•full review posted now• “On our wedding night," she said, "I will cut out your tongue and swallow it. Then both tongues that spoke our marriage vows will belong to me, and I will be wed only to myself. You will most likely choke to death on your own blood, which will be unfortunate, but I will be both husband and wife and therefore not a widow to be pitied.” I'm in the process of giving my grades up for adoption because I'm unfit to raise them myself. Is there any possibility tha

its been about three months since I've read this this and despite hating it, I'm still going to read the next book because I want the pain everyone feels reading this series!!! I still hope the next book will be better!!!! the only problem is that I literally remember nothing from this book. it's so forgetful, oops. 🤷🏻‍♀️----I want pain ;) and death ;) and feels ;) and all the good things everyone promises ;) otherwise you might find me attending my own funeral ;) because i'll be dead from the d...

Dear Kiersten White,Thank you for restoring my faith in the YA Fantasy genre. I’ve had bad luck with it this year and I really needed someone to show me that the genre wasn’t the problem, and I wasn’t the problem, but instead I was just reading the wrong books.Thank you for making me feel so much. For filling me up to the brim with emotion. Love, hatred, happiness, despair, frustration, glee, anxiety, passion. I felt it all while reading And I Darken and I can’t remember the last time a book did...

“So the question becomes, Daughter of the Dragon, what will you sacrifice? What will you let be taken away so that you, too, can have power?” 4 1/2 stars. This book is totally fucked up. In the best possible way.Well, holy shit. Even with the positive reviews rolling in, that was completely unexpected. How do I begin to explain this vicious little nightmare of a book? All I know is: it's different to anything else I've read.And I Darken is dark, gritty and compelling. It pulled me into its da

$1.99 on kindle right now! 6-26-17. As far as I know, it's US pricing Re-Read 2017 I had to read this book again for the new book next week. I love it so freaking much! This time I listened to it on audio from Overdrive (It's now on my audible wishlist) The narrator, Fiona Hardingham did a wonderful job! It was so nice to be back in Lada's world. She's just so tough but I did feel sorry for her with the love interest but it's extremely complicated. She lets her guard down a little in that area b...

Listen. Listen. I adore this series. I love it in my soul. Buuuuuut this is a great example of a series where book one is a great setup but book two is where the payoff is. Even though I had some issues here, it should be noted that book two, Now I Rise, is one of my all-time favorite books, improving on every one of my issues with this book.. Top five-single-books-ever level. Feel free to drop on over to my review. I admit that I loved this slightly more while reading it - I think time and medi...

“So the question becomes, Daughter of the Dragon, what will you sacrifice? What will you let be taken away so that you, too, can have power?” A gem of a book.It was savage and brilliant, a bloody tale of politics laced with tainted relationships, betrayals and desire. For freedom, for power, for human touch. For greatness.In And I Darken, Kiersten White travels through time to medieval Wallachia, a vassal state of the blooming Ottoman Empire. To the court of Vlad Dracul, the cruel fat

Kiersten White deciding to write this: "Diversity win! The ottoman warlord desecrating your small village is a bottom!" (original post on tumblr by @saltysalmonkid)(This was initially a way longer review, detailing all the way in which the author shat all over my country's history. Please be aware whatever you think of saying to me about my low rating, I've probably heard it already. People saying "but it is fantasy" do not understand that my issue is not with a poorly written FICTION, but by on...

Why, oh why, oh why, OH FUCKING WHY do English-speaking authors insist on using Slavic names, which they obviously keep fucking misusing????? Can anyoone please explain to me in a layman's terms what so chic or risque can there be about using names you don't know how to use? Have the editors gone extinct? Is there some grand conspiracy to keep me properly irritated? Why the blazing fads can they not get into their obviously thicker than average heads that a boy would be called Vladislav, Alexand...

'And I Darken' was the first book that I've ever read by Ms. Kiersten White, but it certainly won't be the last. The first book in 'The Conquerers' series, it managed to completely captivate me. I am both intrigued, enamored, and at times appalled, by these characters and the turbulent world that they occupy.Lada Dragwlya is an unlikely heroine. She's unattractive, uncouth and at times, downright mean. She's everything her father had hoped for in a son, but got in his daughter. Her only redeemin...

