Review | The Evil Queen & The Glass Queen — this has kicked my need for YA Fantasy into high gear.

The Evil Queen by Gena Showalter
Series | The Forest of Good and Evil #1
Release Date | June 25, 2019
Published by Inkyard Press
Genres | Young Adult, Fantasy
Tropes | Fairytale Retelling
Format | ARC, eBook
Add to TBR | ADD TO GOODREADS
Buy | Amazon | Paperback | Indie Bookstore
Rating |

WELCOME TO THE FOREST OF GOOD AND EVIL.
A DREAM COME TRUE…AND A LIVING NIGHTMARE.

Far, far away, in the realm of Enchantia, creatures of legend still exist, magic is the norm and fairy tales are real. Except, fairy tales aren’t based on myths and legends of the past—they are prophecies of the future.

Raised in the mortal realm, Everly Morrow has no idea she’s a real-life fairy-tale princess—until she manifests an ability to commune with mirrors.

Look. See… What will one peek hurt?

Soon, a horrifying truth is revealed. She is fated to be Snow White’s greatest enemy, the Evil Queen.

With powers beyond her imagination or control, Everly returns to the land of her birth. There, she meets Roth Charmaine, the supposed Prince Charming. Their attraction is undeniable, but their relationship is doomed. As the prophecy unfolds, Everly faces one betrayal after another, and giving in to her dark side proves more tempting every day. Can she resist, or will she become the queen—and villain—she was born to be?

The battle between good and evil is on.

The Evil Queen

Not too bad for my first Gena Showalter read. It took me a bit to get into the story, but once things picked up, it really picked up.

Everly was definitely ruled by her emotions and was often conflicted with the many prophecies that would determine her future. Although there was growth with her character, she definitely had some setbacks towards the end. I understood her need for vengeance, the amount of pain she went through physically and emotionally. How can you expect someone to bounce back so easily from that?

Gena definitely wove us a fantastic world and I was completely intrigued.

The book did feel a bit too long and often we were stuck on the same thing for what seemed like forever. There’s a lot of information coming at you and got pretty overwhelmed by it, but eventually caught on to who was who and what was what.

I haven’t read a YA fantasy like this in a while, but I enjoyed it quite a bit. I often shook my head at the many decisions made by some of these characters, but that was definitely to be expected. I wasn’t expecting the flooding of emotions this one was going to put me through.

I’m pretty eager to see how the rest of the series goes.

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The Glass Queen by Gena Showalter
Series | The Forest of Good and Evil #2
Release Date | September 29, 2020
Published by Inkyard Press
Genres | New Adult, Fantasy Romance
Tropes | Fairytale Retelling, Enemies to Lovers
Format | ARC, eBook
Add to TBR | ADD TO GOODREADS
Buy | Amazon | Indie Bookstore
Rating |

Dare to enter the Forest of Good and Evil, where strength is weakness and weakness is strength. Don’t miss book two of
New York Times
bestselling author Gena Showalter’s magical, romantic and fascinating fairy-tale series, in which the fairy tales we know and love are prophecies of the future…

Pitied.
Sickly.
Unfit to rule.

Princess Ashleigh Charmaine is known as the Glass Princess, fragile enough to shatter with a whisper of wind. Born with a weak heart, she dreams of being treated like anyone else. Unlike her headstrong sisters, she received no magical ability at birth and lives every day expecting to die. Until an oracle announces that Ashleigh is fated to play the part of Cinderella, wed a handsome royal and save the Kingdom of Sevon from the evil king and queen who once ruled the land.

As war rages, Ashleigh begins to doubt her role in the fairy-tale prophecy. Animals despise her, she can’t carry a merry tune and she has zero social graces. Worse, the king she’s supposed to enchant is the newly crowned sovereign of the winged warriors known as the Avian…and he despises her, too.

When Ashleigh develops a terrifying magical ability to commune with dragons and create fire from air—a power she cannot control—she must work with King Saxon to save their kingdoms and their lives. By the stroke of midnight, she must warm his icy heart…or forever break her own. Will Ashleigh ever become the queen she’s prophesied to be…or will she lose everything she’s come to love?

The Glass Queen

As soon as I finished The Evil Queen, I was pretty eager to start this one right away. With this being my second read by Gena, I kind of had a sense of her writing style and expected about the same with this one.

The Glass Queen is what I’d say is a new adult fantasy romance with the enemies to lovers trope. This is a Cinderella retelling and one of the things I really enjoy about this series is figuring who is who.

I actually really liked Ashleigh and Saxon, they both go through some character development as the story progresses, but I was definitely hoping for a little bit more.

I really have to hand it to Gena, she does a phenomenal job with her world-building. I’m definitely not used to the way that she writes it, but with this being my second book, I had a better idea of how she approaches everything. She hooked me in completely with this world and characters.

I loved that we got to see Everly and Roth again, I don’t think I could ever tire of them.

Even though this has the enemies to lovers trope, they still managed to pull the emotions out of me. I did feel their connection and chemistry, but to me, it felt like it could have gone a tad bit deeper.

Like the first, I struggled with how lengthy the book is and sometimes felt we were just going through the motions of the story.

However, I’m completely sold on this series, I’ve been enjoying every bit of it and can’t wait for the next book in the series.

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