Lis is working two jobs to pay off her mother's medical bills. Creston is a prince who is sent to find her and bring her back to the neighboring kingdom. She does not know she is a princess, and he is hesitant to tell her for fear she will run. He discovers she is deaf. She does not believe him about being a princess until her mother's lawyer turns up at work giving her a letter from her mother telling her about her father. She agrees to go with Creston for a visit. Their attraction grows the more time they spend together. Will she be accepted by her father and his family? Will she stay?

I enjoyed this story. Creston and Lis are a perfect couple, just made for each other. She brings out the best in him. He accepts her with no hesitation. Her father is not happy with him but soon realizes that Lis can take care of herself. Lis is absolutely adorable. I really liked his parents. They may be king and queen, but they don't let it interfere with their love. His mother is great! I'm on the fence about his older brother but he seems to give good advice. I loved this story! It is a feel-good story and a keeper.

Samantha Rousseau barely even notices the royals visiting her college campus. She's a wildlife biology grad student specializing in raptors. Between taking care of injured raptors, teaching classes, convincing her truck to keep working, and dealing with her stepfather's medical bills, there isn't much time in her life for anything else. Then she gets invited to what she thinks is dinner with a potential donor, only to be told that she's one of Lilaria's lost royals. The queen wants to reinstate her title and lands, which would mean leaving her studies and life in Minnesota behind. On the plus side, Lilaria is supposed to have an excellent healthcare system - they might have more effective treatments for her stepfather's prostate cancer, and it would certainly be better for her finances.

It's a lot for Samantha to think about, and unfortunately there isn't much quiet time for thinking. Reporters immediately start swarming, and her classes are suddenly filled with people who definitely aren't interested in birds. Then there's the gorgeous and enticing Prince Alex. Is he really as interested in her as he seems, or is he just trying to convince her to go to Lilaria and accept her title? And even if he is interested in her, what sort of relationship could she, an American who knows nothing about royal life and can't speak a word of Lilarian, hope to have with a prince?

If you've read and enjoyed other "ordinary person discovers they're a royal" stories, there's really nothing new here. This wasn't a bad book, but it wasn't great either, and in some ways it suffered from me having read (and enjoyed) Alyssa Cole's A Princess in Theory a year ago.

Samantha was an okay heroine, but a little too prone to jealousy for my tastes. The romance's timeline didn't help - during Samantha and Alex's first kiss (right in front of the mouse that Samantha had just sliced up for the injured raptors), I found myself doing the math, and I'm pretty sure they'd known each other for less than 24 hours. No matter how well they connected, both of them should have had reasons to want to take it slow. Samantha was dealing with the revelations about her family and trying to make a life-changing decision. Alex had a relatively recent relationship scandal - he knew full well what the paparazzi could do if they caught a whiff of anything between him and Samantha. Also, they'd literally just met.

The story was surprisingly low conflict. Every time I thought Chase had introduced a character or detail that was going to become a drama time bomb, nothing came of it. The zookeeper who seemed overly interested in Samantha? Mentioned once or twice later on and then never again. Alex's most recent ex? Zero on-page appearances. Prince Alex's sister's romantic life didn't turn into an enormous scandal, none of Alex's other exes were horrible to Samantha, and no one had problems with Samantha becoming a Lilarian duchess. Even Chadwick's relationship problems were resolved without any drama (and while it's great that the book includes a gay couple, you can bet I noticed and raised an eyebrow at their complete lack of on-page appearances together - not even an on-page phone conversation). Most of the book was devoted to Samantha deciding to go to Lilaria, getting used to her new life, fretting about her growing feelings for Alex, and worrying about her stepfather.

