To Kill a Kingdom

I've been in the mood for a pirate fantasy for a long time now, and this was the only thing I could find that seemed like it would satisfy that. This book wasn't perfect, but oh, boy did it fill the pirate-sized hole in my heart.

So why did I like this book? And what was missing for me? (Keep in mind that a lot of these are preference things, and may not apply to you at all.)



PRO: SETTING.

If there was ever a setting I needed right now, Alexandra Christo captured it perfectly. The sunny, semi-tropical setting explored in To Kill a Kingdom perfectly encapsulates the bright Denmark coastline found in Disney's The Little Mermaid. It's intoxicating and fun, and I have been thinking about it obsessively since finishing this novel.


^^Most of the show more book had this vibe. It wasn't described as looking this way, but, ya know, same energy.

CON: SETTING.

As I said, I enjoyed the setting of this book quite a bit. That is, until the last 1/4 of the book. Regardless of medium, I have never liked harsh wintery settings. I don't mind snow or even a blizzard. But Siberian-type winters like the one explored here just don't appeal to me. I know that's a preference thing, but I thought I'd mention it anyway.

PRO: CHARACTERS.

I know this is a bit of a controversial one. Even so, I genuinely enjoyed our characters and their development. It was easy for me to feel like I knew them all. Everyone had their own voice, and any character that needed to had some pretty great development. And we love some good character development.

CON: PACING.

This was probably the only thing in this book that bothered me enough to bring it down a star. This book somehow managed to feel like it was too short, and too long, at the same time. The book couldn't be any longer as it was (it would feel tedious), but if the author had added one more small subplot, this book could have easily been 100 pages longer, and the whole story would have felt complete. There were just a lot of things that were shortened or missing that could have been beneficial to the story.

PRO & CON COMBINED: ROMANCE.

I have some mixed feelings about the romance in this book. It isn't that I didn't love it (who doesn't love a classic I'm-gonna-kill-you enemies-to-lovers romance???), but there were some things missing for me, which are all technically spoilers. So I'm sorry if you haven't read the book and don't want any spoilers. I guess you'll just have to trust me.

That first kiss, for instance. There were so many things that irritated me with that: the fact that she was the one to initiate it--it didn't make sense for her character (it should have been him). The fact that there was no description of it (I don't need too much, but c'mon, gimme something. ANYTHING. We've waited this long.)

And then there was the way that their inevitable falling-out near the end was resolved far too quickly to make sense. Fight me on this.

CONCLUSION.

From what I can tell after reading quite a few negative reviews of this book, the thing that really ruins this for people is false expectations. There is nothing inherently bad about this book. But you have to understand: this is an enemies-to-lovers romance. While there are some dark siren elements to the story, that is not the point of the novel as a whole. This is a Little Mermaid retelling. This is a slow-paced story about two lonely people finding families, identities, and, thus, homes.

For the most part, as long as you go in with the right expectations, this is a really enjoyable read.

—Elliana Maselli
Thursday, May 20, 2021
10:28AM show less

UPDATE: After a book club discussion of this book, I'm dropping it down to a solid 2 stars. Lazy, confusing, forgettable storytelling that had potential and missed the mark by a long shot.

This book was more of a 3.5 when I finished. The main flaw is that it takes a long while for the story to really kick in. Skim until Elian finds Lira in the water. All the exposition and world-building up until then is overdone and almost unnecessary. Christo keeps re-explaining it anyway. I like the witty banter between the two main characters. Everything else is a spoiler.

I don't know. If I were to quickly tagline the book: "A dark re-imagining of The Little Mermaid story". I'm not sure I mean that as a compliment, though. The concept had potential show more and fell short for me. (Also, I am tired of 17yo girls being All That in YA fantasy. You barely know anything. Stahp.) show less

I think my issue with this "dark retelling" of the little mermaid is that the original story is much darker. In that story the mermaid sacrifices her tongue, voice, and life under the sea forever and spends the rest of her days in pain, all for the chance to marry the prince. The prince marries someone else, and because of the spell that makes her human that means she dies and turns to foam.

