Curse Workers Trilogy By Holly Black || Book Review

Hey Guys! It is Max here and I will be doing my very-first trilogy review on this blog today and the book trilogy is the ‘Curse Workers’ trilogy written by Holly Black. If you have seen my Goodreads page, you would have noticed that I did not enjoy reading ‘The Coldest Girl In Coldtown’ written by the same author. Despite my dislike for that book, I had decided to give the author another chance by reading this trilogy and IT DEFINITELY DID NOT DISAPPOINT!

I cannot even begin by how much I loved this series, that this series had destroyed me, that it might be in the exact same spot as the ‘Daughter Of Smoke And Bone’ which is my number one favourite book of all time! With all of those being said, you will know what to expect next in this review: GUSHING! Before we get into those things, let us start off by diffusing through what this series is about.

In all three books of the Curse Workers trilogy (Genre: Young Adult, Urban Fantasy), we follow a seventeen-year-old boy named Cassel as he discovers that his memories have been jumbled up and later finds that he is one of the rarest ‘workers,’ a person who can perform magic, in the world which leads to a great number of people willing to pay for him to kill others. So, without further ado, let us get into the series review straight on!

Disclaimers:

• All thoughts and opinions are on my own and…
• The review of this trilogy is spoiler-proof. So, feel free to stay until the very end of this article!

Synopsis:

Cassel comes from a family of curse workers: people who have the power to change your emotions, your memories, your luck, by the slightest touch of their hands. And since curse work is illegal, they’re all criminals. Many become mobsters and con artists. But not Cassel. He hasn’t got magic, so he’s an outsider; the straight kid in a crooked family. You just have to ignore one small detail – he killed his best friend, Lila, three years ago.

Cassel has carefully built up a facade of normalcy, blending into the crowd. But his facade starts to crumble when he finds himself sleepwalking, propelled into the night by terrifying dreams about a white cat that wants to tell him something. He’s noticing other disturbing things, too, including the strange behaviour of his two brothers. They are keeping secrets from him. As Cassel begins to suspect he’s part of a huge con game, he must unravel his past and his memories. To find out the truth, Cassel will have to outcon the conmen.

My thoughts: The Beginning

How do I even begin with this review? Alright. I have to chill or else my words would not make any sense to you guys. 3,2,1… Go.

Let us begin with this review by commenting on this beautiful trilogy’s covers. I, personally, enjoyed the cover changes to this trilogy although others might not agree because the original covers have a mysterious and secretive vibe to it that many of them thought that it was fantastic as the trilogy itself was baffling. I relished on these covers because of the little dots that make up a face and mind you, White Cat’s cover does look a little sexualize but that does not take away the quality of the covers. I appreciated the colour scheme and how the dots are formed into wordings of the book titles. Furthermore, the covers have a dream-like quality to it that will make you dream about a dream but you are not in the dream (hopefully you get what I was talking about). Therefore, I really loved the covers and I am giving a 100% to the beautiful cover makeovers.

Moving on, we have the pacing that I would like to address on which had been placed throughout the trilogy. For White Cat, I thought that the book was very well paced with many factors that were supposed to be information-overload but Holly Black somehow made it possible that the pacing was just gliding through the novel easily which I admired her for doing so because she just spared the pain of the readers’ with easy pacing. However, for Red Gloves, I found that the pacing was a little slower and it kind of lack a distinctive quality that White Cat had and due to its fall of lacking something its predecessor had, it slowed down. As for Black Heart, the pacing went back to normal- just like how White Cat always was. Hence, I enjoyed most of the pacing that was flowing through the trilogy.

Furthermore, I would like to address on addictive quality that this book had around it. Just like a drug, this trilogy had a quality so relentless and addictive that nothing beats this trilogy as long as the pages are still flying by. It will replace the endorphins in your brain with words that are so beautiful and quite mysterious that you just want to know what the heck is going to happen next in the book. Thus, I truly enjoyed how wonderful Holly had made to be this enjoyable.

Moving on, we have the world-building & politics that I would like to talk about in this review. For the first book in the trilogy, also known as White Cat, we see how the world works, what workers are and how it revolves around a universe so close to ours but somehow, very different and unique. The politics in the first book weren’t as exposed as the later books but it still had a good chunk of it at the end of the book. As for the second novel- Red Gloves, the politics had gotten even more exposed and the world expanded in many ways that would cause the readers no harm in exploring. For the last and final book- Black Heart, I felt that we fully understand how the world functions and how everything had been set up from the beginning and how the surface area of the politics had gotten even more exposed. Therefore, I enjoyed how wonderful everything was!

Moreover, we have the atmosphere that I would like to comment on for these novels. The atmosphere throughout these three books was mysterious, competitive and hard to guess. I liked the mysterious and competitive aspects of these novels because it caused a kind of clutch in my heart and made it pumped hard and inconsistent until these novels ended. Therefore, I enjoyed reading the atmosphere in these books! It definitely was a wonderful aspect of these blockbusters.

Diving deeper into the review, we have the predictability of the novels I would like to address on in this review. To be honest, I had figured some plot twists out myself in this novel but the severe plot twists were hidden pretty well and no clues were given to that little twist that made my head spun. Out of all of these books, I would say that all of them had plot twists that will make you hate, love, cry and etc. I definitely did enjoy the plot twists and I would love to hear if Holly Black is writing more books for this trilogy because of how wonderful it was! Therefore, it wasn’t as predictable as it seemed!

Some of you might ask if the story was well-constructed and if there are any plot holes… Well, here’s your answer:

Yes, this book is definitely well-constructed and you can clearly see that Mrs.Black did her homework and plot all of the plots nicely to review everything in order to cancel out the ugly plot holes. Thus, I really loved how this series wrapped itself up nicely.

