Review ~ Radiance by Grace Draven

Posted February 28, 2015 by Karen in Book Reviews / 0 Comments

Review ~ Radiance by Grace DravenRadiance by Grace Draven
Also by this author: Master of Crows
Series: Wraith Kings #1
Published by Independently Published on January 11, 2015
Genres: Fantasy, Paranormal, Romance
Pages: 296
Format: eBook
ISBN: 1506119719
ASIN: B00S5IDLEQ
Goodreads
four-half-stars

THE PRINCE OF NO VALUE

Brishen Khaskem, prince of the Kai, has lived content as the nonessential spare heir to a throne secured many times over. A trade and political alliance between the human kingdom of Gaur and the Kai kingdom of Bast-Haradis requires that he marry a Gauri woman to seal the treaty. Always a dutiful son, Brishen agrees to the marriage and discovers his bride is as ugly as he expected and more beautiful than he could have imagined.

THE NOBLEWOMAN OF NO IMPORTANCE 

Ildiko, niece of the Gauri king, has always known her only worth to the royal family lay in a strategic marriage. Resigned to her fate, she is horrified to learn that her intended groom isn’t just a foreign aristocrat but the younger prince of a people neither familiar nor human. Bound to her new husband, Ildiko will leave behind all she’s known to embrace a man shrouded in darkness but with a soul forged by light.

Two people brought together by the trappings of duty and politics will discover they are destined for each other, even as the powers of a hostile kingdom scheme to tear them apart.

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Page Break 5

 

Karen two Cents

 

4.25 STARS 

Grace Draven in Radiance does what some more well known fantasy writers fail at; Draven pulls the reader into her world, and doesn’t try to crush the reader under too complex a world.   Draven’s world building is fresh, and just nuance enough to keep a fantasy reader enthralled, without being a labyrinth of unnecessary pitfalls for the reader.

Draven’s story revolves around the arranged marriage between a Kai Prince and a human noble woman from a neighbor province.  Problem is that Kai are not human, and both species find each other physically repellent.  Despite the Kai not being humans, they are humanoid in appearance.

In Radiance, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but in book explores  beauty as coming from the soul.  Both characters are used as pawns by their countries and families, to form an alliance.  The joy that these two characters find in their unlikely alliance is such a sweet love story.  There is no instant ‘I Love You’ between the two, they actually get to know each other.  They discover so much about each other.

The backstory of Brishen, the Kai princes life, and upbringing is shocking. I would have like more interaction between Brishen and his brother; as we never got to know what type of relationship they had.  The Kai people are portrayed as insular, but I wondered if this was because of something, or did they just not want to be part of the greater world. The are also apart of the Elder races, which I hope Draven expands on in her sequel.

The world that Draven has built is seen via the newcomer Ildiko eyes, as she is a fish out of water in the Kai world.  Draven does jump ahead two months of her settling into her new home and I wish I could have seen Ildiko interacting more with the household, getting glimpse of her learning to naviagate her new home.

four-half-stars

About Grace Draven

I’m an author and Louisiana native living in Texas with my husband, three smalls and a big doofus dog. I have lived in Spain, hiked the Teton Mountains, honeymooned in Scotland, ridden in competition rodeo and am the great great granddaughter of a Nicaraguan president. I also hate doing laundry and refuse to iron anything.

I’ve loved storytelling since forever. I published my first short story with Amber Quill Press and have since written several other tales. A love of the bad boy in fiction always inspires me.

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