SHORT REVIEW: A gorgeously written tale playing off of A Thousand and One Nights with a fiery protagonist, sympathetic secondary characters, and a brooding but well-written male lead. Prepare to be swept away into the kingdom of Khorasan. 
 LONG REVIEW: I am a sucker for gorgeous prose. (Think The Book Thief.) The problem with elaborately stylistic prose is that it can easily fall into purple prose territory. That is not this book. This book is beautiful. Go ahead and judge this book by the cover. 
 Protagonist Shazi (or Shahrzad) is feisty and outgoing. She can, at times, fall into the cliche -- she is super skilled with a bow, has to prod herself into thinking about more important things after she starts falling for her love interest, and often times ends up in bad situations due to her tendency to ignore wise counsel in favor of her impetuous desires. She can also be a complete brat, but that facet of her personality is forgiven because her handmaiden, Despina, a sociable and confident Greek slave, often calls her out on her less likable characteristics. She is also, in the tradition of female YA fantasy/adventure protagonists, primarily fueled by her desire to avenge a loved one. As mentioned in the book's summary, Shazi's best friend is one of many young brides taken by Khalid, the Caliph (ruler) of the kingdom of Khorasan, whose one night at the palace ends in a silk cord wrapped around her neck, and Shazi volunteers herself to be the next bride in order to figure out Khalid's weakness and assassinate him. 
 Khalid, the complex boy-king filled with inexplicable self-loathing and masked indifference, was a little harder to grow to like. He's disliked by his uber charming cousin, the Captain of the Guard, Jamal. He is the second-best sword fighter in the nation, but not because of any inherent strength or ability but because he has practiced since his childhood. We know that he has "tiger eyes" -- Lord, there is one overdone epithet -- and that he likes to kill his brides, but we also start seeing softer sides to him. It's obvious he is not some murder-happy boy-king, and that he is dealing with some real issues, from what sparked the entire murder debacle to sly enemies who disparage his mama. It took a while for me to like Khalid, and for some time I was mostly rooting for him because it was clear there was another explanation behind why he was killing all the young women in Khorasan, and Shazi's first love was a complete annoyance. 
 I appreciated Shazi's struggle in trying to keep to her original motive to kill Khalid while balancing her growing love for him. Save for one attempt, though, she never really follows through on her mission, which would have made for a more interesting story, in my opinion. It's also a little tedious, this 'should-I-or-shouldn't-I' story where a person's love is the crux of all that goes against their character or family or whatever. Still, Ahdieh resuscitated my romantic feelings towards the end with her beautiful prose. 
 The story also suffers from having an ill-established beginning -- but for the summary itself, there was not a sufficiently clear explanation for why Shazi was doing what she was doing until a good thirty pages into the book -- and it takes way too long for Khalid to reveal his "secret." And again, I would have been more impressed if Shazi had figured it out on her own, though I understand the need for Khalid to tell his story. One last wrinkle is that there is not really a sufficient explanation for why Khalid would risk what he does to keep Shazi on the first night, besides instalove and the fact that she had just had sex with him, which is not adequate in my opinion. I guess it could be perfectly adequate to him... 
 Other than those aforementioned plot-related mishaps, it is a worthwhile read if you like getting lost in your novels.