Book Review :: Defy the Night, by Brigid Kemmerer

Defy the Night by Brigid Kemmerer
ISBN: 1526632802
Series: Defy the Night #1
Published by Bloomsbury YA
on 2021-09-14
Genres: Fantasy, Young Adult
Pages: 448
Source: Allen & Unwin NZ
Goodreads

A spark of rebellion is all it takes to DEFY THE NIGHT.

In a kingdom where sickness stalks the streets and only the richest can afford a cure, King Harristan and his brother Prince Corrick are forced to rule with an iron fist.

Tessa Cade is a masked outlaw marked for death, but she likes it that way. Together with the mysterious, handsome Weston, she robs from the rich to help the poor, distributing food and medicine to those who need it most.
As it becomes clear that the only way to save her people is to assassinate the King, Tessa must face a deadly mission that will take her to the dark heart of the kingdom, and force her to work with the very people she intended to destroy

Last updated on 13 February 2023

This post may contain affiliate links. If you make a purchase with one of these links, I recieve a small commission at no additional cost to you. Read the full Affiliate Policy.

Defy the Night is the first in a new series

Think Robin Hood in this steal-from-the-rich-give-to-the-poor young adult fantasy novel from Brigid Kemmerer. Defy the Night tells of Tessa Cade, an outlaw who sneaks food and medicine to people in need in her community, to help them live in a time of disease.

With her best friend, Weston, they help the people of Kandala with medicine made from the moonflower, the only thing that will save you from the disease. It’s a rare and expensive flower that only the rich can afford, which means the lower classes go without it, or don’t have enough. King Harristan and his brother, Prince Corrick rule the country, deciding who gets supplies of the moonflower, where it goes, and what the dose is. They’re cruel, and they’re unjust, so when Tessa finds herself with an opportunity to sneak into the palace, she leaps at it. Her only mission: to kill the King.

When she gets there, she discovers that all is not as it seems inside the ruler’s palace.

My thought on Defy the Night

Defy the Night was a fast-paced story that was heavy on the political alliances and the struggles that come with ruling a country with multiple counties.

The plot follows both Tessa in the first person and Prince Corrick in the first person, alternating (mostly) chapters as the story plays out. As we discover more and more about the moonflower that grows in only two sectors in the country, the consuls who represent the different sectors, and the relationships between the supporting characters, Tessa and Corrick are both caught up in the drama and injustice of the palace and ever-growing disease sweeping the nation.

“I think that very few people truly deserve what they get, Tessa.” He pauses, and for the briefest moment, sadness flickers through his eyes. “For good or for bad.”

Tessa was a great character until she go to the palace. Out in her own place, she was determined and almost fierce, but as soon as she got to the palace, her character seemed to change somewhat and I didn’t like her as much at all. She’s written in a very hesitant sort of way, repeating her words, with ellipses in every second or third sentence. Her confidence wanes and while I understood that it was good for character development later, it was so sudden and jarring that it’s one of the reasons I bumped it down from 5 stars.

Prince Corrick, the other main character, struggles to be the King’s Justice. While he’s Harristan’s younger brother and in charge of dolling out justice in the land, he has a secret, and it impacts so greatly on his own consciousness that he internally fights with opposing beliefs every day. I really liked him as a character, and I thought he was written really well. Looking forward to more of him and his story in the books to come.

There are some epic twists and turns in this book and some supporting characters that I loved. Defy the Night is the first book in a new series by Kemerrer, so while the second book hasn’t been released yet – nor even announced – I’ll definitely be reading it and finding out what happens next.

Have you read Defy the Night? What did you think? 

---

I received this book from Allen & Unwin NZ in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my review all the thoughts and opinions are my own.