I took a chance on this one, being unfamiliar with the author and I think she’s a new favorite of mine.

Told in alternating first-person POVs, this drops the reader right into a very dark world, where a young queen has to fight just to survive, let alone maintain anything else—like her wealth and family legacy, etc.

I loved the female lead, for the most part. She is only 17 years old, yet is brilliant and free-thinking and very self-aware. (I did find this plausible for the situations she was raised in / and then found herself in.)