Now, that's a story that could easily be teased out and expanded to comment on how society reduces women's humanity, autonomy and worth, and how women internalize that. On the misuse of power, and how one retains ones humanity and sense of morality through oppression. Instead, this story reduces the main female protagonists growth as an effect of the show more morality of the male protagonist, instead of focusing on her relationship with her cousin and aunt for instance.

The problem of a retelling is that it always exists in direct dialogue with every other version of that story. For me, the landmark of a good little mermaid retelling is probably When the Water Sang Fire by Leigh Bardugo which is beautiful, haunting and explores male fears and exploitation of female power. What that story has that this one lacks is a willingness to move further from the source material and subvert it. This story stays in the realm of the Disney version, and seems more keen to weave aspects of that into the story than to use it as a jumping of point for something original.

I don't know if I was expecting too much from a YA retelling, but there's some good YA out there. Beyond the lack of depth and reduction of the female protagonist, I just didn't enjoy this story much. The dialogue was good, but the way the first person POV's were written was off to me, and the ancillary characters weren't that fleshed out or memorable. show less

Das wilde Herz der See ♦ Alexandra Christo | Rezension

Aufgrund des Klappentextes hatte ich eine ungefähre Ahnung, was mich in Das wilde Herz der See erwartet. Trotzdem war ich angenehm überrascht, dass diese, eher düstere Young Adult Fantasy Geschichte so fesselnd sein konnte. Abgesehen von Enemies-to-Lovers kam Alexandra Christo gut damit aus, nicht in die üblichen Tropen des Genres zu verfallen. Was mich wirklich angenehm überrascht hat.



Das wilde Herz der See ♦ Alexandra Christo

Meinung

Ich habe ein Herz für jedes Jahr meines Lebens.

Mit diesen Worten von Lira beginnt Das wilde Herz der See aus der Feder von Alexandra Christo und dieser erste Satz konnte mich direkt gefangen nehmen.
Lira ist eine Sirene und die Tochter der show more Meereskönigin. Wegen all der Prinzen, deren Herzen sie herausgerissen hat, ist Lira unter den Menschen und Seeleuten als Fluch der Prinzen bekannt. Weil sie sich nicht an die Regeln der Meereskönigin gehalten hat, bestraft diese Lira, indem sie sie in einen Menschen verwandelt. Wie es das Schicksal so will, wird Lira, jetzt als Mensch, von eben jenem Prinzen gerettet, dessen Herz sie ihrer Mutter bringen soll, Elian.

Elian ist ein mutiger und waghalsiger Sirenenjäger, und er hat kein Interesse daran, an den Thron und die damit einhergehenden Pflichten als König gefesselt zu sein. Er will nur eins, den Tod seine Freundes rächen und damit auch den Fluch der Prinzen zu Fall bringen. Mitsamt seiner Mannschaft begibt sich Elian auf eine riskante Suche nach der einen Sirene. Unterwegs stellt sich heraus, dass eine alte Legende, die Lösung zum Auffinden eines uralten Kristalls und damit zur endgültigen Vernichtung der Meereskönigin und ihrer Sirenen enthalten könnte.

Wir sind gefesselt: er an ein Land und ein vorgezeichnetes Leben, ich an das mörderische Erbe meiner Mutter. Und beide vernehmen wir den Lockruf des Ozeans. Es ist ein Lied von Freiheit und Sehnsucht.

All diese Ereignisse bringen unsere beiden unerwarteten Gefährten zusammen. Doch nur Lira ist sich der Identität beider bewusst, die unter anderen Umständen eher Todfeinde wäre, als sich auf ein gemeinsames Abenteuer einzulassen. Der sarkastische Schlagabtausch zwischen Lira und Elian hat der gesamte Story eine ganz besondere Würze gegeben. Auch die zaghafte Annäherung der Protagonisten hat Christo sehr behutsam in die Handlung eingearbeitet.

