I got an ARC of Fortune’s Fool through TBRindr and I’d like to thank Angela Boord for it. It started out a bit slow for me, but I ended up really enjoying it, and if I had to sum it up shortly, I’d say it’s complex. So this is going to be a pretty long review to go with a pretty big book.

Structure stuff

Fortune’s Fool will be part of the Eterean Empire series but it’s self contained and works as a stand alone, the story is wrapped up and there’s no cliffhanger situation. I definitely want to read more about the Eterean Empire cause it’s fascinating.

We follow Kyrra d’Aliente who has a bad reputation and an arm made of metal. The book is written in first person, and it takes place on two planes, past and present. Past story, Kyrra’s backstory, is told in past tense, and book-present day events in present tense. I found the first person present a bit jarring, which is part of why it took me a while to get into the book, but it does work great with fast paced action scenes, and the flow between the two is nicely done.

I’m really bad with names, and it kinda throws you in the deep end with mentioning a lot of houses right at the start, which I think is the main reason I felt so disconnected before the first flashback chapter. The explanation of Kyrra’s backstory really brought things into focus and filled vital info.

Characters

Kyrra’s the main character and we follow her perspective exclusively. She’s interesting, constantly torn between duty, guilt, revenge and love. But not really likeable, I didn’t think. She just fucks up royally, a lot. There’s a very good explanation to her anger issues, but I just didn’t really care for her that much.

Arsenault was great though. He’s tall, brooding and Mysterious. He does purposefully withhold information that could be useful, but that’s acknowledged as one of his main flaws.

Kyrra and Arsenault are very much the engines of the story, but there are other interesting characters, struggling with their own conflicts and mysterious pasts, there’s a lot of mysterious pasts going around.

Worldbuilding

This was probably my favorite part. The world Angela Boord builds is so complex and detailed. It’s inspired by renaissance Italy, but there’s much more to it than that, I loved the other neighboring cultures and the history of Liera. The worldbuilding ranges from complex politics between ruling families, to detailed information about silk manufacturing and trade, to the sheer horror of bringing guns to a knife fight for the first time.

The gods and mythology are great, I don’t want to give too much away, but I just really loved that aspect.

I think the magic is a soft system, I get the feeling that there are some rules and limitations somewhere but it’s very vague.

Story(s)

There’s a lot of peeling back layers of mysteries and lies, in both and past and present stories. A lot of plots, back alley transactions, complicated politics but also fast sword fighting, chases across rooftops. There’s some romance, which acts more like a catalyst than an end goal.

I was a lot more engaged with the past story, it felt more contained and easy to follow. And from the start there are a lot of questions about how Kyrra ended up where she is at the beginning of the book, so I was really interested in finding that out.

The present day story is more layers upon layer of betrayal and complicated politics, and trying to figure out who wants what, which I could not really keep up with. The ending of the present day story is a roller coaster and really gripping, I enjoyed the last 25% or so of it a lot.

The prose

I found the prose beautiful, there’s a fair bit of description but it paints a gorgeous vivid picture of sights and sounds and smells. And there were a lot of phrases that just seemed artful.

This might just be me, cause I listen to a lot of audiobooks but I read this on ebook, but I got this feeling like the characters had very distinct voices, the dialogues came alive sort of, I dunno, I might be weird.

Overall I enjoyed it, even though the beginning didn’t really grip me and I was no Kyrra’s biggest fan. It was unusual for me that I didn’t feel the need to read it a lot, but whenever I did I kept going oh that’s cool, interesting, clever etc. There’s a lot of feeling like “What the hell is going on” but Kyrra’s usually trying to figure that exact thing out, so it works.