Daughter of the Siren Queen

📚🌊 **Book Review: *Daughter of the Siren Queen***
⭐ **Rating: 3.5 / 5**

Back on the high seas we go, sails snapping, siren magic humming just beneath the surface. 🏴‍☠️✨
Alosa returns exactly as we remember her: sharp-tongued, confident, and very much in charge. Her mission from book one is complete, the map pieces secured, the enemies captured, and yes… Riden is now firmly *under her command*. Delicious irony. 😌⚓

This sequel leans deeper into the siren lore and political tension, pulling us into a dangerous race that pits Alosa not just against enemies, but against long-buried secrets tied to her own father. The stakes are higher, the magic stronger, and the emotional threads more tangled. You still get that show more familiar pirate adventure energy mixed with fantasy, danger, and romance simmering just under the surface. 💙🌊

That said, if I’m being honest with myself, this one didn’t quite grip me the way *Daughter of the Pirate King* did. The story is solid, the characters are still fun and compelling, and I absolutely flew through it in a single day, but something felt just a touch less… electric. The action didn’t pull me under as hard, and while I enjoyed every chapter, I kept waiting for *that moment* that never fully landed.

Still, this is very much a **worth-the-voyage** read. If pirates, sirens, banter, and a capable heroine steering her own fate are your thing, you’ll have a good time aboard this ship. ⚓🧜‍♀️

Fun, fast, magical, just missing that extra spark that made book one unforgettable.

🏴‍☠️✨ **Tropes & Vibes**

* Pirate Queen Energy
* Siren Magic
* Captain Under Pressure
* High Seas Adventure
* Strong Female Lead
* Loyalty vs Legacy

If you loved the first book, you’ll want to finish the journey… even if this leg of the voyage is a little calmer than the last. 🌊📖 show less

This was a fantastic conclusion to this YA fantasy adventure duology. Both the books in this series were fun, highly entertaining, and easy to read. The story sucked me right in again and I ended up reading it in two sittings; it was pretty much impossible to put down.

In this book Alosa is confronted with the truth about her father and begins a search for her mother. As she unravels her father’s lies she also unravels the truth of her own past and heritage.

I love Alosa as a heroine; she is tough, loves to act, and is fiercely protective of those she considers “hers”. The story is told at a fast clip and full of wonderful witty banter that I really enjoyed.

Overall I really loved both books in this series and can't wait to see what show more Levenseller writes next! I would highly recommend to those who enjoy fast-paced YA adventure fantasy featuring a strong heroine. show less

Literary Merit: Good
Characterization: Excellent
Recommended: Recommended
Level: High School

Two months after the end of Daughter of the Pirate King, Daughter of the Siren Queen begins with Alosa and her badass crew of ladies working to find the third, most crucial piece of a treasure map that is sure to lead them to all the wealth they could ever dream of. But unfortunately, the road to riches is never paved smoothly. With betrayals lurking around every corner, and secrets running amuck, Alosa quickly learns that everything she thought she knew about her father is nowhere near the truth.

Alosa is a tough as nails pirate princess with a heart of gold. She loves her crew and is willing to do just about anything to protect them. She’s tested show more again and again in situations of peril and she rarely ever falters. One of the things I really liked about Alosa was her readiness to face her fears. Being half siren, she doesn’t trust herself when she’s fully submerged in sea water, as it gives her abilities and brings out the siren side of her. When it becomes necessary to embrace who she is in order to save the day, she does what she has to, no matter how frightened it makes her for the wellbeing of those she loves. She is fiery and witty and overall, a really fun main character to root for.

Riden is also wonderful. They begin as enemies turned frenemies turned lovers and I was totally on board with it. I loved reading their banter and seeing the ways that their relationship grew and changed throughout both books in the duology.

I really really loved that Alosa’s crew is made up almost entirely of women. Not just for practical reasons, such as they are resilient to a siren’s call, but also because they have so much fierceness and a vast variety of skills to offer. There’s a true sisterhood amongst the girls, and it’s so nice to see them all building each other up, rather than tearing each other down. They’re also all fleshed out and developed extremely well for so many to be present in only a two book series.

Extremely fast paced and full of loveable characters, this book presents a thrill ride from start to finish, and I loved every second of it. show less

This was fun, but not as good as the first book. The first was like a perfect storm- the romance was a large focal point and since the setting took place in one location a majority of the narrative, it made for a simplicity that really pulled me in. I miss Riden's room.
This one however had a lot more going on- Alosa's ship is our main setting, but we venture off to islands and pirate keeps and other ships, and even underwater. The narrative has a lot more, let's say, politics pulling it in different directions. Maybe Tricia bit off more than she could chew with the setup in the first one.

