Written by Jennifer Estep (Touch of Frost), Kill the Queen follows Evie, or Lady Everleigh, as she deals with all of the aftermath of the Princess, her cousin, killing the Queen, Evie’s other cousin.
This novel was really interesting because of the characters and plots drove that. The writing was very… repetitive. And read a lot like YA (not surprising, given her other work). If you can’t deal with those – or random cussing that just feels unnecessary, I would recommend you don’t read this.
The other thing to note is that this is the first novel in the Crown of Shards series (currently a trilogy, and I think it will stay that way), and while this novel doesn’t have any adult bits (other than a lot of violence and blood), the next two books DEFINITELY do.
Okay, the good things. The plot, and how the past plays into the present, very much feels like something that could happen and falls in line with the kind of plotting people are actually capable of.
The characters? I loved them all. Evie is an interesting character that is surprisingly devious and loyal to the duty of her family. Those are really the character traits to keep in mind as you work through this series. She isn’t a bad person, but she looks at the world in a very real way.
Sully, Lucas Sullivan, is fantastic. Honestly, I think he is the most interesting character and clearly the love interest. He is reason enough to keep going through the series. He is the enforcer at a certain gladiator group, and he really helps to push the story as well as the other characters on. And, I mean, who doesn’t like a tall guy with devastating blue eyes?
Another thing that this series does well, is giving a good reason to read the next one.
The world itself is interesting though a bit confusing. There is never a section that does a great job of laying everything out. Bellona (Evie’s country) was founded by a gladiator, and therefore everyone learns how to fight and gladiators are huge, including black ring matches where someone will die. With this, one of the downfalls is that they don’t have Evie as a semi-decent fighter. Even if you are bad, you’ll at least be able to handle a weapon if you have been training for over 15 years.
Overall, this was a fun book to read, and the series (yes, there will be more reviews) was decent. If you enjoy blood and fighting and gladiators, you will likely enjoy this if you can deal with the repetition within the writing.
