The Demon King book review

The Demon King by Cinda Williams Chima
Published by Hyperion Books on October 6, 2009
Pages: 506
Goodreads

Times are hard in the mountain city of Fellsmarch. Reformed thief Han Alister will do almost anything to eke out a living for his family. The only thing of value he has is something he can't sell—the thick silver cuffs he's worn since birth. They're clearly magicked—as he grows, they grow, and he's never been able to get them off.
One day, Han and his clan friend, Dancer, confront three young wizards setting fire to the sacred mountain of Hanalea. Han takes an amulet from Micah Bayar, son of the High Wizard, to keep him from using it against them. Soon Han learns that the amulet has an evil history—it once belonged to the Demon King, the wizard who nearly destroyed the world a millennium ago. With a magical piece that powerful at stake, Han knows that the Bayars will stop at nothing to get it back.
Meanwhile, Raisa ana'Marianna, princess heir of the Fells, has her own battles to fight. She's just returned to court after three years of freedom in the mountains—riding, hunting, and working the famous clan markets. Raisa wants to be more than an ornament in a glittering cage. She aspires to be like Hanalea—the legendary warrior queen who killed the Demon King and saved the world. But her mother has other plans for her...
The Seven Realms tremble when the lives of Hans and Raisa collide, fanning the flames of the smoldering war between clans and wizards.

I have had a bit of a mixed bag with Cinda Williams Chima, I wasn’t a huge fan of The Warrior Heir but I was so pleasantly surprised by how quick and brilliant of a read this was. I think I preferred this one purely because it was based in a more traditional fantasy environment and I think the characters and politics were SO much better. The thing about The Demon King is that it was a well-formed storyline that has context, history and the drama. The only reason this didn’t rate a five star was purely because I thought there were moments in this book that were underdeveloped and definitely happened WAY too quickly. I think the ending is a good point and example of this. There was so much time setting everything up and the climax was over in a flash, it was a lot of build-up for not an awful lot. But that being said this was the perfect first book in a series.

The main characters in The Demon King are Princess Heir Rasia, her guard Amon, and Cuffs an ex street-lord turned good. I think the various different perspectives is what makes this book so fantastic. I adored learning about each of their lives and the context in which they live and survive the trials. I loved watching the relationships and friendships bloom as well, I think they were exceptionally well done and they all felt completely natural. One thing I did struggle with was the relationship between Micah and Rasia, I wasn’t sure what the appeal was and why they were so set on each other, it just felt particularly forced as a whole.

For me, the best bits of The Demon King would definitely be the pacing and how quickly this book flew by for me. I was so enthralled by the world, by the politics and the people, I really loved everything about this book. I was really excited to find out what was happening within each of the sectors and to learn more about the religions, the magic and the history. I truly love reading about worlds that have well-developed countries as their base and build off that. Although the story is following new characters there is a sense of legend and history to everything they do. I just really loved how deep the roots of this story went.

I’ve mentioned above that for me the bits I struggled with was how quickly everything escalated at the end. I wish there had been a bigger build-up to everything being revealed and there would have been a little more difficulty in everything happened.

I definitely would recommend The Demon King. I really loved this book and it is a great traditional fantasy, with some really great features. I cannot wait to read the sequel, and I am hoping it’s going to be as great as this one was, especially now that all the world-building has been sorted!

What are some of your favourite traditional fantasies? Let me know what they are in the comments!