Cover : 4/5
Plot : 2/5
Characters : 2/5
Writing : 4/5

**Overall Rating : 2.5/5**

Thank you to NetGalley and Henry Holt for the e-ARC of Kiss of Deception.