Speaking of Samantha's stepfather, I wasn't wild about how the medical stuff was handled. Each chapter started with a news headline, and Chapter 9's was "Lilarian Health Care Makes Headway with Homeopathic Medicines." I spent the rest of the book wondering whether Chase was going to make homeopathy the miracle cure for Samantha's stepfather's cancer (FYI, "homeopathic medicine" is garbage and I consider the word "homeopathic" on product packaging to be an immediate red flag). Now that I've finished the book, I think what Chase was using things like "homeopathic medicine" (87), "holistic and natural methods" (93), and "herbal supplements" (93) as shorthand for "Lilarian doctors are more flexible." Considering that it ultimately made no difference in Samantha's stepfather's medical treatment (chemo), I wish Chase had written about the Lilarian specialist differently.

All in all, this was an okay but fairly forgettable book. It's unfortunate that it's first-person POV - I didn't hate that aspect, but there's an excerpt from the second book, which is also first-person POV but from the perspective of Prince Alex's sister, and Samantha and Cathy's "voices" aren't distinct enough for my tastes. I don't intend to read the next book in the series.

(Original review posted on A Library Girl's Familiar Diversions.)

I write this review as a member of Rosie’s Book Review Team (authors, check here if you want to get your book reviewed) and thank her and the author for the ARC copy of the book, which I freely chose to review.

I love fairy tales. I know some of the classic ones are cruel, harsh, and less than politically correct, but I do love them. And I am always intrigued by new versions of old fairy tales, or completely new fairy tales.

This short fairy tale has elements of the classics: a King and father, insisting that his daughter must marry the man of his choice (for political reasons); a Princess and daughter, Faith, who wants to follow her heart (she hardly knows Jaeger, the young prince she is due to marry. She always assumed she would marry the older, more mature, Mikhail, who is known for his caring attitude towards his people, although she does not know him well either); a challenge/mission… This time, the princess is not just passively waiting for a prince to come and rescue her (although she hopes Mikhail, who has been missing for a long time, will come back before her 19^th birthday when she is supposed to get married). She decides to go to her father and make a deal with him. She wants to prove that she is not a useless thing that needs looking after. Her father agrees that if she can survive for three months in the forest, without any outside help, she will be free to marry whomever, whenever.

Faith is headstrong, rushed, and impulsive. She knows that she lives a life where she is totally dependent on others, (princesses don’t even get dressed by themselves), and has been trying to learn how to do things for herself, but she soon realises she has not thought things through. She should have negotiated the conditions of her deal to her advantage (she does not even have appropriate shoes to wear, does not know how to light a fire, and has no weapons to defend herself from wild animals or any other dangers she might encounter).

Faith learns a lot in the three months she spends in the forest. She meets a hermit who helps her (despite her insistence that she does not want to cheat); she realises that she must think before she acts and that we need to learn to walk before we can run. Her beliefs are put to the test, as are her prejudices, and although she knows she has a specific role to play due to her position in life and she is not free to do as she likes, she cannot help but end up feeling quite close to the hermit.

The story, written in the third person, is made up of vivid vignettes illustrating both, Faith’s life in the castle at first, and then her attempts at survival in the forest (mostly unsuccessful and lucky escapes, including a lovely interlude with a bear cub). This is not a story about a girl who suddenly discovers she is good at everything and has a natural talent to survive in the wild. She makes mistakes, is sorely unprepared, and keeps getting into trouble. She is about to give up but the hermit helps her and convinces her to keep going. The story dedicates much more time to the first couple of days when we meet Faith and she goes into the forest, than it does to the rest of the three months. Although there are some stirrings of a possible romance, and Faith has to admit to having developed feelings for the hermit, she is more passionate about tasting some chocolate after not having tried it for a few months than she is about any of the men in her life.

As some other reviewers have noted, this is no magical fairy tale, this is the tale of a determined (obstinate?) girl who learns the value of being prepared, of working hard for what you want, and of being truly independent.

The big reveal will not be a surprise to most readers, although it does tie things up nicely, and the actual ending, which some readers feel is a bit rushed, I thought made perfect sense and proved that Faith had learned from her experience and grown up.

