Review: Four Dead Queens by Astrid Scholte
First, I have the OwlCrate edition of the book. The cover is different than the standard edition, but not significantly different.
Standard:
OwlCrate:
3.25 Stars First let me say that I kind of loved Keralie. I thought she was funny and charming, but unfortunately did not save this book for me. The confusing thing about this book is that it really had the potential to be amazing. I found myself comparing Keralie to Kaz Brekker a good bit, as they are both criminals, and both plagued by things that happened in their pasts. It's a shame that the plot for me just didn't pull through. Just from the title, you know that 4 queens are going to die, or are already dead. Not a big spoiler, but the story starts with all 4 queens being alive and then being killed off. The first 300 or so pages take place over 4-5 days, but the Queen's stories start on day 3, and Keralie on Day 1. Kind of. It's really kind of confusing. Basically Keralie ingests these comm chip things which hold memories and when eaten, the person who ate them can see the memories. The ones Keralie eat hold memories of the queens being assassinated. She goes to the palace to see what is happening and who has replaced the queens she's known, only to find that all the queens are alive and well. While she's there, after court, the first queen is murdered. Keralie and Varin launch into an investigation to catch the murderer and stop them before they can carry out the rest of the murders. There were a couple of plot twists near the end of the book, one of which made me actually scream because it was so unexpected and go "what the f**k?!" Would I reread this book? - Probably not. The majority of the book was predictable. The lore was kind of all over the place and some of it didn't make sense. Would I recommend this book? - For Preteens and Teenagers sure. For adults, probably not. IS THIS A FEMINIST BOOK? - Absolutely not! I've heard about this being considered a feminist book, and I highly disagree. Choices are still taken away from the female rulers, and they are still kind of treated like cattle. The most feminist character was Keralie and it was probably one of the reasons I loved her so.
