#64 Red Sister

Red Sister by Mark Lawrence 

This book follows the story of Nona Grey, a young girl who from the first chapter is sentenced to death by hanging, she has the noose around her neck when an abbess from a nearby convent comes to her rescue and steals her away from her fatal fate. The abbess takes her to The Convent of Sweet Mercy and its there that the story unfolds.

Nona becomes a novice in the red class of the convent. The convent is training the novices to be bad ass magical fighting nuns. There's a range of classes that teach them things from blade training to spiritual magic in the form of paths.

I adored Nona as a character, i love her mysterious past and how she does everything she can to hide it from everyone around her. Nona lies several times about her past so its left to the reader to try and piece things together which i very much enjoyed. I loved how angry Nona was and how this fuelled the majority of her decisions.

A few other notable characters are: The abbess, shes such a sass queen and a bad ass female character. Shes logical and takes no shit, i love that. Clera, Clera becomes Nonas first friend at the convent and is the main reason that Nona starts to open up and let her many walls down. Ara, Ara is one of my favourite side characters she is brought into the convent as 'the chosen one' and is exceptionally skilled at path magic. Sister Apple, although shes not a very integral character i thought she was amazing, she was so shady and was known as 'the poisoner' as she has a knack for poisoning the new students.

Another thing i loved was the world building, it is so amazing and well done. You really feel like you are there as everything is described so well. Parts of this book are really slow burn and you feel as if you haven't a clue what is happening but if anything i think that really adds to its charm!

The magic system is so interesting too. There are 4 main 'tribes' that the magic came from, the gerant who are said to be the strongest, the hunska whose magic makes them really fast as they can slow time around them, the marjal who mainly use shadow magic and the quantal people who use path magic. Nona is believed to be from the hunska tribe as she is very quick in her fighting style and is able to anticipate the blows and block them.

Something i usually dont care for in books generally is 'the chosen one' trope (obviously HP is not included in this :P) but in this book i really enjoyed it. There are many characters that could be 'the chosen one' and you are constantly guessing who it could be. This was a solid 4 star read for me and im really keen to pick up the next books. (ive already requested them at my local library #keen)