I feel her writing is very anticlimactic. She sets up these long, slow dynamics that are building up very well, but then the payoff is lackluster and show more quick. I felt that in the first book, but there wasn't enough going on for me to really take notice- in this, it's very obvious. From Alosa's slow burn with Riden still carrying from the first book, to a near call on an island of cannibals, to finally finding the sirens and her mother, and the fight scenes in the end with the Pirate King- it just all felt like... this is what we've been building up to? The various high points were thought out and made to be satisfying ( MAJOR SPOILER!!! the siren the Pirate King held captive for 18 years dragging him into the deep never to be seen again for instance felt like poetic justice), but it's the execution that doesn't give me what I want. Maybe I'm too much of a horror girly, but I just think more guts and blood and such could have been shown, so I could really feel the terror of what these pirates were going through. Instead, Tricia just gives us action by action with no heart- he stabbed here, I limped there, I knew I wouldn't see him again, etc.

This is the biggest issue I have with her writing, but not the only issue unfortunately. Holy casual gender essentialism batman. I simply cannot wrap my head around the idea that pirates and a future Pirate Queen, would hold onto such asinine and semi-strict gender roles in the way Tricia writes them to. This is obviously her own mindset worming it's way in. I would say that 20% in, things of that sort aren't mentioned nearly as much, if at all, but it was annoying to wade through in the beginning. We do get an asexual character which is really cool, so points for that! Though, it is a simple one off line that I'm clinging to here lol.

My last gripe is with either a plot hole (ish?) or simply Alosa being an argumentative shit for the fun of it- after some time spent in the ocean, Alosa is brought back onto the ship. She demands blankets and dry clothes 'or else (she'll) freeze'. In the very next scene, and for every scene after where she gets wet, she talks about drying herself off with her siren abilities... I cannot remember this particular ability being mentioned in the first book, but admittedly, she spends very little time in any water then. I just don't understand why she asks for dry clothes and blankets if she can make herself dry a la Percy Jackson, unless it's simply a character quirk of hers to be annoying.

I give this 4 stars because it was a very easy read, and the romance aspect is fun, though it can be aggravating for slow burn haters, as Alosa lies to herself for much of the book about her feelings for Riden. But I love slow burn, and while this isn't the best one I've ever read, I really like Riden and Alosa as characters, so it was fun watching them play around with eachother.
Another positive aspect is the characters in general- I wouldn't call them very fleshed out as we really don't get much background other than a one liner for some of them, but they feel real. I love the idea of a majority woman pirate crew, it's satisfying since pirates are so painfully often a bunch of white dudes.

In all, Tricia Levenseller is a decent writer, she just needs work on her climax and action sequences to make them more meaningful. And some gender queer history lessons wouldn't hurt her. I'll be checking out the last book in this series, and I'm both nervous and delighted to find it's about another member of the crew, rather than Alosa. This should be interesting! show less

Definitely 100% leaps and bounds better than Pirate King - however, there were a bunch of spelling/grammar errors that just drove me insane. The story overall was amazing - it was a unique take on a siren - I have never read something like that before. There was a lot of mayhem and it was very exciting, though a lot of it was predictable it was still entertaining. Definitely a nice way to finish the series.

Alosa has completed the map and is preparing to go off on the expedition with her father, the Pirate King, to retrieve the missing treasure. But when she discovers her father's biggest secret, her loyalties waver and she sets off on her own instead. But will she and her crew be able to make it to the legendary site before he catches them?

This second installment in the duology did not disappoint! I felt the rush of adventure and the lulls of waiting for wind right along with the crew, fully immersed in the world from the first page. The romance did not disappoint, but I also loved the relationship Alosa has with her entire crew. She is not only their Captain, she is their sister and friend, and she will do anything for them, as they show more will for her.

I will definitely be rereading this many times in the future and can't wait to read more by Tricia! show less

I really struggled with how I was going to review this one. I wanted to rate it five stars like the first one, but I just couldn't. I rated it four stars, but it's more like 4.5 stars. And that is because the romance that started in the first book was so much more frustrating in this book than the first one because Alossa would deny the feelings she had for Riden over and over again for the same stupid reasons, and it became repetitive and annoying. That was the only thing that frustrated me. Other than that, it was a fantastic book. I also went the audiobook route with this one, and I definitely recommend the audiobooks for this series.