King of Scars

New York Times best-selling author Leigh Bardugo continues the adventures of her Grishaverse characters in her 2019 novel King of Scars. Picking up three years after the events in the Shadow and Bone trilogy, King of Scars follows the journeys of King Nikolai Lantsov, General Zoya Nazyalensky, and Ravkan spy Nina Zenik as they navigate life after the civil war. Motivated by regret and resentment, they learn that faith and self-acceptance have transformative powers. The King of Scars story continues in the sequel, Rule of Wolves (2021). Bardugo’s other novels include: The Language of Thorns, The Lives of Saints, the Shadow and Bone trilogy, and the Six of Crows duology. In 2021, Netflix produced an adaptation (also titled Shadow and Bone) that is based on both trilogy and duology.

This study guide references the 2021 paperback reprint edition by Square Fish, an imprint of MacMillan Publishing.

Plot Summary

King of Scars concerns inner demons—the regrets, the resentments, the dark secrets that hide inside everyone—and what happens when they surface. Written with a third-person omniscient narrator, the perspective changes with each chapter to follow the thoughts and actions of a single character.