Arc Review: Kiss of the Royal

Title: Kiss of the Royal by Lindsey Duga
Pages: 319
Rating: 4 stars

***Update
This book has been published this July and is therefore available for purchase.

**** I received a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This is by far the most unique book I’ve read this year. As the title suggests, it involves a lot of kisses and kissing between royals. It’s just not in the way you would expect. Kisses in this world are a powerful weapon used by royals to defeat evil.

The main character, Princess Ivy possesses the most powerful kiss since she is a direct descendant of the great Queen Myriana. Together with her new partner Zach and her page Bromley, they set out to find and destroy an object of great evil that may bring about the destruction of their world.

What follows in the next a hundred plus pages is an adventure packed with magical action and plagued with evil creatures. Goblins, witches and wraiths, this book has them all. Ironically, despite the liberal use of kisses in this book, most of the characters don’t believe in love or romance. Those who do, (the Romantica) are considered evil and dangerous.

To be honest, I was not sure about the whole kissing thing when I began the book. I did not see how the whole story would work out. It is good to be proven wrong, because this was better than I had expected. Apart from the fantasy and action, this book also contains romance which slowly builds up to a beautiful ending without overshadowing the actual plot.

My favorite character was Zach. He is the swoon worthy kind of character male character I love in books. Ivy was my least favorite character even though her point of view was the one used in the book and everything was centered on her. Everything about her was a huge contradiction. What we are told about her and what her actions show are two different things. She is said to be powerful and well trained since she was a little girl but there is no evidence of this. I wish there were more instances in which we are shown her power instead of being told about it. For obvious reasons I can’t argue about Zach being powerful because I saw it many times. So what about his equally powerful partner? Other than that I have no legitimate complaints about this book. I recommend this to:
→ Fantasy readers
→YA readers
→YA romance readers

Happy Reading.