Beide Hauptcharaktere haben einige moralisch fragwürdige Eigenschaften inne. Doch während Elian klar als der Held heraussticht, ist Lira die mörderische Antiheldin. Doch je nach Betrachtung der Seiten können sich diese Ansichten auch schnell verschieben. Sowohl Haupt- als auch Nebencharaktere haben Tiefgang und sind in den jeweiligen Situationen klar und deutlich dargestellt.

Fazit

Trotz offensichtlicher Ähnlichkeiten zu Ariel – Die kleine Meerjungfrau ist das Buch nicht für jene zu empfehlen, die nach einer Nacherzählung suchen. Denn davon ist es weit entfernt. Das wilde Herz der See ist düster, teils bösartig und die Protas sind weit davon entfernt, die große Liebe finden zu wollen.
Aber was Leser finden sind Antiheldinnen, Rebellen, uralte Legenden, amüsantes Geplänkel, tiefe Freundschaften und eine sich langsam aufbauende Romanze.


This review was first published at The Art of Reading. show less

I seem to be reading a ton of Mermaid stories lately. I mean, first, I thought it was wild when reading Charles Stross and cool when it was Mira Grant... but lately it's been a closer re-telling after closer re-telling of the original legends. With a very, very regular dose of yet another YA Fantasy plot rehash, of course.

You know what I'm talking about. Boy and girl are on other sides of clashing kingdoms and they're bound to hate each other but they fall for each other anyway and there's a bloody battle and they wind up in each other's arms. A regular dose of yet another YA Fantasy plot rehash, in other words.

WELL. Guess what?

It's the same here.

Fortunately for most of us, and that includes me, if it is done well, it's worth it. We show more like these stories. Ad nauseam. We can't get enough of them. We love the hate at first sight stuff. Obviously, they're going to wind up together.

In this case, it's the race of Sirens with their magic and insurmountable language barrier against the rest of the kingdoms and especially that of Man. Hello, little mermaid, get ready to battle mommy to the death for the right to rule the bloodthirsty kingdom. Oh, wait, here comes the prince of Man.

*crosses-eyes*

BUT, like I said, it's done well and it's enjoyable even if it's very much like everything else we tend to enjoy. Nothing groundbreaking. Ha. Ha. You see what I did there? But the characters are enjoyable and their character arcs are fun and the final realization is satisfying and the magic and battles are very good.

I enjoyed myself DESPITE the first third of the novel making me want to puke. Yeah. It's that kind of novel. :) show less

Alexandra Christo has the most GORGEOUS prose . Every sentence is like a cake Peeta Mellark personally decorated just for you, complete with dolphin swirls and katniss flowers. But I digress. I adored this book! Told in dual perspectives of a siren, princess daughter of the Sea Witch, and a prince of the kingdom of Midas who hunts sires, this had the great twist of the two main protagonists determined to kill each other, only to slow fall for each other.

The world building was intricate and twisty, with a quest of to an ice kingdom and other players complicating things, and I truly enjoyed the fresh take on this world, which is gritty and very fishy at times! I LOVED all the unique underwater descriptions. Quite a delight if you are a show more Little Mermaid fan!

Please excuse typos/name misspellings. Entered on screen reader. show less

Okay, this book first came to my attention on one of those "top twisted fairy tale books" which I'm always willing to try but I'm often skeptical. I'm glad I tried this one though because I was grabbed from the first page. I love how Christo makes sirens such monsters and even after Lira's transformation into human, she still has such a ways to go before she unlearns her monstrous habits. Speaking of, I LOVED Lira and Elian and their relationship and the natural way they drifted together, both so alike and yet incredibly different. I think the reason I loved their relationship so much at the end is because I feel so in love with them as characters separately first.

Anyway, if you want an INCREDIBLE and very dark take on "The Little show more Mermaid," please pick up this book.

Also....any chance of a sequel??? show less