To Kill a Kingdom by Alexandra Christo
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

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 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. :)

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