Let me start with the good. 
There is some truly gorgeous prose here. I have never marked so many phrases I loved in an ebook before. Many descriptions, or even minor parts to larger sentences, are poetic and vivid. 
The main character is a badass. She knows how to defend herself both physically and verbally, takes no prisoners, is entirely herself, and also has the softness that comes with knowing healthy familial love. And she’s smart— she is quick to notice things, which is sadly not something I can say for all the supposedly strong heroines I’ve read in fantasy fiction. 
 
Now for the less good parts. 
While the descriptive phrases are often stunning, they’re also overused in a lot of places. Certain aesthetics are described in moments they don’t need to be, when they add nothing to the content of the story. Sure, it’s lovely to read some of it, but it interferes with the flow of the plot enough that it gets frustrating. 
The worldbuilding is told rather than shown, and inserted randomly at moments that don’t make sense. 
Mal and Ash’s relationship have no chemistry until they decided they like each other out of nowhere. This comes after a series of miscommunications (which are, blissfully, due to an actual reason:

Ash’s insecurity about his stammer

). But their care for each other feels completely unearned. 
 
The biggest issue I have, however, made me contemplate DNFing multiple times (before I finally did): the inconsistency of the writing. 
There are multiple POVs throughout the book, but they’re never introduced. At first, it seems as though Mal is the only one whose perspective we’ll get, and that’s fine. But then it jumps to her brother, and then later to side characters from other kingdoms, and none of it makes a whole lot of sense. There are essentially no transitions to explain the narrative shifts, and with it sometimes changing mid-scene, there are many parts of chapters that are difficult to read. 
Action scenes feel like afterthoughts, with very little explanation of what’s happening, and then it’s over.  There is a complete lack of tension in these moments, because there’s no build up nor any payoff. 
The resulting jerky nature of both the writing and the characterization of characters is, by far, the main reason for my rating being what it is (right now, I'd have it at 2 stars). 
 
I really wish the pacing had been better planned; the book drags in some places and then speeds through the action scenes so that it feels like nothing is happening overall. I’d have liked to have the characters be given more time to be introduced, so we could get to know them, rather than have side characters take over the majority of the narrative with very little reason as to why. It feels like they’re there simply to pad out the length of the book and make the world feel bigger, but it instead leaves everything feeling rather flat. The

witch maid

reveals herself almost immediately, eliminating the possibility for tension and the impact of a reveal. The spymaster, Wren, is supposed to be brilliant, but tells Mal everything she knows upon their first meeting. (And don’t get me started on Wren’s characterization—it’s one of my biggest issues with the book). 
 
The paragraphs in the electronic copy I read are also not indented, and at times not separated properly from thought to thought, making it even more difficult to read. I hope this is fixed for the published copy. 

I will try to come back to it at some point. I really want to know how it concludes, because the story is still interesting to me. But for now, I simply can't get through it. When I do finish it, however, I'll come back to update my review.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and JF Johns for giving me an ARC of this book in exchange for my honest review!