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Series: The Queen’s Rising #1

When her seventeenth summer solstice arrives, Brienna desires only two things: to master her passion and to be chosen by a patron.

Growing up in the southern Kingdom of Valenia at the renowned Magnalia House should have prepared her for such a life. While some are born with an innate talent for one of the five passions—art, music, dramatics, wit, and knowledge—Brienna struggled to find hers until she belatedly chose to study knowledge. However, despite all her preparations, Brienna’s greatest fear comes true—the solstice does not go according to plan and she is left without a patron.

Months later, her life takes an unexpected turn when a disgraced lord offers her patronage. Suspicious of his intent, and with no other choices, she accepts. But there is much more to his story, and Brienna soon discovers that he has sought her out for his own vengeful gain. For there is a dangerous plot being planned to overthrow the king of Maevana—the archrival kingdom of Valenia—and restore the rightful queen, and her magic, to the northern throne. And others are involved—some closer to Brienna than she realizes.

With war brewing between the two lands, Brienna must choose whose side she will remain loyal to—passion or blood. Because a queen is destined to rise and lead the battle to reclaim the crown. The ultimate decision Brienna must determine is: Who will be that queen?

3 Drink Me Potions

**The Queen’s Rising comes out February 6, 2018!**

Thank you Edelweiss and HarperCollins for this copy in exchange for an honest review

The Queen’s Rising was a refreshing take on different factions known as “passions” with a good mix of impending battles and forbidden love.

I didn’t bring too many expectations into this novel and I think that made it more enjoyable for me. We follow Brienna, a half-Maevan girl living in another neighbouring kingdom of Valenia, who just doesn’t know how to choose between the different passions. Like, girl, just make up your mind! But the system was interesting. There are 5 passions which include knowledge, music, art, wit, and dramatics. It takes 7 years of schooling to complete the training at which time you gain a passion cloak that is a symbol of prestige and completion akin to a school degree upon graduation.

Likewise, the different clans in Maevana was really cool, especially the history and timelines of certain clans. With Brienna being part Maevan, I assumed there’d be quite a bit of information about them.

While I enjoyed this world building, I felt it wasn’t ENOUGH.

First, there’re beautiful maps made of the kingdoms at the front of the book. Half the places here we never really get much information on, or barely mentioned at all during the plot. Maybe I’m just jumping the gun and they’ll appear more in later books of the series, but besides the bits about individual clans and certain city names, there’s really not much given to us in the actual book.

Second, those darn ancestry timelines! Of course since they’re at the front of the book, I looked at it. And if you were hoping for a surprise twist or whatever in the plot, especially about the identity of Brienna’s father, then don’t look at it! It totally ruins everything unless the point was that this tidbit of information wasn’t meant to be a surprise to the readers.

Third, both the passion system and the magical abilities of the Kavanaugh clan wasn’t really developed. Most of the story is focused on Maevana while the Valenian half was like a filler leading towards how Brienna could understand more of her Maevan heritage. What I don’t get is that there’s really nothing much explored with WHY the Kavanaughs are solely powerful and HOW it can go awry if used poorly. And the passion system seemed thrown in there like a last minute thought sometimes without truly developing the system such as who is allowed to passion, and what is the point of it all when you complete/waste 7 years of your life on it? Maybe these questions don’t matter to some of you, but it does for me as it gives me more of a taste of this world that they live in.

The amount of character building felt lacking to me too! With a page full of different characters at the front and their roles in the story, it just made me assume that this was necessary in order to keep track of all the people we’d meet along the way.

But no! That is not the case here. I thought the girls Brienna passioned with would play more prominent roles but most of them aren’t mentioned after a quarter into the plot. And for the ones who feature more, they just felt flat. I couldn’t understand how they could “love” each other so strongly after such a short period of time. The lengths they’d go to to sacrifice for each other was difficult to comprehend. It was nice, but hard for me to wrap my mind around.

Overall, yes, I had my issues with this book, but there were a lot of good ideas that just needed more time to flesh out more thoroughly. I enjoyed the passion system. I liked some of the characters that we do stick with, and I love the romantic interest. It’s a very slow-burn kinda romance that probably started before the timeline of the story which makes it more plausible in my opinion. It may be a bit weird for some people who don’t love the previous teacher-student relationship, but if you’re into forbidden love tropes, then this was delicious in a slow-burn way.

The ending wrapped things up nicely (maybe a bit too nicely) so I’m not sure what’s in store for the future books. However, I still think this was a good start no matter my less-than-ecstatic comments. There is a whole lot of potential for great improvement with this series and this author in the future, and I wanna be there when that happens.

