In her seventeenth year, Princess Alera of Hytanica faces one duty: to marry the man who will be king. But her father's choice of suitor fills her with despair.
When the palace guard captures and intruder—a boy her age with steel-blue eyes, hailing from her kingdom's greatest enemy—Alera is alarmed…and intrigued. But she could not have guessed that their clandestine meetings would unveil the dark legacy shadowing both their lands.
In this mystical world of court conspiracies and blood magic, loyalties will be tested. Courage won't be enough. And as the battle begins for everything Alera holds dear, love may be the downfall of a kingdom.
Review:
I was hooked on this book from the very beginning and I absolutely canot wait to get my hands on book 2, Allegiance. The introduction lends itself to a classic fairy tale, providing the pertinent background information for the kingdom, creating a believable legend slash curse, and introducing the main characters. After the prologue you get this line:
"I think I'm going to vomit."
How can you not want to read more? I cracked up. And from that point on you know that this is not going to be your ordinary princess story at all.
Princess Alera is bound by duty to marry a man that is capable of becoming the next King of Hytanica, a prospect that isn't thrilling her to death. Her father wants her to marry Steldor. Only Steldor isn't exactly what she wants in a husband, especially when she meets Narian.
Steldor reminded me of Gaston from Beauty and the Beast~ arrogant, narcissistic, and selfish. He is admired and revered by all in the kingdom for reasons that have nothing to do with his actual personality. He is a skilled warrior of the guard with a reputation that many choose to ignore because of his standing in society, a society that doesn't place very much value on women. So to everyone else Steldor is simply doing what is expected of all men. This is reflected in how he treats Alera. He views her temperament as an amusement, nothing more.
Narian has the opposite personality and treats Alera with nothing but kindness and respect. He listens to her and shows her parts of life that she didn't dream of. To others he is a mystery and possibly a threat to the kingdom, to Alera he is everything she wants and cannot have.
The twists in this book were awesome and it's even more amazing that this book was written by a teen. We shouldn't underestimate the power of this generation or we risk missing out on so many things, like Legacy. It's a good thing I expanded my reading horizons and picked this YA title. I've since learned that this is the first of a planned trilogy, and that they have already been released overseas (due to different publishers and publishing schedules). Here in the U.S. they will be released under the Harlequin Teen brand.
Cayla has a blog that you can find here.
*Reviewed by Anna Dougherty
*I found this title on NetGalley
1 comment:
I loved the fashion in this story. I can't wait for the second book in this series.
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