The Winner's Curse By Kestrel

The seventeen-year-old daughter of a powerful General of the Valorian Empire, Kestrel leads a fairy sheltered life in the recently conquered lands of the Herrani. Like all Valorian nobles, man and woman alike, Kestrel is trained in basic military arts and self-defense, but her true passions are for stratagem and music. Kestrel has a brilliant, cunning mind honed for games and political power; a talent her Valorian father wishes she’d hone by enlisting for the military. In this society, when an aristocratic Valorian woman comes of adult age, she must choose her future by enlisting in the military or by entering marriage – both futures Kestrel desperately resists. Before she reaches the age of majority, Kestrel takes solace in the escape of her …show more content…
Surprisingly, the most wonderful thing about The Winner’s Curse is the aspect of the book that I feared would be the most problematic: the complex issue of enslavement and the fraught (romantic) relationship between an aristocratic lady and her slave. Inherently, this kind of relationship sets off all kinds of alarm bells as, inherently, the power dynamics of such a relationship (in which one person literally owns the other) isn’t actually romantic. Given that there’s no free will or choice involved, I’m not inclined to buy this type of “romance.” Imagine my surprise, then, when I found the dynamic between the two main characters to be well-crafted, and that the bond between Kestrel and Arin – while totally conflated into an all-encompassing great love – actually works. The ickiness inherent in the romance between slave and master is explored and inverted in the book, which I appreciate; I also appreciate that Kestrel never really leaves the master/slave paradigm in her mind (in fact, it’s the most authentic thing about her character, in my opinion). It’s also worth noting that there’s a larger examination of enslavement and rebellion on a societal scale that occurs in The Winner’s Curse, and should continue to be examined in the future books – this alone is enough to tempt me back to this …show more content…
(War brewing? NO PROBLEM! We’ll wave that off with a single conversation that takes less than a chapter.) Any obstacle Kestrel faces is effortlessly overcome thanks to her amazing tactical mind. You see, as a character, Kestrel is one of those exceptional heroines. She’s exceptionally talented at piano-playing and at games of skill and chance because she’s exceptionally intelligent and strategic. She doesn’t even care about balls or dresses or what other people think because she’s so much deeper than anyone else. This includes her best friend Jess, who is bubbly and totally obsessed with parties and fashion and dresses, but Kestrel loves her anyway. Similarly, Arin is also exceptionally talented – as a musician, as a blacksmith, and maybe even keener of mind than