My initial
thoughts on starting this were "this is weird." When I hear George
Washington, I think of the 1700's. But hearing this in conjunction with
laptops, the internet, and their phones, it threw me for a loop at the very
beginning. But as time went on, I got more used to it. And that's when I
started to enjoy the story so much more.
All we've ever
known for America is a democracy. But what if America was run by royalty
instead? What is George Washington was a king and not an elected President and
has run America for 200 years? Suddenly things are changing. Princess Beatrice
is the next up on the throne and she’s the first girl to do so. Then there’s
her sister, Princess Samantha, who is “spare” no one cares about. And Prince
Jefferson, who missed the throne by one generation, is spending most of his
time fighting off girls who are fighting over him.
I
hate the saying “it was like watching a train crash and not being able to look
away,” but that’s exactly what this was. I didn’t hate it, but at some points it
was just way too much drama. I get that this is the more than likely how things
would happen, with all the rumors and
backstabbing and Instagram drama, but that’s normally what I would stay away
from. My anxiety spikes when that stuff happens IRL, so I was pretty surprised
when I listened to all of this.
As
for the characters, I don’t remember really liking any of them except Beatrice.
She was willing to do whatever it took to remain herself. She didn’t let anyone
change her. She was tough as nails and still stood tall after it was all said
and done. The one I despised the most was Daphne. I don’t feel like she deserved
anything she had and I really hoped she ended up with nothing. I’ve said it
once and I’ll say it again… If she ends up with the thing she wants most, I
will DNF book 2. I don’t care where I am in the story. That’s how much I didn’t
like her. To go as far as she did? Yeah, she’s unhinged. And I don’t like that.
Maybe that’s just me, but no, I can’t do it.
And
all those POV’s with characters I didn’t really like, this was not fun. This is
hard for me when there’s only 2 POV’s and one of them is someone I don’t care
for, so having 3 out of 4 that I don’t like was troubling. It just didn’t work
for me and if I had been reading a physical copy, I would have skimmed it
instead of listening all the way through.
As
for the ending, there is a cliff-hanger, and I hated it. I don’t like
cliff-hangers because it usually means that nothing was resolved in the book, that
it just ended, and that’s exactly what happened in this one. There was so much
going on and then it was just over. Nothing was resolved and Book 2 is going to
be just another long continuation of this one. And this book was already long.
What
mostly saved this for me was the amazing narrator. Brittany Pressley is one of
my favorites, and I had actually just finished something else that she had
narrated, so it seemed like destiny when she I found this one by her too. So
because I love her work, I could overlook the fact that I don’t really like
history and that this wasn’t exactly something I was really interested in.
This
wasn’t something I particularly loved or something I particularly hated, but I
read it. I’ve added Book 2 to my TBR, but we’ll see how things go with that. I’m
not sure if I’ll be continuing this or not. Unless that is, someone tells
spoiled Daphne no and they continue with using the same narrator for Book 2 lol
Overall, I give this