Despite her irritation, she blinked at the sight of his face. He was so young!

Did I mention the excessive abuse of exclamation points in this book?  They’re all over the place!  You could start a drinking game on all these exclamation points, most of which are in the narration and not dialogue. 

Also, Chaol is hot, because of course.  What kind of book did you think we’re reading?

So she’s faced with the crown prince, who’s named Dorian, and she refuses to bow to him.  So some other guy n the room, a red-faced duke, runs up on her and knocks her to the ground screaming about respect.  Jee, for someone who could supposedly take out multiple guards and consider it no more than a ‘nuisance,’ an old man sure got the drop on her pretty easily.  And mind you, this is told in third person narration, so it’s not Celaena blowing her own puffed up horn.  Third person narration is not supposed to be unreliable.

By the way, this Duke Perrington is described as overweight with a red-face and thinning hair, and the book spends a while making sure we know he’s not attractive.  Just so you know, he’s not attractive.  Did you get it yet?  He’s not attractive.

Dorian gives a bullshit speech about respect to put Perrington in his place and then sends the other man out of the room.

His words were coated with glorious boredom.

…what?

Actually, I almost like that line.  Well, no, I like ‘glorious boredom.’  It’s an evocative phrase, and I think it fits the kind of demeanor the book is going for here, but then the first half of that sentence is trying way too hard.

So Celeana is finally released from the aged, prissy nobleman who was apparently more of an opponent than three armed guards put together.

As she rose, she frowned at the imprint of grit she left behind on the otherwise spotless floor, and at the clank of her shackles echoing through the silent room. But she’d been trained to be an assassin since the age of eight, since the day the King of the Assassins found her half-dead on the banks of a frozen river and brought her to his keep. She wouldn’t be humiliated by anything, least of all being dirty.

This is the third time this chapter that she’s noticed or thought about being dirty.  She may not be humiliated by it, but she’s certainly preoccupied with it.

And what’s up with the dirt obsession, anyway?  I think that after a year of slave labor, cleanliness would be somewhere near the bottom of a person’s concerns.  It’s the only negative effect of mining that we’ve heard of so far, which leaves the impression that she’s perfectly fine except for a bit of muck. 

Oh, Dorian is hot, too.  Just in case there was any doubt about what kind of book we’re reading.

I don’t care what the book was going for with that name, if it was Dorian Grey or if the author just liked it or what.  Because either way, when I read it, this is all I think of:

I assume picturing him played by Zack Braff will only make things better.

Fourth mention of Celaena’s dirt.  This one is a segue to talking about how pretty she is, you know, except for the dirtiness.

At a passing glance, one might think her eyes blue or gray, perhaps even green, depending on the color of her clothing. Up close, though, these warring hues were offset by the brilliant ring of gold around her pupils.

What is it about Sue authors always wanting to put a ring around the pupil?  I’ve seen that in pretty much ever Mary Sue Special Eyes description ever.  Is it just a tradition now?

“After a year, you seem to be more or less alive. I wonder how that’s possible when the average life expectancy in these mines is a month.”

“Quite a mystery, I’m sure.” She batted her eyelashes and readjusted her shackles as if they were lace gloves.

I can only assume that the explanation is that the guards aren’t actually putting her to work, because just look at that.  She’s barely even perturbed.

They chat animatedly about her one and only escape attempt, in which she almost made it to some wall, which should be impossible since no one else has gotten nearly so close to getting out.  Most of the conversation is given over to Celaena making sure that Dorian realizes how impressive this feat is, because apparently that’s the important thing.

Apparently she did that as a suicide attempt, because every other escape-attempter gets killed, but the guards had special orders not to kill her so she could be miserable more or something.  Which really makes it all the stranger that she was practically puffed up with pride over the whole thing.  Also, if she wanted to die, she’s got a perfectly good pickaxe every day and enough training to be able to hit major arteries.  She could have taken a more direct route, but her guards and their ‘keep her alive’ orders didn’t consider that?

Fifth mention of her being dirty.  But hey, this time they’re also talking about scars!  Apparently the prince is very interested in what Caleana looks like, as he’s already mentioned that he can ‘see her potential’ and now wants to know about any scaring.  She has a mere three scars.  On her back.  After a whole year of being in shackles. 

Dorian grinned. “What remarkable eyes you have! And how angry you are!”

I had to read that and now so do you.

Caleana continues to act blithe and flippant, then when scolded says that they’re not going to do anything to her because obviously they want her for something.  Dorian says he has a proposition for her, and Caleana agrees to hear him out, because if it involves leaving the mines, she can escape easier from the outside, so she doesn’t necessarily have to take his offer in good faith, whatever it is.

Also,

Her chest tightened. Never, not in her most fanciful dreams, had she imagined that the opportunity to speak with Dorian Havilliard would arise. She could kill him so easily, tear that grin from his face … She could destroy the king as he had destroyed her …

Through the chapter the book has mentioned stuff about killing Dorian, but it’s all been mindless chatter.  “Oh, I could choke him with my chain before anyone stops me.”  “Oh, I could grab that sword there and kill ten people.”  All of it serves no point to the scene except bragging, especially when we’ve already seen her made helpless by some random guy that’s not even athletic.

But this one here, this I like.  This actually has a point.  It’s not bragging, it’s just talking about why she’s thinking about killing him, and so it actually serves to tell us something about her.

It doesn’t hurt that there’s no claims of physical prowess in the mix.