Protect the Prince by Jennifer Estep

Protect the Prince (Crown of Shards, #2)

by Jennifer Estep

USA TODAY Bestseller!

Magic, murder, adventure, and romance combine in this second novel in the exciting Crown of Shards saga from New York Times and USA Today bestselling author Jennifer Estep.

Everleigh Blair might be the new gladiator queen of Bellona, but her problems are far from over.

First, Evie has to deal with a court full of arrogant, demanding nobles, all of whom want to get their greedy hands on her crown. As if that wasn’t bad enough, an assassin tries to kill Evie in her own throne room.

Despite the dangers, Evie goes ahead with a scheduled trip to the neighboring kingdom of Andvari in order to secure a desperately needed alliance. But complicating matters is the stubborn Andvarian king, who wants to punish Evie for the deaths of his countrymen during the Seven Spire massacre.

Dark forces are also at work inside the Andvarian palace, and Evie soon realizes that no one is safe. Worse, her immunity to magic starts acting in strange, unexpected ways, which makes Evie wonder whether she is truly strong enough to be a Winter Queen.

Evie’s magic, life, and crown aren’t the only things in danger—so is her heart, thanks to Lucas Sullivan, the Andvarian king’s bastard son and Evie’s … well, Evie isn’t quite sure what Sullivan is to her.

Only one thing is certain—protecting a prince might be even harder than killing a queen…

Reviewed by Leigha on

4 of 5 stars

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I received this book for free from Edelweiss in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Evie and the gang are headed to Andvari to secure peace and an alliance in this Kill the Queen sequel.

I’m …torn on this one. For the most part, it’s an enjoyable sequel to the series. Evie is as bad ass as ever. This story is very much Evie coming into her own as a queen. She’s putting her hodgepodge skill set and political intrigue to the test. I’ve really enjoyed watching her blossom into a powerful and vibrant ruler. Her relationships with her friends take a back seat, but the romance between her and Sully heats up. I wasn’t crazy with all the romance drama, but the ending made up for the tediousness of it all.

However, the world building and pacing weren’t the best. I find Estep to be really repetitive in her series. She goes on ad nauseam about the littlest setting details. I’m assuming these details become important later, but I only need them mentioned once or twice. I’m a smart person, I can remember details. Not to mention, she places most of the world building within the first 20% of the novel. The pacing suffers for it.

tl;dr While enjoyable, the novel suffers from pacing problems such as too much world building at the beginning of the novel.

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  • Started reading
  • 6 January, 2019: Finished reading
  • 6 January, 2019: Reviewed