Book Check-In 10/20/20

 This week I read One Dark Throne by Kendare Blake.

Review after the cut! (It’s the second in a series so there will be spoilers for the first book)

This book was a lot of fun! I really like the premise of the series. It follows triplet princesses, each who has their own set of powers. At age 6, they are separated and sent to train their powers - one to the naturalists who control growing things and can gain a bond with an animal familiar, one to the elementalists who's basically the avatar with power over the elements, and one to the poisoners who are immune to all sorts of poison. When they reach age 16, the ascension year begins, and they are meant to fight and kill each other until only one remains, who is crowned the Queen. These sisters remember each other from when they were children, and don’t want to kill each other.

At the end of the first book, the poisoner sister, who was extremely weak and not expected to survive, was pushed into a crevasse where the corpses of failed princesses were put when they died during the ascension year. Their spirits remained in the crevasse and infected her and gave her power and desire to win. We also found out that the naturalist sister, who had no power and was forced to use blood magic to bind an animal familiar to her, was actually a poisoner. Her poisoner sister sent her poisoned sweets and she was fine, while her adopted sister nearly died.

This book involved the trickery and fear involved with not wanting to die and not wanting to kill your sisters. It also involved the ‘suitors’. The straight YA relationships were a little tired, but the rest of the book was so interesting that I didn’t mind much. I really wanted the sisters to team up and say no, we won’t kill each other, we’re going to rule together and have everything be happy but that’s not really the genre 😅

4/5 This was fun and fresh!

I am still reading Outlander by Diana Gabaldon (as an audiobook), like I mentioned in my last check-in, it’s 32 hours so it’s taking me a second to get through it. I also started The Queen of Attolia by Megan Whalen Turner. It’s the sequel to Thief which I talked about in my last check-in.

As always, you can see all the books I’ve read on my reading list.