Girl, Serpent, Thorn had the atmosphere of a fairytale. I thoroughly enjoyed this standalone. The storytelling tone of the first pages echoes throughout the entirety of the book. Like a classic tale, Soraya is a princess, and she is cursed. Her curse forces her to grow in isolation. She moves like a phantom throughout the secret passages of the castle, careful not to meet anyone. The only friend she has eventually abandons her. Alone, untouchable, resentment brews in the depths of her heart, so when the opportunity to figure out a way to be rid of her curse presents itself, she takes it.

What made Soraya interesting was her internal moral dilemma that follows her throughout the entirety of the book. I think I could label her an anti-hero, for she does share many of an anti-heroes traits, and this would have made an incredible origin story for a villainess, had her choices been different. I won’t go too much into depth to avoid spoilers, but people who read and will read this book will know what I mean.

The romance didn’t entirely convince me. While I found Soraya and Parvaneh to be cute, their development felt rushed. My perception was that, in the end, Soraya had a lot more page time with the villain and again, had she gone down the villain path, it would have made for quite the angsty villain romance. I don’t usually root for the bad guy, but the Shahmar was very well developed and my interest piqued when he was in the scene. I dare say, after The Darkling from The Grisha Trilogy, he’s my favorite villain.