“Fate doesn’t require us to be well-suited to our roles, it simply requires us to fill them.”
Look, teenage me was obsessed with Divergent and the Carve the Mark duology, so of course I trusted Veronica Roth enough to just dive into Seek the Traitor’s Son completely blind. And honestly, this new epic romantic dystopian sci-fi delivered exactly what I expected it to while also surprising me in all the best ways, if that makes any sense. It’s an excitingly ambitious genreblender that’s giving Sun Eater meets The Bone Season meets Shatter Me vibes while also being completely its own unique thing, and I love it for that.
So, on paper, the start of Seek the Traitor’s Son should have been very overwhelming. There’s a lot going on with the intricate political set-up, the dystopian Earth split between the Fever-worshipping Talusar and the tech-heavy Cedrae with its space colony, and all the complicated character tensions, but somehow it never felt like too much to me. I was honestly kind of impressed with how smoothly everything came together without slowing the story down, and I was just hooked from page one.
I think the main reason it all worked so well for me is the characters, because I would not have cared this much about everything going on if the core conflict wasn’t carved straight into them. We’ve got Elegy, a soldier just minding her business as the spare to the Sword of Cedre until a prophecy is dropped on her head; we’ve got Theren, the son of a Talusar exile forced into a knighthood under Elegy that he doesn’t want; and we’ve got Hela, Elegy’s sister who just gets dragged into this mess with them. And trust me, it gets messy in the best ways.
I was also completely hooked by the unique spin on the prophecy trope here, which is usually one of my least favourite tropes because they tend to feel predictable, but not in Seek the Traitor’s Son. See, we don’t know if it’s Elegy or the enemy Talusar general Rava who is the ‘chosen one’ that will lead their people to victory over the other by assembling the right three people to fulfill the prophecy before the other does. And then add to that the fact that at the center of both of their fates is a man, who Elegy is told she will fall in love with. Like, hello tensionnn!!!
The start of Seek the Traitor’s Son honestly gave me instant 5-star vibes, but while I loved that strong beginning, it also made it quite hard for the rest of the book to keep up, especially after the unexpected four year time jump that comes right after a pretty intense turning point. I can’t deny that it took me a while to settle back into the story, but ultimately I did end up really appreciating how much emotional weight it added. The themes of trauma, fate, identity, mortality, morality, and trust hit so hard even though we don’t know all the details around what they went through, and I was honestly so here for the sense of mystery surrounding their emotional baggage, especially with Theren’s memory issues.
Now, speaking of emotions, the whole romantic element of Seek the Traitor’s Son was honestly a wild rollercoaster for me. It mostly just simmers in the background while the politics and plot do the heavy lifting, and I just loved that it was so soft and reverent and curious and kind of aching, especially in combination with Theren’s emotion sensing powers that he got after being infected with the Fever. I do have to say that I felt like the sudden shift in their dynamic around the halfway point felt a bit rushed, and I wasn’t entirely convinced by how fast things developed from there. But oh well, the vibes were vibing, the feels were feeling, and I love that for them.
I actually really appreciated that this romance was just one of the many complicated relationships that lie at the core of Seek the Traitor’s Son, as the messy family dynamics, heated rivalries, and past relationships all play a big role and sometimes felt even more important. Particularly Theren’s relationship with his mother Kesia had me in a chokehold, and I loved seeing how her (misguided?) beliefs influenced her actions and how those actions affected Theren and the wider world in general. And one of the biggest surprises for me was my sapphic girl Hela, for reasons I can’t even say without getting into spoilers. At first I wasn’t sure why we were even getting her perspective, but she ended up being one of my favorite parts of the book as her storyline added a lot of intrigue and took things in directions I didn’t expect, which kept the plot feeling so exciting and unpredictable.
I will say, the second half of Seek the Traitor’s Son didn’t hit quite as hard for me as the first. Some of the emotional moments and twists rely heavily on things that happened off page, either during the time jump or before the story even started, and that hindered the impact and created a bit of emotional distance for me. I also wanted a bit more from Rava as an enemy, especially because she plays such a core part in the whole prophecy. Also, I am always a sucker for a hot villain vibe, so there’s that.
Still, I truly adored how Roth did not pull any punches and constantly kept reminding both the characters and the readers of just how high the stakes are, because I was living for the emotional turmoil of that. Seek the Traitor’s Son may not have ended up being the 5-star fave I thought it would be at the start, but even with my little quibbles I absolutely devoured it and I would highly recommend it to anyone who is looking for a story has some of that addictive 2010s YA nostalgia except make it a whole lot more mature, complex, and brutal. You better bet I will be first in line when book 2 drops, what a wild ride.
Thank you to NetGalley and PanMacmillan for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own. Seek the Traitor’s Son is scheduled for release on 12 May 2026.
