First Published : March 2018

Genre : Fiction, Fantasy, YA, Romance

My Rating : ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Read it some time ago, like way back in May, but only got a chance to put this here now.

Ok so right off the bat, this isn’t the typical hate to love masked as enemy to lovers story. This is a kill or get killed kind of a dynamics. An enemies to lovers done mostly right!

I am not a romance enthusiast, but I think it was done with enough maturity. Our protagonists, siren princess Lira and the human prince Elian, both have their own reasons to be at each other’s throat. When they form a temporary alliance, they get to know each other through each other’s actions and slowly realise how, despite their differences, they have things in common too. It’s not a slow burn but also not a story of ‘hate him but he is so hot that I cannot stop myself from being attracted to him’. (🤢 That’s one trope I cannot get behind!).

There are few things, if done differently, might have made it more appealing to me. Things felt a bit rushed in the end. Their relationship could have been fletched out more. The villian felt like she came right out of a Cdrama (Chinese Drama). The last boss battle was, in my opinion, underwhelming.

But overall a good YA novel.