The Shadow Queen by C.J. Redwine Series: Ravenspire #1
Published by Balzer + Bray (2.23.2016)
Genres: High Fantasy, Young Adult
400 pages
Source: Edelweiss
Lorelai Diederich, crown princess and fugitive at large, has one mission: kill the wicked queen who took both the Ravenspire throne and the life of her father. To do that, Lorelai needs to use the one weapon she and Queen Irina have in common—magic. She’ll have to be stronger, faster, and more powerful than Irina, the most dangerous sorceress Ravenspire has ever seen.
In the neighboring kingdom of Eldr, when Prince Kol’s father and older brother are killed by an invading army of magic-wielding ogres, the second-born prince is suddenly given the responsibility of saving his kingdom. To do that, Kol needs magic—and the only way to get it is to make a deal with the queen of Ravenspire, promise to become her personal huntsman…and bring her Lorelai’s heart.
But Lorelai is nothing like Kol expected—beautiful, fierce, and unstoppable—and despite dark magic, Lorelai is drawn in by the passionate and troubled king. Fighting to stay one step ahead of the dragon huntsman—who she likes far more than she should—Lorelai does everything in her power to ruin the wicked queen. But Irina isn’t going down without a fight, and her final move may cost the princess the one thing she still has left to lose.
My thoughts
She was iron and fire, a warrior’s spirit with a lion’s heart.
While I didn’t enjoy this one quite as much as I’d hoped (I loved the Defiance trilogy), it was still an enjoyable read! I love retellings, and even though I never really got super into the Snow White fairy tale, I thought this was a great retelling of it. Wicked stepmother and all. (Except, where are the dwarves?!)
The thing I loved the most about this book? DRAGONS. Oh my goodness, I loved the Draconi! That was definitely the best part about this whole book. I love dragons, and I especially love them when they shift into people form. They were awesome!
The magic aspect was very cool, too. I liked how Lorelai drew from the elements and the land to perform magic!
He was fire, blood, and death. And the girl was going to die.
It totally sucked that Kol and Lorelai were forced to be enemies by Irina, but while Kol was supposed to be dead set on killing Lorelai, I never felt any danger from him. It was obvious they were going to have a romance, and that they would overcome the queen’s curse. They were pretty cute together, though! She helped him find himself when he was lost, and they both made each other stronger. It was also interesting that they could hear each others’ thoughts. I mean, on one hand, you’d be really close. You can’t beat a bond like that. On the other hand, how much would that suck? You’d never be able to have any secrets of your own. NOTHING would be private. Awkward…
It kinda felt like nothing really happened. I didn’t get bored, but looking back, it seemed like the majority of the book was Kol and Lorelai fighting to be together. This book is a romance. Not an action. My main issue with this book, however, is that I felt absolutely nothing. While it held my interest, I couldn’t connect to the characters or story at all. View Spoiler » I found the prose to be rather dry and stiff. I think I would have absolutely loved this story if I hadn’t had such a problem connecting to it, because the idea was fabulous! I think this series has a lot of potential and I definitely want to see where it goes!
Overall Assessment
Plot: 3/5
Premise: 4.5/5
Writing style: 4/5
Originality: 4/5
Characters: 3/5
World-building: 4/5
Pace: 4/5
Feels: 1/5
Cover: 4.5/5
Overall rating: 3.5/5
OOh nice! Seeing some mostly good things about this one! I am definitely looking forward to it myself. I sadly could not get into her Defiance trilogy, but this one sounds more like my kind of read because I love fairy tales and retellings. Snow White was always one of my favorite fairy tales. It’s much darker than what Disney gave us! I love the added dragons though! Can’t wait to read it! Very nice review!
I love fairy tale retellings! I haven’t read many on Snow White (other than Winter) but this sounds great, though it seems a bit generic/unoriginal. Great review!