The Queen Of The Tearling (The Queen of the Tearling, #1)

by Erika Johansen

[inlibrisveritas]

The Queen of the Tearling was one that I heard a lot of back and forth over. Some said it was full of info-dumps, others said it had awful world building, and then there were those who loved it. Honestly I had no intention of ever reading it…until it showed in my library’s digital stock and well…free books have a power over me. And I’m so glad I did!

The Queen of the Tearling has been labeled as young adult by many, but I find that it’s more of a New Adult age range. It pulls no punches and can be downright brutal, and there quite a few mentions of more mature content. As much as I hate when publishers reference other books in their summaries I would say the cross over of Hunger Games and Game of Thrones is fair, keeping in mind that it moves as quickly and ‘lightly’ as the Hunger Games but it has the feel of the high fantasy intrigue and danger as Game of Thrones..I personally didn’t find there to be any info dumps that caused me boredom, and the weirdness of the origin of this world had pulled me in. It’s rare to find a high fantasy set in our world, so to speak, that comes AFTER our society. I will admit that it was slightly confusing trying to figure out the when and where, but in the end I feel confident that this is something we’ll get more of an answer for later as a few things were revealed a bit later in the book.

Kelsea is my sort of main character. She’s intelligent, independent (when it’s not a hinderance), and very strong willed. To top it off she has a bit of an anger issue and in the face of attraction she doesn’t get incredibly distracted and forget she’s in charge of a kingdom. I love that she adores learning, but isn’t afraid to get her hands dirty if she needs to. And kudos to the author for leaving out an overlaying romance! THANK YOU! Not everything needs stolen kisses and love confessions in the first book…if it comes later, that’s great but at least now I know Kelsea and I know about the men & women around her. The whole story around the Red Queen is one so full of mystery that I wished we had more pov sections from here. She’s a nasty piece of work, but her whole existence brings even more questions and I enjoyed seeing the characters try to tackle the fact that she is fearsome because she is seemingly ancient and yet constantly present and young.

The story itself had a slightly addicting quality. As the new world was constructed before me I found myself more intrigued and encouraged by the unanswered questions than frustrated, and I felt that had to do with the rather neat way we were given some of the information. Most of the book is centered around Kelsea, but on occasion we get to see the world from other people’s eyes including the Red Queen. In addition there are also little quotes and excerpts at the beginning of each chapter that come from history books set in this world, that also give you glimpses of the impact the events being spread out before you have later on in the worlds future. Plus there is the added bonus of who narrated this well written tome, Katherine Kellgren! Bow down to her book reading prowess. She has a rather soothing tone that she can change to different accents, different genders, and keep you absolutely enraptured with the story she’s telling. She could probably read me War and Peace and I would be hard pressed to pause it.

Overall I think this is not one to miss out on! As a fan of high fantasy I though this to be a true gem, and I can’t wait to see what the next book has in store.