actual rating 3.5 
 So I've been holding off on rating and reviewing books until a few days have passed so that I don't get caught up in the immediate feelings following a book, or let a good ending overshadow a meh book. Unfortunately I read this book and the sequel and now they are slightly running together and I can't quite remember where this one ended and the next one picked up in the over all story. oops. I'm currently watching and reading a bunch of reviews to try to sort out what came in which book. 
 So apparently this book is compared to The Hunger Games and Game of Thrones. It isn't like either of those, who made these comparisons? Did they read any of these books? 
 Kelsea is the heir to the throne, however she can't take power till she's 19 so her mom has hidden her away for safe keeping till she can take the throne. On her 19th birthday her now dead mothers guard come to take her back to the capital to reclaim her throne which is currently being held by her Uncle. 
 I really liked this book. It's a very politically based future fantasy novel, but the world has no tech. The world building and descriptions in parts of this were a bit lengthy and thus chunks of this book were slow. Kelsea is also all up in her head about pretty much everything and we hear all about all her thoughts. Overall though I like Kelsea. I really liked that Kelsea was a plain heavy set bookish girl. I think that's something that a lot of young readers can identify with. Also I liked it because I get very tired of characters having the "I'm so ugly and plain" inner dialog then describing themselves as our exact beauty standards. I like that she has some real bad ass moments, but wasn't always a bad ass. I like that she has a very distinct view on how things should be even though it's super idealistic for a world she knows almost nothing about. 
 I really enjoyed the side characters in this book. I love the Guard, I love the Fetch and his crew, I really love the women who come to work in the palace and Father Tyler. I love to hate the villains. 
 My one big gripe with this book is that for it's length and I don't feel like we got enough. It build a lot so that the next book had a place to jump in and there are places for the series to go but for as long as it was I wanted more. Which is probably why I picked up book two right away. 
 I did like this book enough to buy it new, albeit was on sale, for less than 5.50 (thanks Barnes and Noble bargain books) but I mean I did like it enough to buy which is rare for me.