The Queen of the Tearling

“Even a book can be dangerous in the wrong hands, and when that happens, you blame the hands, but you also read the book.”

4.5 STARS

Okay, let's get one thing straight: this is not a YA novel. This is by all means an adult novel, simply with a very young main character. And because of that, it's not like the YA books with their fast paced adventures. The Queen of the Tearling takes its time to explain the world, to develop its beauty and its squalor, and it makes it a very, very slow read. It does pick up in the end, but many will go in expecting the immediate YA call to action, which this doesn't really have. Now, this by no means makes this a bad book. I think it was actually really good, it's plot was just slow as molasses. But if you could move past that, let yourself soak in the world, absorb everything up, and let the story slowly take you along a calm river rather than rapids, it's amazing. The sheer magnitude of the world Johansen has crafted is mind-boggling. The story begins with the young Queen of the Tearling, Kelsea, who at nineteen has now come of age to claim the throne. Her mother, having died when she was twenty-eight before sending Kelsea away to live with Barty and Carlin in a small cottage, had left the position open to Thomas, her brother and the current Regent. He has squandered the Tearling, breaking it economically and socially with slave treaties to the Tear's neighbor Mortmesne. So the story begins. The Characters Because there was so much time to focus on introspection so the characters were very well rounded, well, most of them. Kelsea, Lazarus of the Mace, Javel, Arlen Thorne, Thomas, and many others were well developed and you could see their points of view and what they were thinking. However, especially with the Queen's Guard, a lot of names were thrown out all at once and they were extremely hard to keep track of, and weren't really straightened out until the very end of the book. Now, Kelsea is not the typical herione. She is heavyset, with her face as 'round and ruddy as a tomato' and certainly doesn't view herself to be attractive. Now, I was all for having a main character who wasn't a supermodel, but she mentioned her looks so often and was down on herself so much it seemed to consume the majority of her character. Now, I completely understand why Johansen did this, because it is definitely at the forefront of Kelsea's mind, but it shouldn't be. The lack of confidence put a bad skew on her character, which is intentional, but it was hard to read. But when things get down to it, Kelsea was strong as iron and her rule would be one of steel. One of my favorite parts of this book was the relationship between Kelsea and the Mace. It felt to me extremely similar to Daenerys Targaryen and Ser Jorah Mormont, though not with the same creeper romance as in A Song of Ice and Fire. But that equal, advising relationship they had was entertaining and I liked how sarcastic and comfortable Kelsea was with her Guard as they got to knew one another. Overall the characters were interesting and the primary characters held their own, but a lot of the secondary ones fell into the background, just white noise in the huge epic of the story. The Writing Again, because Johansen took so long to explain everything, the book was extremely beautifully written, every sentence crafted with care. We got to see from several different points of view, not just Kelsea, which was refreshing and interesting. Each had a different voice, motivated by different things in their own threads of the plotline, and it made the story much more well developed with so many voices. Though at times it seemed a little heavy, or a little too descriptive, I really liked Johansen's style. It was complex, interwoven, and delicate, but defined as well. The only complaint I have with it is that I could fall out of it pretty easily, getting lost sometimes in that tapestry she crafted, but overall you could fit yourself easily within the words. The Story I will say once more: THIS IS NOT YA AND IT IS SLOW AS MOLASSES UNTIL THE LAST HUNDRED PAGES. But that's okay because the world is so interesting, the characters so captivating, and the political intrigue so gripping. I think the hardest part of this book to understand is, in fact, how this world came to be. It's a slash between dystopia and fantasy. In snippets through the novel we start to understand that there was a Crossing of American and European countries (I'm not sure if the other continents were included or not) 'discovered a new sea' and sailed across it to find a new continent. Did it just rise out of the ocean? Did Earth get hit with a meteor and it made a new land mass? And MY GOD THE MOST DUMB THING IN THIS BOOK WAS THAT ALL THE DOCTORS WERE ON ONE SHIP, ALL THE MEDICINE AND EQUIPMENT, AND IT CRASHED AND ALL OF THEM DIED HOW DAMN STUPID CAN YOU BE DON'T PUT ALL YOUR EGGS IN ONE BUCKET, MY GOD HAS HISTORY TAUGHT YOUNOTHING? There are so many questions, so many things I want to have answered and it's though not typical, though it's not easy to get through, The Queen of the Tearling is most certainly worth reading. Share your thoughts!