Thursday 8 November 2012

The Kingdom - Book Review/Rant


The Kingdom (Graveyard Queen #2)
by Amanda Stevens


What is it about:
Deep in the shadowy foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains lies a dying town.

…My name is Amelia Gray. They call me The Graveyard Queen. I've been commissioned to restore an old cemetery in Asher Falls, South Carolina, but I'm coming to think I have another purpose here.

Why is there a cemetery at the bottom of Bell Lake? Why am I drawn time and again to a hidden grave I've discovered in the woods? Something is eating away at the soul of this town—this withering kingdom—and it will only be restored if I can uncover the truth.


What did I think about it:
Warning: spoilers about the romance

If this had been a standalone novel I would have loved it.

The story is intriguing and creepy. There's a sense of secrecy and danger throughout and the main plot is very well thought out. On it's own this would have been a perfect ghostly read with just some minor flaws.

But.... this is book two in a trilogy and looking at it like that I find one major flaw that annoyed me.

In The Restorer there's a romance between Amelia and Devlin. Because he's haunted Amelia decides to take her distance from him. So of course not even two chapters into The Kingdom a new love interest is introduced. Now nothing is wrong with that (apart from the fact that I liked Devlin a lot more than this Thane), but it turns out that this romance is needed to carry a large part of the plot for this mystery. And then in the end things are nicely wrapped up and Amelia and her love interest part ways so Amelia is all set to reunite with Devlin for book three.

Seriously? After all the tension and everything between Amelia and Devlin I'm forced to invest in yet another romantic storyline, just to have the new love interest kicked out at the end of the book so we can go back to the romance between Amelia and Devlin? Talk about convenient.

I really think this book would have worked better as a standalone or maybe as a start of the trilogy instead of the middle book.

Apart from the romance that bugged me there was also a minor plotline that really felt unnecessary in my opinion and that dragged out the ending of the book.

Don't get me wrong: I really enjoyed this book even with those two annoyances and I will certainly read book three to see if Amelia will indeed reunite with Devlin in the end.

Why should you read it:
It's an intriguing and ghostly Paranormal read.


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2 comments:

Aurian said...

I've read more about this series, and I really want to try it, I just fear it is too creepy for me.

Melliane said...

I love this series, really it's so awesome! and I'm curious to see how the fourth will be0