Title: Prince of Thorns (book 1 – The Broken Empire)
Author: Mark Lawrence
Publisher: Ace
Wow, when the reviews I found before starting this book said it was dark, they weren’t kidding.
Prince of Thorns is the first book I read by Mark Lawrence. I started it on kind of a whim. This was a book I wanted to read for a while, just never picked up, and for one of the readathons I participated in last year, I needed a book with green on the cover. It was fate, there is green on the cover.
The hero in this story is more of an anti-hero. He is a prince of a seriously ruthless King. He was scarred as a young boy, both literally and figuratively, when the carriage he was traveling in with his mother the Queen, and younger brother was attacked. He was thrown by his mother to save his life, and he gets stuck in a bush with a lot of thorns.
The book jumps in and out of past and present, so we see in bits and pieces how he ends up where we see him now; traveling on the road with a bunch of bandits. His temper seems to mirror his father’s as he wants to punch or kill anyone and everyone for the slightest thing.
I found this entertaining, and enjoyed the writing. It wasn’t over the stars good, but I still gave this 4 of 5 stars on Goodreads. I kind of lost interest in this though for a while, slash, life got in the way. I started the book somewhere in July or August I think, and finished in the nick of time on December 31, 2018.
I would recommend this book for anyone wanting to hurt people for any reason. You can live vicariously through the main character.