Overall Recommendation:
The Queen’s Rising was fairly fast-paced with a unique system of passions. While the romance was a bit more subtle which normally would bug me more, I appreciated the role it played and the ability to focus more on the main plotline. However, character development and plot could’ve been better thought out but there was definitely potential in its world building. Ending on a happy note, I am curious and still interested in seeing where else this story is going.

Review: Dividing Eden by Joelle Charbonneau

May 18, 2017May 23, 2017 Andge @ Down the Rabbit Hole

Series: Dividing Eden #1

dividing eden -joelle charbonneau From the author of the New York Times bestselling Testing trilogy comes a sweeping new fantasy series, perfect for fans of Victoria Aveyard and Sarah J. Maas.

Twins Carys and Andreus were never destined to rule Eden. With their older brother next in line to inherit the throne, the future of the kingdom was secure.

But appearances—and rivals—can be deceiving. When Eden’s king and crown prince are killed by assassins, Eden desperately needs a monarch, but the line of succession is no longer clear. With a ruling council scheming to gain power, Carys and Andreus are faced with only one option—to take part in a Trial of Succession that will determine which one of them is worthy of ruling the kingdom.

As sister and brother, Carys and Andreus have always kept each other safe—from their secrets, from the court, and from the monsters lurking in the mountains beyond the kingdom’s wall. But the Trial of Succession will test the bonds of trust and family.

With their country and their hearts divided, Carys and Andreus will discover exactly what each will do to win the crown. How long before suspicion takes hold and the thirst for power leads to the ultimate betrayal?

4 Drink Me Potions

Thank you Edelweiss and HarperCollins for this copy in exchange for an honest review

**Dividing Eden comes out on June 6, 2017**

A game. A fight for the throne. Power plays behind the scenes by unknown third parties? That sounds just about up my alley.

But to be honest? This rating barely managed to ramp up to 4 stars if it weren’t for the last half of the book. Here’s why.

You know the whole Carys versus Andreus thing because the ones in line for the throne all suddenly died? Well, that doesn’t really start to come into play until 50% of the way into the novel. Talk about a slow start where none of this was surprising ’cause, hey, the synopsis RUINED it all for you.

Ok, so I sound a little bitter at that aspect. I was just impatient. But I get it. Charbonneau did a good job of setting the scene. Here’s a land that seemingly relies heavily on being well-lit in order to drive away the evil things that lurk in the darkness. The people truly believe in the work of the light, including setting up “engineers” known as Masters of Lights. But beyond all that, they believe in the power of the wind and the One who could command it. That person would be the seer, and in this book, the seer played a bigger role in the plot than I initially pegged her to do.

Unbeknownst to the twins at first, there are far darker things present in their kingdom that have no need to hide in the dark but rather walk boldly in the light. It’s frustrating to be the third person, omnipotent viewer sometimes as there’s pieces of information found out by each twin but the other doesn’t know. This all funnels into one giant snowball of miscommunication that ultimately pits the two against each other.

No longer sure they could trust each other, the game FINALLY commences and really picks up. Carys is honestly my favoured twin. She’s always been the one to protect her brother from the others as he has a secret that couldn’t be found out by any one. A previous seer predicted one of them would be cursed before they were born, and their mother always believed it was Andreus. But is it really? That’s one of the wonderful things that’s hard to know for sure, and definitely an element that kept me rapidly flipping through the pages.

Anyway, with Carys always taking the blame for Andreus in order to draw less attention to him, this whole twin against twin thing was both interesting from the competition standpoint but it was also heartbreaking to see Andreus truly turn on Carys due to misunderstandings that he wouldn’t allow her to explain away.

The action ramps up by like 110% in like the last 30% of the book. Not only is there a physical game being played by the twins in order to win the throne and keep the tumultuous times in Eden at a low, but there are other invisible strings being pulled in the background with unknown players pulling them. The mystery hasn’t been fully solved, so that’ll be intriguing to see carry on to book 2. It doesn’t end on a cliffhanger, per se, but it definitely leaves things unresolved as it would look like those invisible players had won by fixing the game in order to control the kingdom better. Then there’s also the matter of the cursed twin and what exactly that entails. Many great things are introduced in Dividing Eden and it was definitely a different kind of read. Overall enjoyable but the first half may need to be skimmed a little to get to the truly good stuff.

