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This book was so engaging that I couldn’t put it down. Just when I thought I would be able to get some slumber, something else happened that I simply couldn’t wait until the next day to find out what happened. So I had some sleepless nights while reading this. If you like a real gripper, interesting characters, fine fantasy world-building and quality writing, then this is for you. It’s been a while since I read it, so I can’t comment on the editing; my memory was simply that is was a jolly good book.
I did find the title misleading. The Madness Project sounds more like sci fi to me than fantasy, and there wasn’t really a strong sense of a ‘project’ mad or otherwise to warrant calling the book that. I love the cover though!
The only thing I could say against the book was that the plot was a little repetitive in that people kept going missing and betraying each other. I also felt frustrated that the central character often seemed slow to act even when the logical action was quite obvious to me. When he finally came to the obvious decision, things had changed and it was too late. But I’m only going to take off half a star for that, so this will still show up as 5 stars.
Blurb
Cavnal has been at peace for nearly a century. Magic, once revered, is now the object of contempt. And anyone unfortunate enough to be born with its powers has been banned from the nobility and pushed to the fringes of society.
All his life, Prince Tarik has known that if the world discovered his secret—that he was born a mage—he would lose everything. But when a wave of violence in the city points back to an underground society of mages, everything changes. Only Tarik has the power to infiltrate their ranks. Only he can learn the truth about a plot that could destroy everything he loves.
But nothing can prepare him for the life of lies he will have to live to win a place in that society. Or for Hayli, a shape-shifter mage who is unlike any girl he has ever met. She might be the one to destroy all his plans…or she may be the only one who can save him from himself.
Together they face a dangerous web of sedition, crime and violent ambition, where nothing is as simple as either of them believed. And what they discover will challenge everything they thought they knew about loyalty and betrayal, love and honor.
