Mortal Heart by Robin LaFevers – Review

Mortal Heart by Robin LaFevers
Series: His Fair Assassin #3
Also in this series: Grave Mercy
Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt on 11/4/2014
Genres: Action & Adventure, Europe, Fantasy, Historical Fiction, Love & Romance, Young Adult
Pages: 464
Source: BEA
My content rating: YA (Some violence; Characters have sex, but it is not shown)
My rating:

Annith has watched her gifted sisters at the convent come and go, carrying out their dark dealings in the name of St. Mortain, patiently awaiting her own turn to serve Death. But her worst fears are realized when she discovers she is being groomed by the abbess as a Seeress, to be forever sequestered in the rock and stone womb of the convent. Feeling sorely betrayed, Annith decides to strike out on her own.

She has spent her whole life training to be an assassin. Just because the convent has changed its mind doesn't mean she has...

I am a huge fan of this series! I’m so glad that I found it! The final book in the series focuses on Annith, who desperately wants to flee the “destiny” that the abbess has set before her – to become the new Seer.

What I loved:

• Tangled webs. This book has the most twists and turns of any in the series. Annith discovers a lot about her own background in this book and we learn it right along with her. Now I do have to say that there were some twists (especially those about Annith’s background) that I saw coming – I do tend to figure out twists in books pretty consistently though. And there was one major twist that I didn’t see coming – it was a big surprise, and I LOVED it!!
• Balthazar and the Hellequin. My favorite parts of this book were the parts that involved Balthazar and the Hellequin. The Hellequin are spirits of people who have died who want to repent for sins that in their lives. They help to collect souls and shepherd them toward death – sort of earning forgiveness for their sins by helping out death. I loved how Annith learned about these lost souls and started to learn about them. Balthazar was the love interest in this book – a truly tortured soul and I ADORED him! Annith and Balthazar’s romance developed slowly and took the reader on a true journey.

The negatives:

• Slow start. I did feel like this book had a bit of a slower start than the other two books in the series. I had a little harder time getting into it, but once I did, I loved it!!

I am so glad that I picked up this series! If you haven’t read it yet, then you definitely need to pick it up NOW! I give this book 4.5/5 stars.

***Disclosure: I received this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. No other compensation was given and all opinions are my own.***

About the Author

Robin LaFevers was raised on a steady diet of fairy tales, Bulfinch’s mythology, and 19th century poetry. It is not surprising she grew up to be a hopeless romantic.

Though she has never trained as an assassin or joined a convent, she did attend Catholic school for three years, which instilled in her a deep fascination with sacred rituals and the concept of the Divine. She has been on a search for answers to life’s mysteries ever since.

While many of those answers still elude her, she was lucky enough to find her one true love, and is living happily ever after with him in the foothills of southern California.

In addition to writing about teen assassin nuns in medieval Brittany, she writes books for middle grade readers, including the Theodosia books and the Nathaniel Fludd, Beastologist series.

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