*
1 / 5

Frankly, I found Quests of the Kings to be rather boring. Natalie, the main character, is all over the place in terms of personality, there's a lot of sexist attitudes to wade through (the world, not the author's opinions, per se), and the plot doesn't really pick up until about half-way through. The main idea is that Natalie runs afoul of an adventurer, Brago, who is on a quest to uncover a golden harp. He threatens her life and she seeks safety with another adventurer, Sir Edris.

Natalie is an okay character for the first chunk of the book: she's hardworking, trying to support her struggling family. She doesn't much like men (and reminds us of this fact every few pages) - given the world Evert has constructed, I can't much blame her. Very early on in the book she gets beaten up quite badly and everyone she meets implies it's her fault for getting on the wrong side of a noble man. Charming. Somewhere along the line, however, she alternates between crying all the time and brandishing knives at people whilst going on quests. Natalie spends most of the book either in grief or stabbing people.

"Well," Hadley said hesitantly, "you could work on a few things. Your hair, for example."

The plot is easy to follow and the idea of adventurers on quests has some potential. I was enjoying this book the most when it focused on the hunt for the golden harp and there were a couple of nice puzzles that the characters had to solve. However, the rest of the plot was rather dull and not-suspenseful, most of the "twists" being rather obvious. My main gripe, however, is that literally everyone takes Natalie and Artis, her male friend, to be lovers. Literally everyone comments on this. Or tells Natalie how to dress more feminine, or how to wear her hair, or to get a different job (she mucks out stables). Even her friends do this. A lot. Speaking of which her two female friends are bit one-dimensional and vanish from the plot fairly quickly.

"And just how many women have come here, beaten up?" Natalie demanded, hands upon her hips. Borist leaned heavily on the table, "One is too many, isn't it?"

Creating a world with rampant sexism is fine, but there has to be some kind of critique around it. The closest we got was Natalie going "ugh, I hate men" every few pages. Reasonable reaction, but not really a critique. Whenever she did make some sort of insightful comment it was met with a "not all men" response, which she promptly agreed to, thus destroying any kind of progress made. The quote above is one of the better criticisms. Which is a shame, because the basic idea behind Quests of the Kings isn't bad.

I had a hard time getting into this book. Since I did not finish it, I do not intend to publish a review.

I really liked the premise of the book but it turned out that the writing got me so distracted that I just couldn't read all though the book. Too much speech, not enough descriptions. I really couldn't get into it or connect with the characters.

I received a free E-Arc from Netgalley of this book.

I don't like to be negative about a book from the very beginning, but I genuinely am not sure what the author was trying to accomplish with this book. If it was to sympathetically portray a young woman in a society governed by men who must try and survive despite the odds, then it failed quite badly. If it was to paint a picture of a good old fashioned quest from a different perspective to that of the gallant knights, then again it failed.

I am also concerned as to the intended audience for this book. It is a simple writing style that the author adopts, far too simple, and yet some of the content is quite adult, and the violence, on occasion, is quite hideous and yet too accepted, all at the same time. There is some bad language (not that this bothers me but it grates with the simplistic storyline and characterisation). I can't imagine a young adult enjoying the strange juxtaposition. None of the characters is well formed, and the author too often relies on an image of a knight or a king that the reader might bring to the book as opposed to fleshing out the characters. The naming of places is also simplistic and shows a lack of imagination from the author.

The heroine (if she can be called that) is supposed to be a hard-working, and stressed teenager dealing with all sorts of problems in a world where she has little option, but if the author was going for the surliness of Katniss Everdeen or even Bella in the first Twilight book, then again, the characterisation didn't work. One minute she's crying and sobbing and the next she's angry and unmanageable and yet everyone seems to forgive her, as though it's acceptable.

The 'quest' itself is a bit of a joke - as are the knights. It's easily solved and in fact, doesn't really deserve the name quest.

Overall I would say that the cover of the book and the blurb promises a great deal which the author fails to deliver. There is a story in there that might be worth telling, somewhere, but it needs more time and effort and more thought to the characters and the plot development and the audience needs a bit more consideration as well.

I really enjoyed reading Quests of Kings, it was an adventure. As much as I enjoyed reading it I wanted more. There was something about the characters and how they were written that makes you want to care, but also separates readers from them.

This book felt like one big adventure story. It ignites an almost childlike wish to go out into the world and experience all there is to see. To be and do something more.

