This was a great start to a trilogy! I loved the complexity of Kelsea's character and loved being able to see her growth throughout the story as well. Learning about her world through her felt pretty natural. There weren't any crazy info dumps about this new fantasy world and I have so many questions about this world which I hope are answered in the next two books in this series. I don't understand why so much about her kingdom and about her mother was kept from Kelsea as she was growing up secluded from life at the castle and so I'm hoping all that will also be explained. Her guards are interesting characters as well and I enjoyed reading about the complexity of their characters. In fact, all characters (even some quite minor characters) were given such complexity that I didn't want to put the book down. One thing I did have a slight problem with was (for lack of better words) the mixture of "regal talk" with "street talk". I understand Kelsea was new to hearing certain words and phrases since being brought up by a couple who probably never swore around her, but I found the mixture of using queen-like/regal language in with swear words and phrases only used by those from today's society at a juxtaposition that didn't sit well with me. There is one point where Kelsea says something to the effect of, "You don't have the 'balls to do that'." But then at other times she speaks so eloquently (in the way I imagined she was raised to speak) that the two don't sit well with me. There is some talk that I would consider "middle ground" no regalia to the terms/sentence structure, but no street slang and that was okay for me. That was quite honestly the only thing I could find fault with in this book which makes me lean more towards a 4.85 but overall, Erika Johansen is quite a story teller and I'm hoping to see this great story telling continue throughout the next books in this trilogy.