YMMV / The Savior's Series

• Alternative Character Interpretation: From Tobias' and Leila's perspectives, Cosima is presented as a shallow, attention-seeking Spoiled Brat at best, a treacherous Femme Fatale at worst. However, some readers feel she has Hidden Depths that potentially cast her in a more sympathetic light.
  • Cosima has grown up in the shadow of a young woman who is practically a living god, whom she's expected to serve unquestioningly, so it would make sense she'd be eager to get some attention and adoration for herself - perhaps in any form - including going off with lots of men and thoroughly enjoying pretending to be the Savior.
  • Cosima is shown to be genuinely moved when she hears Tobias' poem describing the traits he admires in her, which consist of things like her intelligence and wit rather than her beauty and powers. She's then very disappointed when she finds out he actually composed the poem for Leila. Readers have speculated that this could've been one of the first times in Cosima's life she's been valued for something besides her looks and sex appeal.
  • Some readers interpret the scene where Cosima is revealed to be one of Brontes' spies and has sex with him as being a lot darker than Leila interprets it; Brontes accuses Cosima of having failed him, to which she insists she can still serve him "in other ways", prompting Brontes to throw her onto a bed and roughly have sex with her. It's been pointed out that Cosima's consent (both to the spying and the sex) is rather dubious: Brontes is not only the most powerful person in Thessan, but Cosima knows he's ruthless enough that he's trying to kill his own daughter, so she may just be doing whatever she can to stay alive.
• Captain Obvious Reveal: Many readers have stated they predicted early on that Leila was in fact the true Savior; the twist itself isn't revealed until near the end of the first book and none of the main characters figure it out despite lots of readers finding it extremely obvious. The not-so-subtle hints include Tobias often receiving the Savior's blessing after spending time with Leila, Brontes wanting Leila dead and her revelation she's assassinated several senators who support him when she's supposedly just a lowly servant / healer, Leila getting upset when Tobias criticizes the Savior, Leila's obvious tendency to keep secrets from Tobias, and Leila's overall importance as a character (she's quickly established as the secondary protagonist next to Tobias). Some readers have mentioned that the twist was so obvious to them they actually thought it was a deliberate misdirection, only for it to be played straight.
• Designated Hero: Leila in The Savior's Sister. She has some moments in The Savior's Champion that make her come off as less sympathetic than intended, but she comes off even worse here. While Leila having to take some drastic measures to protect herself and topple Brontes is understandable, her methods are often excessively ruthless, which is never questioned by the text. Her main plan is to torture and murder the courtiers who support her father (sometimes in exceedingly gruesome ways), as opposed to trying to win some of them over to her side, cultivating allies to give her more political influence, or just going after Brontes. Most of these courtiers are meant to be Asshole Victims given they're on Brontes' side...except many of them are never depicted doing anything villainous and we're just told they deserve this. Leila never expresses any feelings of remorse or inner conflict, even when her actions cause harm to innocent people caught in the crossfire; at best, she occasionally worries about how it will affect her loved ones' views of her. Leila is presumably intended to be portrayed as a badass heroine, but lots of readers find she instead comes off as a borderline psychopath.
• It's the Same, Now It Sucks!: Lots of reviews for The Savior's Sister tend to be critical of the sections that go over the plot points of The Savior's Champion, as they tend to cover the exact same sequence of events and have identical dialogue, with Leila's POV contributing little. Considering these sections take up a large chunk of the novel - which is longer than TSC - it comes off as tedious at times. Some have opined TSS might've worked better if it was trimmed down to a novella covering only the stuff we didn't see in TSC, or that the first two books could've been combined into one novel, giving the reader access to both Leila's and Tobias' perspectives while not retreading the same content over and over.
• So Okay, It's Average: The general consensus from readers is that The Savior's Champion is more competently-written than Moreci's debut novel, it has some cool action scenes and the romance between the leads is decent, but it doesn't stand out much from other dark fantasy stories of its kind, the worldbuilding is lacking and you can see the main twist coming from a mile off.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character: At the beginning of The Savior's Champion, we're introduced to Tobias' best friend Milo, who enters the tournament alongside him. This sets up a good opportunity to explore how the tournament and Tobias' growing love for Leila affects their friendship, perhaps developing into a We Used to Be Friends situation. However, Milo gets killed off right at the start of the tournament for shock value. It ultimately has little impact on the story or Tobias's character; we barely know Milo at this stage so it's difficult to feel much sadness over his demise and Tobias himself only angsts over it for a few chapters before seeming to forget Milo existed. We're later introduced to fellow competitor Flynn, who fills the same friend-turned-potential rival role to Tobias and has a similar personality to Milo, leading some readers to comment that Milo could've been kept alive to fill Flynn's role and thus had much more impact on the plot.
• Unintentionally Unsympathetic: Leila can come off as a childish and petty Clingy Jealous Girl when she gets upset about Tobias spending time with Cosima. While her feeling a bit envious or insecure is understandable, she knows that the whole point of the contest is so Tobias can become the Savior's husband, so naturally he will have to spend time with and try to impress Cosima, especially with his life on the line. But despite being fully aware of this and Tobias' repeated assertions that it's Leila he truly loves, she refuses to listen to him, hysterically accuses him of preferring Cosima and gives him the silent treatment. It gets even worse when it's revealed she is actually the Savior and Cosima is just her stand-in, as this means she knows she will get Tobias anyway provided he wins the competition, making her jealousy seem more unfounded. It also means she's willing to let Tobias suffer over the apparent dilemma of loving Leila but having to marry someone else to save his own life when she could just tell him the truth. Leila gets upset when Tobias expresses his dislike for the Savior to her, which suggests she feels he wouldn't accept her if he knew the truth...except she knows Tobias is talking about Cosima, the woman he's been led to believe is the Savior who he has good reasons to dislike. This makes Leila come off as irrational more than anything.
• What Do You Mean, It's Not for Kids?: Some have have described the books as being "Young Adult" and the story does bear similarities to YA plots and tropes popular at the time (deadly tournament, evil government, underdog protagonist, forbidden love etc). However, it's clearly not aimed at young teens given the extremely graphic violence, sexual content and frequent use of strong profanity / crass language.

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