Nikolai Lantsov inherited the throne after The Darkling brought a war to Ravka, killing his older brother and sending his parents into exile. Even though The Darkling was killed, Nikolai still struggles with the beast left inside him after The Darkling cursed him with his dark magic. He’s determined to do it all–save his kingdom, earn the people’s trust, and hopefully save himself from the beast within.

It’s no secret that Nikolai has been my favorite character in the Grishaverse since he came into the story in the second Shadow and Bone book–so I’ve been really excited to read this. My feelings toward it are pretty neutral. I didn’t hate it, but I didn’t love it. It seemed like we covered a lot of ground in 511 pages to get to the ending we arrived at. It was another cliff hanger so I will be reading the next one to see what happens but I’m not hurrying to pick it up. When I was reading it, I enjoyed the story, but I wasn’t sucked in like I thought I would be. We follow two different story lines in King of Scars and I didn’t care very much about Nina’s chapters. I felt like I suffered through those to get back to Nikolai. I was bothered by some of Nina’s feelings after the things she went through in Crooked Kingdom and I honestly didn’t care about what she was doing. There were some jaw-dropping, gasp worthy moments in the book so I enjoyed that, but overall, I’m disappointed by my neutral attitude. I was hoping I’d love it. Maybe I’ll like the next one better.