I’m going to chalk this one up to being not the right book for me (maybe just not the right time?) because I really can’t think of anything this book did wrong. It just didn’t get me in my feels. In fact, it did a lot of things right that these fantasy romance new adult type books often don’t. The enemies to lovers thing was very real. They were DEFINITELY enemies. Like, in just a slightly different universe, the male MC could have murdered her on the street on behalf of his government kind of enemies, and then just walked away. This is also a book premise that relies on the main character, Sylia/Essiya, having experienced the genocide of her people, and having to live daily with the knowledge that she or any other Jasadi might be found out and executed, for the crime of having magic.
Because yes, the main character is the lost/secret heir to the Jasadi Kingdom, which no longer exists, and she is in hiding. I was actually really into this whole thing before the love interest, the heir to another kingdom, showed up and the competition entered the plot. So maybe I just don’t like how those two things turned out or maybe I’m tired of those two things in stories, I don’t know. The dude wasn’t my favorite, for sure.
I’m genuinely not sure if I want to continue in the series yet. I guess I’ll just wait until the next book is published and see how I feel then.
[3.5 stars]