Five Things About The Crown 
 There isn't much I can say about THE CROWN that differs from my review of THE HEIR. There were improvements, but there were also things that were much worse, yay! 
 Eadlyn isn't AS bad as she was before! 
 In my review of the previous installment I called Eadlyn "the very definition of a spoiled, selfish brat" who "believes she is better than anyone else and looks down on others" while also treating her suitors like garbage. I can happily say that Eadlyn is only a brat now! She still likes to remind people she's more powerful than anyone while basically figuratively pointing a middle finger at anyone who slightly has a problem with her. 
 On a positive note, there is actual character growth here but I'm not sure how much of it actually seems legit because the change kind of comes out of nowhere. I also have to say that even though she is tolerable now, some of her comments still make me have to put the book down and take a few deep breaths. 
 Forget about any plot besides the romance. 
 THE CROWN doesn't even try to be a dystopian anymore. The original Selection trilogy at least had a little going on behind the scenes and a few sub plots, but not here! The attempts at adding politics into the mix were laughable at best and cringe-worthy at worst. The wishy-washy romance is definitely at the forefront here. 
 It just feels like a sloppy addition. 
 This point is kind of hard to explain but the entire book just felt kind of thrown together with little effort, like even Cass didn't want to write it. The writing was pretty bad, time wasn't spent on things that should have been fleshed out, there were way too many conveniences, and everything was just so easy for Eadlyn. Wants to be queen? DONE. Doesn't agree with an advisor? FIRED. Goes against the rules? WHO CARES, NBD. 
 Surprise! The romance will come out of nowhere! 
 I'm not going to say much for this section because anything would be a huge spoiler but just let me tell you that whoever you were rooting for probably loses. I mean, MY ship sailed but that was a pipe dream that just happened to come true. Plus it was so abrupt and unexpected I couldn't even celebrate. While I thought many of the guys were interesting in THE HEIR, they have basically been reduced to statues in THE CROWN. There are random things that seem to happen only to be convenient to the plot and whittle down the number of guys left. 
 Predictable but also unrealistic. 
 You can probably guess why I've called THE CROWN unrealistic due to my previous points, but I also found it predictable. I'm not sure if it's because I read the other books in the series but nothing really happened outside of we all knew was going to happen (except the romance, that really was a surprise). There are also a few things in this book that could be considered offensive to others, particularly as one man is not entirely fluent in English. 
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 Overall, I found THE CROWN to be a lackluster finale. 
 You can find more of my reviews on Readers in Wonderland!