I remember being so insanely excited for this book to come out back in 2012. High fantasy has always been one of my favorite genres and this sounded like it had been written especially for me. The cover was beautiful and I had crazy high expectations for it. I bought it a few days after it came out, and I put it away on the shelf to read very soon. Except . . . soon turned into two years later, and I have no idea how. Time has just flown by for me since then. I finally made some time to pick it up, and I'm definitely glad I did. I can't honestly say it was as amazing as I hoped it would be, but like I said, I think I set the bar too high anyway. Falling Kingdoms could have really used a map in the beginning; the story is perfect for it. It's not mandatory for me to enjoy the novel, but it would have been really cool to flip back to the beginning to see exactly where the characters were at any given time. Perhaps there will be one in the sequel? 
 Falling Kingdoms is pitched as "Game of Thrones for teens" so I figured there would be quite a bit of world building involved. Admittedly, I've only read about a hundred pages of Game of Thrones (and I will eventually get back to it someday), but I got the gist of the world in that short period of time. It was intricate and rather interesting, with a huge cast of characters. In the Falling Kingdoms world, there are three realms; Auranos, Paelsia and Limeros. Two are ruled by kings and the third by a chieftain. Surprisingly it didn't take long at all for me to get the setup of everything; who was who and who was ruling what. Rhodes has a pretty simple writing style that's easy to read. Everything came together really well I enjoyed the lack of plot holes. The beginning captured my attention immediately because it starts on a really exciting note; two sisters sneaking through town in an attempt to steal something with the help of blood magic. 
 The story follows four different people, each with different backgrounds and personalities. My favorite of the bunch was probably Magnus. His character seemed the most complex, and I liked reading about his thoughts and issues. In the first half of the book, he seems like a pretty decent guy with really evil parents. He definitely had a mean streak but overall I liked him. The feelings he had for his "sister" were strange. Although the two of them weren't really related they were raised thinking that they were, and I can't really make any excuses for him in that department. He's a prince and it's not like he'd have a hard time getting other girls. He changes a lot in a short period of time and becomes a lot meaner. I wouldn't say he is now completely evil, but I really hope he reverts back to his old self at some point in Rebel Spring. It says that Lucia is also one of the main characters, but honestly I felt like her parts were few. Of all four, she was the least developed. She seemed like a nice girl, but I didn't spend nearly enough time with her - or see anything truly remarkable about her aside from her "chosen one" power - to have any strong feelings towards her at all. 
 I didn't like Cleo much at all first. She comes off as a whiny, spoiled princess in every way you could think of. She's also a little reckless and impulsive. I do think she had some character development by the end, though, because I felt like she got a little stronger. After the ordeal she went through, I assume she'll be a little more mature later on. Although her storyline wasn't always particularly interesting to me, she had her moments and I felt really bad for her after her father told her she had to marry Aron. I don't know if I'd truly consider Aron a villain in Falling Kingdoms; he's more like a spoiled, mean little kid. He's also the one who gets the ball rolling and the war started between the realms. I also didn't care much for the insta-love between Cleo and her guard, Theron. Maybe within the story a lot of time passed with them together, but the reader is merely informed about this and it was hard for me to care much about their romance. The last person the story follows is Jonas, a man hell-bent on getting revenge for the murder of his brother, Tomas. It seemed like I got more chapters from him than Lucia, but still not a lot. He's a really tortured character who went about getting what he wanted in the wrong way. 
 To me, the best part of Falling Kingdoms was the climax of the book. I was really excited for this war to happen, and conflicted because although I didn't want Paelsia and Limeros to win, I also didn't want anything bad to happen to Magnus (unfortunately I didn't really care what happened to Lucia). The magic system is pretty interesting, and I liked the stories about the elements and the goddesses. The chapters from the Sanctuary were really confusing at first, but once it was explained everything fell into place. The real villain in the book is King Gaius, a.k.a. The King of Blood. Throughout Falling Kingdoms, he schemed, plotted and betrayed various people at almost every turn. He put on a good show for the people of his land, but he was seriously strict and just an all around evil dude. Once I realized what he was like, his actions ceased to surprise me and I was just waiting for the final betrayal towards the end to go down. I half expected him to hurt or kill Magnus at some point, and the fake kindness he extended to Lucia because of her power was awful. I can only hope for his demise in later installments. I really liked this book overall and I'd be more than happy to get my hands on the sequel.