And before I forget, I didn’t mention romance at all so far in this review, but fear not romance lovers. There’s a smidge of romance going on in this novel, with a love interest for both twins (albeit one relationship I despised more than the other – I’ll let you guess which one that would be). But heavy romance honestly wasn’t necessary here. At the heart of it all, this was a book about a sibling relationship and what was worth risking all for the sake of a crown.

Overall Recommendation:
Dividing Eden may have started off a little slow with its world building, but it amped it up to be well worth the wait. Pitting twins Carys and Andreus, who always had each other’s backs, for a chance at the throne of Eden was more than just an exciting competition. The stakes were so much higher than that with behind the scenes power plays being made by mysterious figures, and a greater destiny for one twin who may indeed have been born with a curse. This book was ultimately about family and what it would take to save each other, even if the cost was their kingdom.

Review: The Great Pursuit by Wendy Higgins

March 21, 2017April 18, 2017 Andge @ Down the Rabbit Hole

Series: Eurona Duology #2

the great pursuit -wendy higgins In The Great Pursuit, the dramatic sequel to the New York Times bestselling The Great Hunt, Wendy Higgins delivers another thrilling fantasy filled with dangerous enemies, political intrigue, searing romance, and a princess who is willing to do everything to protect her kingdom.

One hunt has ended, but the pursuit for love and justice continues.

The kingdom of Lochlanach has traded the great beast that once terrorized the realm of Eurona for something far more dangerous: the ire of powerful Lashed woman Rosaria Rocato. Rosaria demands that Eurona overturn the laws prohibiting magic, or an innocent will be killed each day.

Despite the king’s resistance, Princess Aerity believes they must make peace with the Lashed, and though she’s accepted a betrothal to the man who took down the beast, she cannot help thinking about Paxton, the Lashed man who stole her heart and disappeared.

Aerity soon discovers that Paxton has joined Rosaria’s army in the war against her family. Though her feelings for him are still strong, her duty to her kingdom and her family is stronger—especially when her parents are kidnapped and she has to step up to the throne and once again put aside what’s best for her in order to do what’s best for her people. Paxton and Princess Aerity must fight to see what is more powerful: their love or the impending war between the magical Lashed and the non-magic humans.

4.5 Drink Me Potions

The Great Pursuit wraps up a duology in a way that fit my expectations and some. With mysterious intrigue about the evil Rosaria and her plans for the Lashed, this story has elements that would excite different readers.

Starting back very closely from where the previous novel left off, our protagonists are all in a bit of a pickle. Aerity is being rushed to marry Lief, who previously won her hand for killing the first beast that terrorized the land. Her actual love, Pax, is on the run into other kingdoms following the Zandalee women, fierce warriors who showcase the power and might of women instead of the traditional male-dominant role. And Aerity’s cousin, Wyn, fancies Lief while it’s obvious that someone else who’s more worthy of her attentions is left with his unrequited love.

What a love-mess. Fortunately, I thought it was more fun untangling this than I thought it would be, and all my ships have come true. But that’s besides the point (unless that was something you desperately wanted to know too).

Facing off not just one enemy, but two, the powerful Lashed army is coming upon them and they don’t even know it. I normally appreciated Aerity a lot for her stance against her country’s laws on the Lashed and for how selfless she was to sacrifice her own wants for the better of her kingdom, as a true leader should do. At times, it was still difficult as of course the ship game is strong for Pax, but at least I got it.

I felt the romance took up a large space in this story, yet there still felt like it was balanced well with the action parts that took up the rest of the plot. Nothing was going to be the same again in this kingdom if they wanted Lashed and un-Lashed to get along with each other like they once did. This particularly trope reminded me a lot of Marie Rutkoski’s The Winner’s Curse trilogy and I think it similarly looked into this element. Although how it was developed and managed was quite different between the series, Higgins managed to still deliver a heart-pounding story that I gobbled up in a matter of hours.

Oh, and did I mention there was such a HOT scene with Pax and Aerity? My wait since The Great Hunt was definitely rewarded.

Overall Recommendation:
The Great Pursuit delivered the perfect ending that I had wanted, almost wrapped up in a neat bow without it getting too stiflingly perfect. From a world divided and lovers separated, this story brought together battles facing off cunning foes and romances that were just as I had hoped. Aerity is still the strong-headed leader she’s been becoming since before and each of these characters learn more about what it means to live in a world that’s changing. I think fans of the first novel would be satisfied with this ending.

Tag: beautiful covers

Review: The Queen’s Rising by Rebecca Ross