I liked Natalie as a main character. However, I felt she was confused and at times acted colder then her thoughts would suggest her to be. I felt like she was a girl that was broken by her circumstances and never gave herself to what she truly wanted in life. I also feel that there wasn’t enough time spent exploring her thoughts as a character and allowing her to act more naturally. It was like hearing snipets of her voice every once in a while, then rushing to the plot in other parts. A lot of times I felt like something would happen and she would cry, but then in the next two seconds it would be over and it was like an important event that happened is no longer important.

The one part of Natalie’s character that didn’t add up was when she would complain. The girl who does everything she can to feed her family. The girl who cares more about others well-being then her own, doesn’t makes sense with the character that whines about her burdens. Her initial actions do not coincide with what she says and I felt like I was reading about two completely different kinds of characters. It made Natalie fall flat as a result.

I also wish there was more character development for all the characters in the story. I felt that the secondary characters were often easy to look past, because they were not given enough time to truly speak. The biggest example of this is Arist, he is a secondary main character that I felt like I was starting to get to know, but in the end I felt like I didn’t get to know him as well as I should.

I also felt that the death that occurs in this book wasn’t felt as deeply as it should have because the readers didn’t get enough time to care about that character and afterwards the death would feel skimmed over. It felt very rushed, it happened so let’s move on, type of thing.

The things that Natalie goes through are horrific. Her sarcasm and strengths would be felt much stronger if more meaningful time was spent on her dealing with the emotions she has. When connections are severed it is severely painful and emotionally crippling for all people. If that was shown more, I feel like I would have connected with Natalie so much more.

This novel has the potential to be something I could fall in love with. At this point while I enjoyed it, I wanted to care more.

I'd rate this at about 2.5. Mostly, it's due to the main character - who comes across as a super selfish brat. She complains the entire time that she doesn't need a man, and makes that into her motto, but instead of being a self-sufficient woman, she runs straight to men anytime she needs help. That's not the end of the world, but her constant complaints are really annoying. If the author was aiming to prove that women can be self-sufficient, even in a male dominated world, then he did a horrible job. Yes, she solved the problem before the men, but her character and that of all the women around her, were all the typical weak, underdeveloped female stereotypes.

The next con, was how she constantly mistreated her childhood friend. The guy was in love with her. Couldn't she care enough to not cry on his chest every time something bad happened? And the way the author ended wrote the ending for this same friend - someone who deserved a really good ending - that really ruined the book for me.

Normally books tend to end on a high note - where even the most wretched main character will have a good ending. Here, too many things went wrong, and weren't given their proper distinction. Characters who died didn't offer a proper emotional impact, and some didn't need to die to propel the story along. There could've been a better emotional impact by leaving certain people alive and making better character improving choices instead.

All in all, I don't recommend this book.

Disclaimer: I received a free copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This book didn't appeal to me as much. It was very predictable and I felt there was nothing new to this genre.

I have to admit, this was a hard book to read as a woman because of the sheer violence and attitudes towards women in this book even if it was part of the culture/history of a certain age. Thankfully the main female character is portrayed to be strong, independent and with a high sense of self-esteem so there was some ‘balance’ to the vehement antagonistic attitudes that permeated the story line. She had to be strong because she was ferociously beaten up multiple times and would not have survived such ravage violence otherwise. At least the author did a poignant job in allowing the character to talk about the sense of violation a woman would feel at being damaged this way and unable to get help simply because she’s a woman.

The author did a great job in character development and creation because I very much was made to hate the bad guys, want to root for the good guys and I could feel what was being done to Natalie as if I was there including being proud when she picked herself up to fight back.

The scenes were detailed so I could get a sense of what our characters were seeing, touching and hearing. The plot line was well thought out and realistic, too realistic at times according to the tears falling down my face for Natalie.
I thought the treasure hunt part was interesting as they sought out clues along a quest so you get to explore more of the world Evert created.

I can’t blame the author for using a piece of history that actually occurred, and still does even in 2017 in some parts of the world. It doesn’t make it any easier knowing he didn’t make this stuff up for his book but the fact he got me so emotional over fictional characters is a testament to his writing skill.

Knowing this is a first in the series has me curious what more will come if only to see how far Natalie can go in a world decidedly against her gender. What I did appreciate is that as much as the author laid the groundwork for a story that says women are less than second class citizens he still created a character to shatter those stereotypes and find a place in this world where she can succeed on her terms.