The actual fairy tale is shorter than the e-book length suggests, as it contains a sample of the next fairy tale in the series (that looks quite good too).

An original fairy tale, which could facilitate interesting discussions about female role models (beware of the mention of her purity, which might be difficult to explain to very young kids), and the first of what looks like a very interesting series.

From mortal enemies to unexpected allies, two teenagers try to protect everything that matters most.

Ella Harper has met every challenge that life has thrown her way. She’s tough, resilient, and willing to do whatever it takes to defend the people she loves, but the challenge of a long-lost father and a boyfriend whose life is on the line might be too much for even Ella to overcome.

Reed Royal has a quick temper and even faster fists. But his tendency to meet every obstacle with violence has finally caught up with him. If he wants to save himself and the girl he loves, he’ll need to rise above his tortured past and tarnished reputation.

No one believes Ella can survive the Royals. Everyone is sure Reed will destroy them all.

They may be right.

With everything and everyone conspiring to keep them apart, Ella and Reed must find a way to beat the law, save their families, and unravel all the secrets in their Twisted Palace.

Twisted Palace, the third and final book in Reed and Ella’s story. Again not much can be said without spoiling it so I will make it short again.

We were left hanging a with a huge cliffhanger and I was  happy that I already had book three. The wait would have killed me.

This book seemed a bit slower than the first two and a lot if things were not resolved until the end. But overall like the two previous books I enjoyed it a lot.

Papa Royal plays a bigger role in this book, which I enjoyed and I wish I could get more of him. Maybe someday he will get his HEA.  We don’t get as much of Easton, which I dint like as much, because, well he is Easton and my fav.

A ‘new’ person we found out about at the end of book two, is a lot in this book and I don’t think I was a fan at all. It all just sort if seemed off.

We get plenty of Ella and Reed, so that was a bonus. Plus more school drama which again I enjoyed way more than I should have.

Overall, while a bit slower I still enjoyed this book and thought it was a great conclusion to the books.

I’m looking forward to reading Easton’s books but think I wait until they all out again in case of cliffhangers.

I rate this book 4★ but the overall story was a 5★ and super addicting.

THESE ROYALS WILL RUIN YOU...

Reed Royal has it all—looks, status, money. The girls at his elite prep school line up to date him, the guys want to be him, but Reed never gave a damn about anyone but his family until Ella Harper walked into his life.

What started off as burning resentment and the need to make his father’s new ward suffer turned into something else entirely—keep Ella close. Keep Ella safe. But when one foolish mistake drives her out of Reed’s arms and brings chaos to the Royal household, Reed’s entire world begins to fall apart around him.

Ella doesn’t want him anymore. She says they’ll only destroy each other.

SHE MIGHT BE RIGHT.

 There is not much I can say about this book without spoiling it or that has not been said yet. So I make it short

Unlike the first book we get dual view…… Reed and Ella which is great and gives us the chance to get to know Reed better and what drives him.

The books starts off with Reeds POV and right or even a few minutes before the last book left us hanging…… Much of the book we know what drives him … Ella and how to make u for the ending of last book.  We see how much the family really liked Emma and what an impact she made

Ella is making progress but sometimes she is just a bit annoying but then again I could see where she is coming from and understood her. Given her past.

I also liked Papa Royal a tiny bit more; we see that he is not as clueless as we might have thought. It always kind of bothered me that he seemed clueless.

Of course there us more drama in school and it wouldn’t be the same without it. We get plenty of Easton which was A OKAY t for me, since he is still my favorite Royal. We not getting much of the twins but that was okay. I always just saw them as an extension or so.

This book like that last ends with a cliffhanger and much bigger than the last. We get two things thrown at us that leave us hanging in the air. And they are both HUGE. One I had no idea and the other one I sort of saw coming and figured they could play that way. Either way a cruel way to let us hanging lol .

I rate this book 5 ★