My Rating:
Synopsis:
An untested young princess must claim her throne, learn to become a queen, and combat a malevolent sorceress in an epic battle between light and darkness in this spectacular debut—the first novel in a trilogy.
Young Kelsea Raleigh was raised in hiding after the death of her mother, Queen Elyssa, far from the intrigues of the royal Keep and in the care of two devoted servants who pledged their lives to protect her. Growing up in a cottage deep in the woods, Kelsea knows little of her kingdom's haunted past . . . or that its fate will soon rest in her hands.
My Review:
The story overall was great. The plot is good, I like the idea of it. The world is getting there.
The only problem I really have is Kelsea. The main character should be a great example of the author's expertise. Kelsea should be a strong young woman making tough decisions about her new kingdom. At best, Kelsea is.... flimsy. She rules her kingdom just fine. Her morals are great. But some of the thoughts that pass through her head make me want to throw my phone off a cliff. Sometimes she's stern, then she's vain, then she's serious, then she's crazy and delusional. Also, she has no idea what her jewels are doing for her and doesn't want to take advantage of it. Nobody else asks about it either. They don't mention anything about them. She just let's them do what they do. Control that power! Take over the new world!
I know a lot of people have problems with how the world is built; it is a story in the future, but it's more or less renaissance-esque. After a great pilgrimage, in which a lot of modern technology is "lost", not even heroin made it over. But the Red Queen somehow has cannons that fire gunpowder? I don't know. I liked it, but I didn't like it.
Mace is my favorite character. Definitely. He is strong, mysterious, and has morals solid as gold. I'm glad he's not leaving. He needs to stay and make Kelsea stronger.
So yeah, I will be reading the second book in this series, The Invasion of The Tearling.
I personally loved this book ( you can see my review of it here http://booknerdparadise.wix.com/booknerdparadise#!The-Queen-Of-The-Tearling-by-Erika-Johansen/c1rfl/5592bee00cf2585ebcda254f keeping in mind it was one of my first reviews so its not overly detailed)
ReplyDeletehowever in some ways I can see your point about kelsea, she's more immature than I find an 18 year old should be and makes a lot of stupid decisions.. I liked her less and less in the second book (you'll see what I mean)...part of this can probably be attributed to her upbringing, going from having never met another human being other than your "family" to being personally responsible for the well being of millions can not be easy but I agree there are better ways to handle it.... as for the world I didnt really see an issue with it, every dystopian world struggles with the balance between not revealing enough about itself and revealing too much that should be discovered through time and experience in the world and i think this one did fairly well, you learn a lot more about it in the second one and the way its set up it does make sense for the red queen to have higher technology, after all, we managed to create it, why wouldn't future humans be able to recreate it? especially if they have magic!