Queen of Myth and Monsters by Scarlett St. Clair

Isolde, newly coronated queen, has finally found a king worthy of her in the vampire Adrian. But their love for each other has cost Isolde her father and her homeland. With two opposing goddesses playing mortals and vampires like chess pieces against one another, Isolde is uncertain who her allies are in the vampire stronghold of Revekka.

Now, as politics in the Red Palace grow more underhanded and a deadly blood mist threatens all of Cordova, Isolde must trust in the bond she’s formed with Adrian, even as she learns troubling information about his complicated past.

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The highly anticipated sequel to King of Battle and Blood ended up being a somewhat chaotic filler novel. This is always my fear with books that are second in a series. Unless done right, it’s a book full of information that sets up the real plot for the next book, making it a dry read in comparison to the first in the series. That’s exactly what happened here. I absolutely loved the first book. I read it in one sitting and it reminded me of one of my favourite Nightworld couples from long past. This sequel, however, seems to have lost some of the mystery that made the first book so intriguing. One of the reasons I was so excited for it was to see Isolde and Adrian’s relationship grow. But instead, it reverted. No spoilers here, right from chapter one they’re miscommunicating, fighting, and making up. Rinse. Repeat. I was disappointed that, instead of adding extra tension to the pair in their now established and TRUSTING relationship, the author instead decided to undo any growth from the first novel for the sake of having them “make-up” twenty times throughout this book. There was also some plot devices that felt either too rushed in some areas to unnecessary in others. I still love these characters and find this world fascinating and I feel like she set up for book 3 very well, I just wish this one had a bit more purpose. Let’s dig into it.

This is set in a world ruled by vampires, a world cursed. Isolde has discovered her past self and her entire world has shifted with those memories, now, her and Adrian must find a way to move on while solving the current threat. A new and dangerous witch has escaped with a very important book, but odd things are happening around the kingdom and new dangers are around every corner. In the first book the main plot was Isolde discovering the secret of her life and her past, in this book, the main plot was a lot more complicated and I couldn’t really tell you what the main goal was. And that’s the major problem. There should be an end goal in mind, a quest, even a side journey, something to give this sequel some structure and there wasn’t.

Isolde is a strong character and is a very opinionated person with a lot of power, and no idea what to do with it. This makes for a very interesting character journey ahead but we didn’t get very far in this book on that journey. I fully believe it’s because a lot of the growth will be coming in the next book. I liked Isolde in this one and she was the one character that seemed the most similar to book 1, however I do think she needs to work on her problem solving skills. Adrian was completely out of character in this book in my opinion. Given what we seen in book 1 and the flashbacks, the devotion he has to his friends and his people and Isolde seemed to be very surface level in this book. Their relationship also suffered drastically in this book but because of minor plot points which made it seem like maybe their relationship wasn’t as deep as we were lead to believe. This really disappointed me because their dynamic was one of the main selling points on this series for me. It seemed like every chapter had them all domestic, then fighting, they lying, then fighting again, then making up, and ending on them doubting each other again, setting up for the same thing in the next chapter, and the one after that. There needs to be a level of trust even a small one for that relationship to continue working and it feels like that wasn’t there at all in this book.

There were many events in this book, mostly bad luck events that make you feel like the side you’re rooting for is losing, which means you KNOW the next book will have some amazing comebacks. However, because of this, I felt pretty hopeless for most of this book and that’s not really a feeling I enjoy when I’m committing myself to a long fantasy series. Because there was so much going on, it was easy to fly through this book but a lot of it seemed very disconnected. Again, I’m assuming this is because it will all be tied together in the next book, but that’s why I’m not a fan of filler novels. They just feel disjointed.

I still loved reading about this world and seeing Isolde and Adrian again, I just had different expectations in mind when I first picked this book up. I will continue reading this series, I have hopes that the next one will fill the expectations I had this time around. I gave this one 3 stars. But if you’ve never read the series, I highly recommend the first book as it’s a 5 star read all around and could potentially be read as a standalone if you don’t want to continue on.