4/5 stars on Goodreads
 |
| Kill the Queen by Jennifer Estep |
After the previous book, I struggled to
find a book that could hold my interest. I started a couple of books that I had
to put down, but I’ll maybe finish them later when my mood is more suitable for
them. The one that won in the end was Kill the Queen (Crown of Shards 1) by Jennifer Estep.
Kill the Queen is epic fantasy that reads like urban
fantasy. It’s told in the first person point of view, the heroine is a sassy
woman in her late twenties set apart from others because of her different magical
abilities, and she kicks ass. The story itself is pure epic fantasy: the entire
royal family is massacred, and the sole survivor, Evie, goes into hiding to
learn the necessary skills to avenge everyone and claim her place on the
throne. To achieve that, she joins a gladiator troupe where she finds true
friends that she hasn’t had in the court.
The book isn’t necessarily remarkable, and it doesn’t stand
out among the similar books. The lone orphan betrayed by the one person she
thought was her friend is a trope well-tried before. The medieval world is familiar,
even if this one was mixed with things like indoors plumbing and fast
communication. The peoples populating the world were too similar to ours—the
people of the north had Nordic names and the dragon shifter was Chinese. But
the writing style is catchy and I found myself reading late in the night, eager
to find out what would happen next. The story was concise and got to the point
satisfyingly fast, and the ending was good. The story doesn’t need a follow-up,
but there were a couple of questions left open, and I’ll definitely read the
next book too to find out what will happen.
No comments:
Post a Comment