Into the bargain, I would like to talk about the quotes that I have found to be both impressive and marvellous and I would hereby like to share with you guys a few quotes from this trilogy:

“Memory is slippery. It bends to our understanding of the world, twists to accommodate our prejudices. It is unreliable. Witnesses seldom remember the same things. They identify the wrong people. They give us the details of events that never happened. Memory is slippery, but my memories suddenly feel slipperier.”- White Cat, Holly Black.

“I wonder if he really could rationalize what I did to him, really treat betrayal like the slight transgression of a recalcitrant business partner. I wonder if I hurt him. If he can rationalize what I did to him, it’s easy to imagine how he rationalized what he did to me.”- Red Gloves, Holly Black.

“Girls like her, my grandfather once warned me, girls like her turn into women with eyes like bullet holes and mouths made of knives. They are always restless. They are always hungry. They are bad news. They will drink you down like a shot of whisky. Falling in love with them is like falling down a flight of stairs. What no one told me, with all those warnings, is that even after you’ve fallen, even after you know how painful it is, you’d still get in line to do it again.”– Black Heart, Holly Black.

Finally, we have the relationships between all of the characters section of this review! The relationships factor of these novels were filled with good things like Love, Hate, Fear, etc. I thought the first book handled it very well with all of its impudence and actions that were totally unforgettable. However, when we entered the second book in the trilogy which is Red Gloves, the relationship factor had overloaded itself with ammunition that it was a little bit hard to get through and it had also kind of taken away the main plot of the book which is never a good thing. Despite having the second book carried the weight of the relationship between the characters, the book was still enjoyable. As for the third and final novel in the trilogy, everything went back to the way it was with White Cat and I totally enjoyed that book. Therefore, I liked the relationships between the characters in this novel!

Now, let us get into the writing section of this review!

Writing: Middle section of this review

“He’s the kind of liar who totally forgets what he told you the last time, but he believes every single lie with such conviction that sometimes he can convince you of it.”- White Cat, Holly Black.

I enjoyed the style of writing that Holly had placed in this novel. The writing style was consistent, articulate and lyrical. The author’s writing style for this novel was the type which was easy to glide through while learning new vocabularies and how the system of the world works. Also, it had a unique quality to the writing style that had shown that she was a writer of her own kind and that quality is the dream-like condition which made the books so marvellous and so freaking easy to get through and additionally made the readers read all of the novels in one sitting.

Furthermore, I said the writing style was consistent because the characters acted like how they talked and everywhere in this three books, you will notice that all of the characters have the same personalities as the previous books and each of the characters had distinctive personalities that you would know which is which and who is who. Yes, it is that easy to identify them. Therefore, I liked how wonderful Holly Black managed to perform such artistic skills in these novels.

Finally, I enjoyed how every scene in this novel was pictured perfectly in my head. The scenes were written articulately that every single thing that happened will somehow be transported and diffused perfectly throughout your brain which was definitely an enjoyable factor I had with these books while reading each sentence to pluck the images to my brain. Hence, I fancied the prepossessing condition that this book had with its articulate-quality.

Now, let us get into the characters section of this review!

Characters: 4/5 section of this review

“The moment she was cursed, I lost her. Once it wears off- soon- she will be embarrassed to remember things that she said, things she did, things like this. No matter how solid she feels in my arms, she is made of smoke.”- Red Gloves, Holly Black.

Cassel: He was supposed to be an unreliable, not trustworthy and unlikable protagonist for this trilogy but those aspects of his character are the ones that I had been looking for in novels and I truly liked extremely mean and bad protagonist. Although he was unlikable, I thought he was pretty relatable because most of the things that Holly Black had thrown into his nature made it so that we know that he would receive salvation and redemption and as to that, he did. I loved his peculiar characteristics and how snarky he was everywhere in this trilogy. Thus, I fancied him as a character in this trilogy!

Lila: I found Lila to be a badass, crazy and had a sense of odd humour character. She was extremely likeable and I liked how strong she was and her last-line in the Red Glove book was extremely fantastic even though my ship between Cassel and Lila appeared to be dead. Still, I liked her craziness and at the worst time possible, she emerged to be the brightest star in the universe and her character development throughout the series was marvellous! It was spectacular as in from a little girl, she had transformed into an independent and strong young woman which I admired with much glory! Therefore, I loved her as a character in this novel!

Sam: He was a great character. Although I felt he was a little pushed aside by the other characters, he still shone in the light as someone with a burst of different personalities and humane nature. As the books got deeper into their relationships with one another, Sam’s characterization got a boost and I, personally, thought that it was a great pushed to his character to get a development or rather- lots of developments. Therefore, I enjoyed reading him as a character in this blockbuster.

Daneca: Honestly, I found her to be a little annoying in the beginning but as the plot progressed on, she became a person with lots of shining personalities and she definitely had an important persona in these books because she led the HEX club which you will later know what that is about when you read the books and she had also made herself as a symbol for workers-rights! Therefore, I loved loved loved her as a character in this novel!

Overall: The Ending

I am giving this book trilogy a 97% rating. I wholeheartedly enjoyed this novel and I will be reading more books from Holly Black! And I would like all of you to give this book trilogy a try as it is not as hyped-up as I thought it would because it definitely deserves all the attention. So, we have reached the end of the review!
Curse Workers trilogy’s ratings on Goodreads:

• White Cat: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
• Red Gloves: ⭐⭐⭐⭐.5
• Black Heart: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

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This is the end of my spoiler-free review for Curse Workers Trilogy By Holly Black! I hope you all enjoyed it and follow me with your email/Wordpress account to get notifications when I post a new article! Bye!