Note: Read 9 Volumes at time of review The Genius Prince follows Wein as he cleverly plots and schemes against those that aim to attack or subvert his Kingdom of Natra and attains victory usually to a huge boon to his country. Hes blessed with extremely loyal and competent retainers vassals and family that help him get the upper hand in most situations. Wein is genuinely charismatic competent and at times funny. One of the aspects that I most appreciate about this series is that he has the perfect amount of empathy for a ruler he doesnt shy away from killing or sending people to their deaths. Armies are meant to be wielded in battle and losses are expected but too many series tend to try to solve every problem with a completely clean slate which is unrealistic. A ruler cant be nor should be expected to mourn every single death. That said there are no important ally deaths and footsoldier deaths do not really appear to have an impact. In the first novel a significant chunk of their standing army is killed in action 1 of their entire population btw but somehow it doesnt really affect the tiny country of Natra nor is it mentioned again. The worldbuilding is good. We slowly learn about both sides of the world through the interactions of Wein and his everincreasing influence over the continent. The East is ruled by the Empire and the west is a conglomerate of unique and independent countries ultimately subordinate to the religion of Levetia at least in name. That said the purportedly rich culture of the continent feels inconsistent with the timescales that are offered by the author. Natra is said to be the country with the longest history at 200 years which is frankly nothing. So working backwards every other country has a rich history of 24 generations of rulers or that basically kingdoms fall and rise at a staggering rate. The side characters are great. There are ones you root for ones you hate and ones that are annoying in a good way because they are nuisances with a legitimate reason to be so. The Holy Elite are all genuinely terrifying characters whose existence you just have to accept. They weave a complexity to the actions that Wein must take in the West to subvert them. On the other hand the Empires Princes leave a lot to be desired. They feel a bit onenoted into their roles to the point that it feels that they are just jobbing for Wein and Lowellmina. As most characters have interesting personalities the writing is fun and entertaining. The Prince is genuinely clever at times and at the same time his opponents are also not just fodder so it keeps Wein and hence the reader on their toes. A lot of the solutions he comes up with can range from cleverly set pieces good improvisation or simply but admitedly funny forcing it through the skin of their teeth. That said there are many situations where he is just clever by omission that is the author simply neglected to mention the plan and retroactively explains how Wein was always in control which just feels cheap. He also employs quite a bit the literary device of leaving a textspeech blank midconversation or something like were going to do that omitting what that is so as to add to the mystery but really its just terrible. In conclusion its a fun read if you dont think too hard on what Genius means.