I enjoyed this, but as is nearly always the case with epic fantasy, I would have enjoyed it more had there been less of it. 900+ pages, and the story just went on and on and on. In many ways it felt like a trilogy mashed up into one book, with three distinct sections, and that length plus those sections did make me think there was a problem with the pacing at times - I felt as if I were slogging through the middle section in particular. But I liked the characters, and I really liked the emphasis on politics, and I really liked that because the protagonist was a courtesan she was essentially on the outskirt of any battles, which made them brief and even skipped over in the text. I don't know what it is about epic fantasy authors that makes so many of them think I'm hanging on every sword thrust of every tedious battle, but I'm not. The battle scenes bore me, and I'd much rather read political espionage and behind-the-scenes plotting. So kudos to Carey for her emphasis on that, because it was the best part of this story, and had the book been half the length it might have gotten 4 stars from me. What can I say: I value brevity in my fiction.