His Fair Assassin #1

GRAVE MERCY 

His Fair Assassin #1
Written by: Robin LaFevers
Hardcover, 549 pages
Also listened to it on Audio: 
Narrated by Erin Moon
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

European history has always been a favorite subject of mine. I love reading about the battles fought with the rising and falling of Empires.

Grave Mercy is one fascinating story about a young girl , Ismae Rienne, who ends up falling in love against all odds. Death itself. Truly she learns to follow her heart and discovers she could serve the god of Death not with vengeance but with mercy. Ahhh I loved the romance she forges with Gavriel Duval, a noble in the Court of Brittany.

The story captivates me from the get go.
Paragraph 1 Chapter 1 "I BEAR A DEEP RED stain that runs from my left shoulder down to my right hip, a trail left by the herbwitch's poison that my mother used to try to expel me from her womb. That I survived, according to the herbwitch, is no miracle but a sign I have been sired by the god of death himself."

Yes, death had shown her mercy in that she didn't die, and he might of even loved her too. Could it be the reason it was easy for her to show mercy? It's possible. When she was ordered by the Convent to kill Duval's mother, she couldn't do it and spared her life on condition she swears fealty to Anna the Duchess of Britanny who so happens to be her daughter as well.

The story doesn't have too many complicated characters and I was able to follow along comfortably. Even with Ismae's abusive father and her husband-to-be Guillo, the writer is able to convey them accurately. I felt her pain and loss.

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. 

You can learn more about those books at www.robinlafevers.com