Your rating:
In this spellbinding, fantasy-rich novel, a woman is swept into a world where she has the power to alter fairy tales, and change a kingdom’s destiny… To Kaley Arens, a PhD student and expert in folklore, fairy stories have always had a power and an allure beyond mere entertainment. It’s only when Kaley accompanies her lifelong friend Jobi on a visit to his home that she realizes how much she still has to learn. Bellis isn’t the remote island that she believed it to be. It’s another world—a stunningly beautiful and seductive one, with its own royalty, its own rules, and inhabitants who breathe life into the tales she was taught were fiction. Kaley’s presence is no simple holiday. She has a mysterious connection with Jobi and with Bellis, and abilities that may help determine this world’s fate. Tasked with locating a lost prince, Kaley and her companions—the enigmatic Tanek, a member of the Order of Swans, and Sojee, Kaley's colossal bodyguard—journey through a land both thrilling and terrifying, where the uncanny and the familiar go hand in hand. But in fairy tales, heroes and villains are easy to discern. Here, nothing is quite as it seems. And though Kaley is discovering that she can change the outcome of the fairy tales she knows so well, her own story is unfolding in ways impossible to predict, with a destiny she could never have foretold…
This is absolutely not the kind of book I was expecting. I might give until 20% before I dnf.
0Your rating:
3.5/5.
The Vibes:
—sci-fi meets fantasy
—long lost princess energy
—light academia
The Basics:
When folklore expert and phD student Kaley visits Bellis, another world with whom she shares a mysterious connection, she's plunged into an entirely different reality full of fairy tales and magic. However—taking on a quest to find a missing prince with her friends, she discovers that few things are what they actually seem.
The Review:
This was... unexpected.
To begin, I'm someone who really enjoys Jude Deveraux and considers her a master of her craft. She's just a fabulous writer, and manages to lace her stories with such deep emotion. She also isn't afraid of a weird story, or a daring one for that matter. I don't think there's much she wouldn't do if she felt compelled to write it.
Nonetheless, when you read the back copy of this book, I think you do expect a straightforward fantasy romance. This isn't that. It has fantasy aspects, yes, but there's also an entire sci-fi plot that I don't want to spoil. (Which makes discussing the book a little challenging.)
That could be a "it's not you, it's me" thing, because I'm just difficult to please when it comes to sci-fi. There have been sci-fi romances I've enjoyed, but they're relatively few and far between. And while this isn't what I would call hard sci-fi, it's still a big part of the story.
That being said, Kaley is a likable protagonist, charismatic without being "plucky". You root for her, and her interests in folklore make her like... a fun nerd. Her hero, Tanek, I found a bit less interesting. But that could also be because of those sci-fi elements making me feel a bit removed from the story. And the romance was very much a slow burn, which isn't my favorite.
This is a solid book with a bold premise, and I was engaged. I just don't think it hit me quite as hard as Jude's other books tend to.
Thanks to NetGalley and Canary Street Press for providing me with a copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.
0i think i blacked out reading the last third of this book, im not sure i can describe what happened. for such a prolific writer, the writing was… simple? i didn’t like the editorialization, it felt cheap. i wanted to love the fairytales but they were confusing and made the whole read feel like piecemeal instead of a cohesive story. maybe it’s an old style i’m not used to. the fmc was not enjoyable and everything was oversexualized (what exactly is the age gap here? also pls leave the swans alone). and we’re pretty much accepting she’s been kidnapped? idk some parts in the beginning were fun little adventures, but overall nah.
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