Queen of the Conquered
Author: Kacen Callender Genre: Fantasy Publisher: Orbit Books
**I received a copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review**
Sigourney Rose is the only surviving daughter of a noble lineage on the islands of Hans Lollik. When she was a child, her family was murdered by the islands’ colonizers, who have massacred and enslaved generations of her people—and now, Sigourney is ready to exact her revenge.
When the childless king of the islands declares that he will choose his successor from amongst eligible noble families, Sigourney uses her ability to read and control minds to manipulate her way onto the royal island and into the ranks of the ruling colonizers. But when she arrives, prepared to fight for control of all the islands, Sigourney finds herself the target of a dangerous, unknown magic.
Someone is killing off the ruling families to clear a path to the throne. As the bodies pile up and all eyes regard her with suspicion, Sigourney must find allies among her prey and the murderer among her peers… lest she become the next victim.
Likes
- The writing itself. I couldn’t get over how beautifully this was written. It has a lyricalness about it that was captivating and a stark contrast to the often brutal, intense and heart wrenching topics this book depicted.
- The complexity of emotion. This is a very complex book in terms of subject matter and shows a complex character in Sigourney and her position within the kongelig, yet coming from slave origins and being the only Black member of the white kongelig. My heart continually broke under the waves of hated that Sigourney felt and how this was detailed, especially as I could both empathize her position AND see why slaves hated her (fuck the kongelig, though).
- The mystery elements. In the latter half of the book, there were elements of mystery that I really enjoyed and sorta wish I could have seen throughout the entire book!
- Sigourney’s kraft. I thought this was not only an amazing magic system in the kraft, but Sigourney’s kraft, in particular, was really fascinating. And I thought the way Callender wrote about Sigourney’s insight into others by taking over or invading their mind was masterful.
- The ending. I was floored.
Perhaps I’m an idiot, but I absolutely did not pick up any of those pieces that were revealed at the end, which made the ending that much more impactful for me, and made my interest in the sequel increase.
Dislikes
- The pacing. I think the reason that this book took me almost a month to read was that felt, to me, a very slow paced book. I felt akin to Marieke in just wanting Sigourney to do something and, in some ways, I felt some of the information was repetitive, which made it read slow.
Rating
I enjoyed this book (and definitely still plan to read the sequel), but I didn’t completely fall in love with it, despite finding much more that I enjoyed in this book than what I didn’t.
Cheers.
![Hello writers, storytellers and wordsmiths! This month, Thoughts Stained With Ink Editorial turns 3! 🎉
To celebrate, I wrote a really sappy blog post about it, which you can read linked below. On that blog post is also a special thank you, including 10% discount for anyone who books a full manuscript edit this month AND three query critique giveaways (open until 8/12).
Thank you all for the wonderful three years of editing. I cannot wait for see what the next three hold.
Read the blog post and enter the giveaway here: https://thoughtsstainedwithink.com/celebrating-my-freelance-editing-anniversary/
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Nice review! I’m glad you liked
I read this last year and it wasn’t a favorite of mine, though I’d still rate it 3/5 probably, a big reason was because I saw the ending thing earlier on, and that really amplified the frustation of just wanting Sigourney to do something.
That’s totally fair, I can definitely see how that would be frustrating if you caught onto the twist that I completely missed!