Seven of my favorite Bookish Villains in one BookTube Video! The Written Review Rivetingly dark and heartbreakingly human. the nurse offered her own prayer.Let her be strong.Let her be sly.And let her be ugly. Much like the nurse's prayer, Lada Dragwlya grew up single-minded, cruel and absolutely ruthless. Completely in contrast to her beautiful younger brother, Radu. “So the question becomes, Daughter of the Dragon, what will you sacrifice? What will you let be taken away so that

4.5 stars I didn't believe all the high ratings, and now here I am with them.A good example of why it's good to try authors again, btw. I'd read a couple of the author's earlier books and found them likable if a bit unmemorable, but there was absolutely no indication that one day she'd write a brutal book--or an uncompromising heroine--like this. Vlad the Impaler re-imagined as an aggressive girl! Fantastic.

This was truly an epic book. There is a twist in this book, and trust me when I say that you will not see it coming.It has a heroine who flaunts herself as the "anti-princess" and in that sense, the book does not disappoint. Lada - our "female Vlad the Impaler" hooked (impaled?) me from the start. Even as a child in the nursery, she was fierce. Like her brother, Lada had big eyes, but hers were close-set, with arched bows that made her look perpetually cross. Her hair was a tangled mass, so da...

Ever since I read this particular quote taken from And I Darken, I've been enchanted:“On our wedding night," she said, "I will cut out your tongue and swallow it. Then both tongues that spoke our marriage vows will belong to me, and I will be wed only to myself. You will most likely choke to death on your own blood, which will be unfortunate, but I will be both husband and wife and therefore not a widow to be pitied.”And also that beautiful cover didn't hurt. This review contains *spoilers*.A...

Ever heard of Vlad the Impaler? He had a reputation for cruelty throughout Europe. He took pleasure in torturing and killing his enemies with his most preferred method being impalement. He was also the inspiration for Dracula. Imagine an alternate history with Vlad the Impaler as a girl. This is our story. And I Darken follows Lada’s life from the very beginning. We start in 1435 Transylvania with Vlad Dracul taking in the fact that his wife has given birth to a girl. Such a disgrace because sh...

She sat beside his bed for a long while. Finally, she put a hand on his shoulder and whispered, “You are mine.” If you’re looking for a fast paced book with lots of action and historical accuracy you better turn around and leave this review, because I can guarantee that you won’t get either of those two things if you start to read “And I Darken”. If you’re looking for a slow paced and very character driven story that has quite a unique setting and lives and breathes intrigues and machinations......

here's a message to this book: ——1st Read:IT WAS SO GOOD I LOVED IT SO MUCH I HAVE NOTHING BUT AMAZING WORDS FOR THIS BOOK. I LOVED LADA, I LOVED SHE WAS UNPREDICTABLE AND I LOVE HOW SHE DEFIED EVERYTHING!!! IT WAS THE BEST HOLY

in the interest of full transparency, this was not what i was expecting. not in the least. and i think its due to the fact this book is labelled as fantasy, which is misleading because there was no fantasy element to this story at all. its straight up historical fiction. this was about two siblings who befriend mehmed (the conquerer) and experience his early years as the sultan of the ottoman empire. but the more i think about it, the more i actually enjoyed this? which surprises me because worl...

First book of 2017 complete. Really unique story and i did really enjoy it. Some parts were confusing but the majority was brilliant! I thought there would be magic involved but it was not, still really good!

"It is the way of the world. You can be the aggressor, you can fight against crusaders on their own land, or you can stay at home and wait for them to come to you. And they would come. They would come with fire, with disease, with swords and blood and death. Weakness is an irresistible lure." 4.5 stars.Lada made an awesome first impression, not everyone can claim to be a badass right from birth. She wasn't exactly relatable - most of the time I couldn't figure out what her motivations were -