Read an un corrected ARC and I really hated it. Couldn’t tell the two lady protagonist voices apart and also didn’t enjoy the torture

If you’ve loved The Empirium trilogy, Folk of the Air, or Graceling, but want something sapphic, oh boy do I have the book for you! Court intrigue! Assassination plots! Extra swoons and sexual tension! Friends that will go to the ends of the earth to protect each other!

Helen has woven an extraordinary world, and an inviting one - one where there are no words for queerness, because it is simply accepted at face value. But readers will still feel blanketed in Lia's struggles to embrace her love, though the reasons for hiding are different. Even for the plot mostly taking place in the court of Edar, one gets a sense of the full scope of the other kingdoms, can sense the backstories even as they go somewhat untold.

QUEEN will keep you guessing right up until the very end. But for all the threads there are to follow, they come together nicely, in the kind of ending that feels real and all the more wonderful for it.

I really wanted to like this story more. It was the ‘how’ it ended that blew it for me. Sapphic fantasy romance with princesses and spies? Sign me up. I do understand why others wrote how there was a lack of spice between the two MC’s. Honestly, I devoured the first 85% of the book. I forgave the lack of more, intimacy because this is a YA novel, and that perhaps the story bent more towards politics than it being a traditional romance. Which is fine. I was weaned on lesbian subtext, and there definitely was subtext in the first chunk of the story [if you blink, you’ll miss it]- but after the climax of the story when things truly started to fall apart, it felt…even more sterile. The ending read more like a captain’s log of daily events- and really wasn’t satisfying. I finished the book a little annoyed. It bothers me when I invest my time to read something where most of it is really good, only for the last 10% of the story falling flat and is a completely different experience from how it started.

A slow burn that almost lost me but once the plot hits it HITS

a wonderfully queer novel about court intrigues, murder and love. while i thought the beginning and the ending to be a bit rushed i absolutely enjoyed the novel. once the plot truly started it was hard for me to put down. also as this is (as far as i’m aware) the author’s debut novel is it understandable that it was not 100% perfect. i also think the book has more queer characters than straight ones and honestly.. hell yes? i’m so used to LGBTQ people to be a minority in books that it was such a nice change for us not to be sidelined!! representation matters

Thank you to Net Galley and the publishers for sending me a copy in exchange for a review.

I really enjoyed the majority of this book; the romance was really well done and the plot was really interesting. I couldn’t guess what was going to happen next! There was fantastic LGBTQ+ rep throughout and I look forward to any thing else this author writes in the future.

My only issue was that I think the end might have been too fast.

Trigger warnings for loss of a parent.

DNF. Really terrible world-building, the two main characters sounded the exact same and just plain boring. Also a seventeen year old with no previous experience is just suddenly a royal spymaster and good at it? Nah. Also please just include a map. Please. I don’t know this world, I want a geographical sense of it.