POV-Chapter fantasy books have been on the rise recently, seemingly popularized by George R.R. Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire. (If it was popular before that, please forgive my ignorance. 
 POV offers a lot in the way of story telling -- It's fresh, it allows for significant character development and it allows for multiple plot lines to run concurrently. 
 There is often, however, a major pitfall of the POV style: Some POVs tend to be more interesting than others, and it can almost feel like a chore to go from one very interesting/exciting/engrossing POV into one that you have far less interest in. Anyone reading A Feast for Crows or A Dance with Dragons could probably connect with that feeling. 
 In .The Emperor's Blades, Brian Staveley magnificently maneuvers around that pitfall by focusing on three major POVs: Kaden, Valyn, and Adare (all siblings). In narrowing the POVs to three, Staveley makes the entire book feel more focused, and in reality, most of the book is centered on the two brothers. Adare's chapters are interweaved into the story briefly and only occasionally. 
 And this plan works to great effect. Both Kaden and Valyn's story lines are riveting. When something exciting happens in Kaden's life, and you are left with a cliffhanger, and you are then dragged away to Valyn's mind, there may be the initial internal protest, but it is quickly extinguished because you remember that you had the exact same feeling when you had been left with a Valyn cliffhanger two chapters before. 
 All in all, I think this book deserved a 4.5/5, and although the ending felt (just the slightest bit) rushed, I am eagerly awaiting Staveley's second book.