Book Review: This Monster of Mine by Shalini Abeysekara

This Monster of Mine is a fantasy story about a girl who survived a very violent near-death experience and decided to avenge her almost-death by going after her would-be murderer the legal way. And of course, she met a brooding, dashing man along the way. So, kind of like Legally Blonde, but much, much darker. 

And it was… okay. Look, I finished it, which is more than I can say for most romantasies I try these days, and it was interesting enough to keep me hooked. Was it mind-blowing? No. But not every book has to be.

With that said, let’s get into what worked and what didn’t. 

The Prose

People say that the writing in this novel is beautiful, but I disagree, and pretty strongly at that. It felt like whenever the author could have chosen a simple word, she went for the thesaurus and found a more complex one. Which would be fine (I have no issue with flowery and lush prose), but it made the writing sound clunky and overwrought. It just didn’t work. But credit where credit is due — the prose was better than it is in most fantasy romance books, so there’s that. 

The World

This was one of the major weak points of this book, and there’s very little I can tell you about it because very little is given. There’s this big city of Edessa (presumably, the capital), which is in the south and is split into four areas, governed by four judges (or Tetrarchs, in the book). The south is plagued by very bad storms and lightning. And there’s also the north which is left to its own devices (?). It’s very cold and grimy in the north, and that’s basically all we know about it. 

What’s in between north and south, who knows? Not us, because it’s not explained. Are there other countries? Other cities? It’s a mystery. So yeah, other places are mentioned, but in a vague way, in a throwaway line. 

This country (?) has lightning powers, while other places might have other elemental powers. But who has those lightning powers? We only see the judges use them — what about the common folk? Do they even have magic? Not explained.

To channel their magic, and activate their powers, these people (again, not sure who else except the main cast), use these bracelets, their blood, and runes. But what comes out isn’t lightning, it’s various other things. For example, our main character can glamour her appearance, heal, see if someone’s lying, probe into their mind, and project the images from someone’s mind to others (like a movie, I guess). 

Now, the lying and probing thing is cool, especially because the whole judicial system relies on it, but like why aren’t there more people that can do that. It’s mentioned that the main character (Sarai) trained really hard to get them, but how? I’m not sure, because it’s not explained. 

You see what I mean? Think about the world any deeper than the surface level, and it all falls apart. 

I don’t know what Edessa (where we spend the most time) looks like, how it all works, how the magic works, nothing. And what’s worse is that the author uses imaginary words (or Latin, I suppose) for the simplest things but doesn’t explain anything. So instead of “carriage”, we have “raeda”. Instead of “gala/party/etc.”, we have “convivium”. And so forth — you get what I mean. 

It’s like when authors try to reinvent coffee for their worlds, and then you get these long, needless explanations of a bitter, brown drink that makes people more alert. Great! But what does your world actually look like?

I found out through Goodreads reviews that it’s meant to be Roman-inspired. Who would have thought? Not me, from what’s in the book. 

The Characters

One thing I have to note before I go any further is that Sarai, our main girl, is never described to us. We know she wears a braid and has tons of scars everywhere, but what she looks like in general, I’m not sure. Not that it’s important, it’s just strange. Compared to that, the main male character (his name is Kadra and it’s awful, and I hate it), is described a lot, but more so in a vague “he has a presence” way. 

But anyway, looks are more or less irrelevant. 

What matters is that Sarai, as clever as she could be at times, was just plain dumb. So, a bit of backstory — the only thing she remembers from the time she was pushed off a tower is this voice. And that voice belongs to — wouldn’t you know it — our main male character. Because of that, she initially suspects him of being behind her almost-murder.

Rightfully so, in the beginning. He seems menacing, no one likes him, he does a bad thing when they first officially meet. 

But then he constantly does things that prove that he could not possibly be her murderer. He’s the only person investigating a string of staged suicides (which are connected to the attempt on her life). Without him, the world would go on happily thinking no one’s to blame. Why would he do that if he was guilty? 

Like, no joke, he takes her to the morgue to show her the body and tells her it’s not a suicide, and she thinks “He brought me here to gloat, to show off his work, to scare me off.” Girl, what? (??)

Constantly, this man goes out of his way to show her he’s actually the good guy (™). And until the very end, she thinks that he tried to kill her. Even when they’re officially together, she’s all like “I like him, and I don’t want to know if he tried to kill me, it doesn’t matter”. I repeat: what??

It doesn’t help that the real culprit is obvious from the start. 

And look, as much as I defended this man, he is just a ghost of a character. He’s just there. We don’t know anything about him and we learn very little throughout. What motivates him, why is he going against the entire system? We don’t know. 

Just a side note: for the number of things we don’t know (see: world, Kadra, magic system), this book is truly too long. 

Sarai loves being oblivious about everything and everyone. She’s a jaded street urchin, but when her friend is very clearly saying bad things about poor people, and people that come from the streets, she just glosses over it. She ignores all of her friend’s weird behavior and is *shocked Pikachu* when her friend betrays her time and again. 

Final Thoughts

Overall, and despite all of my gripes, this is not a horrible book. By the booktok standard, this is a masterpiece even. There are some interesting elements here, like the fact that magic is used in the judicial system, it’s just not explored enough. But if you’re looking for something relatively fresh and not as romance-focused, this is a good choice.