Title: To Kill A Kingdom
Author: Alexandra Christo
Publisher: Feiwel & Friends
Release Date: March 6, 2018
Princess Lira is siren royalty and the most lethal of them all. With the hearts of seventeen princes in her collection, she is revered across the sea. Until a twist of fate forces her to kill one of her own. To punish her daughter, the Sea Queen transforms Lira into the one thing they loathe most—a human. Robbed of her song, Lira has until the winter solstice to deliver Prince Elian’s heart to the Sea Queen or remain a human forever.
The ocean is the only place Prince Elian calls home, even though he is heir to the most powerful kingdom in the world. Hunting sirens is more than an unsavory hobby—it’s his calling. When he rescues a drowning woman in the ocean, she’s more than what she appears. She promises to help him find the key to destroying all of sirenkind for good—But can he trust her? And just how many deals will Elian have to barter to eliminate mankind’s greatest enemy?
This book was so hyped it was ridiculous. So, of course, I wanted to absolutely love it.
I really enjoyed this book, don't get me wrong. But there were some things that I didn't love so much. I think it needed say another round or two of edits and proofing. There were some things I noticed that may not bother a lot of people, but they are kind of pet peeves for me.
I really loved the plot and the characters of the story. So that was what kept me going, even though I took some issues, writing-wise.
Lyra, aka The Prince's Bane, is banished to the human world as punishment. Her only way to redeem herself is to kill Prince Elian, the pirate prince who kills her kind as his calling. But when she's in the human world, even though she leads him into traps and attempts to foil his plans, she learns there is so much more to humans than she initially thought.
As a retelling of The Little Mermaid, I loved it. It was dark and twisty and different. The issues I took were not with the story itself, but with the editing.
There were many parts that felt tell-y instead of show-y. And then things would often be stated in two different ways right after each other, making it feel repetitive. This did not bother me too much. What really killed me was the swapping between verb tenses. In the first 100 or so pages, verb tense randomly shifts. It has nothing to do with which character is speaking or whether it's a flashback or not.
Without those two little things, this would have easily been a five star read for me. Unfortunately, pet peeves being what they are, I had trouble getting through the first 100 pages because of this. Fortunately, I don't think most people noticed this, and/or it didn't bother them.
Overall
I loved the plot and the characters. Wish it had another round of edits.
3.5 stars
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