Published: March 8th 2017 – Self Published
NOTHING IS BLACK AND WHITE
Secretly trained, swordsmith Sage Blackwell steps up to run her family’s forge when her father falls ill. Sage desires to help the neglected Aermians but is bound by duty to provide for her own… Until, that is, she’s offered a chance to make a difference.
THE REBELLION
Sage knows the risks; imprisonment or death, and yet, she’s still willing to take them to protect her family. But when plans unravel, Sage finds herself facing the devils themselves, her sworn enemies, the princes of Aermia.
THE CROWN
Tehl Ramses is drowning; crops are being burned, villages pillaged, and citizens are disappearing, leading to a rising rebellion. As crown prince, and acting ruler, Tehl must find a way to crush the rebellion before civil war sweeps through his beloved kingdom. He’ll do whatever is necessary to save his people. Yet, his prisoner is not at all what he expected.
ONE STORY. TWO SIDES. ONE GOAL: SAVE AERMIA.
Note: I received an ARC of this from the author. This in no way influences my opinion.
Unfortunately, this was a DNF for me. Which is a shame, because the plot itself was actually pretty good as far as I got (about 55%) – however, my issues mostly lay with the characters, which is, ultimately, why I DNfed.
I want to start with the good. I enjoyed the plot as far as I got. It was fast paced, it kept me on my toes and there was always something going on. I do feel like it sort of slowed down towards where I stopped reading, but I imagine it picks back up. I was told the ending by someone else who has read it (mostly because everyone was raving about the ending and I was just being a nosey tyke really) and I just… wasn’t all that impressed? Not sure if it was because I missed a beat by not reading the rest or whether it’s because I have high expectations because I read A LOT of fantasy, but it just didn’t wow me like it did others who finished this book.
My major issue with this book (and the ultimate reason for me putting it back down) was the characters. For me, it is really important that I form some kind of bond with the characters and, as a result, empathise with them. Unfortunately, I didn’t form this bond with the characters, despite the multiple POVs that were shown. I didn’t really care what happened to the characters and who lived or who died – so I found it really easy to just put the book down and do something else.
My other issue with the characters was that the multiple POVs began to bleed together after a time so, when I did put the book down to do something else, I had to try and remember whose perspective I was reading – which I mostly did through the interactions with the other characters. Whilst they were separate at the beginning – they did sort of change throughout and became too similar for me.
All in all, I actually quite enjoyed the plot (mostly) but my issues with the characters led me to stop reading the book. I gave this book 2/5 stars.
Lauren's Page Turners 
It’s a shame you didn’t enjoy this book Lauren, I agree with you that characters are really important in a story and I’ve not enjoyed books as much as I maybe would have simply because of the character development. The plots were always amazing but because the characters weren’t as well developed I couldn’t enjoy the book as much as I maybe would have.
Still it’s great there were parts of this book you enjoyed, just a shame it wasn’t enough for you to actually finish it. Great review as well. 🙂
I know! It really is a shame, because the writing itself is also fantastic. Other people have absolutely adored this book so far, so give it a go! 🙂
Guess everyone has different opinions on this book, I guess I won’t know until I try it myself! 🙂