Thank you to the author, publisher, & Net Galley for an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I enjoyed listening to this audio book. The narrator was fabulous. I loved the determination of Merida to save her family. I felt like I got to know each of the family members. This is a sweet story.

Bravely

This story was such and a magical and exciting adventure! I loved seeing Merida from Disney’s Brave. I was able to listen to the audio version of this book. The narrator does such an amazing job being the book to life! Merida’s adventure and growth through the Sean’s was fun to see. This book is perfect for students in middle school and up! It has the essence of reading a fairytale.

I must admit, I didn't know much about story of Merida prior to reading this story, but you don't need to in order to enjoy this wonderful story. Well written, a fun adventurous story full of great characters, growth, and heart. While this is considered YA, it feels like it could be easily enjoyed by MG readers as well.

This was a delightful surprise!
Taking place a year or so after the events of Brave, Merida is more than aware of the effects magic can have on the world around you. After a run in with two Gods (one of destruction, one of rebirth) Merida makes another deal with magic to try and save her kingdom from certain doom.
Merida is an exciting main character, her heart is in the right place and you can see how hard she tries to make things right. Some of the other characters fell kind of flat for me, (her friend Leezie - a new character, and her brothers +her parents didn't charm me in the same way they did in the movies. (No clue why Leezie was even thereto be honest). Certain parts were very repetitive and the novel did read more Middle Grade than Young Adult.

I adore Brave, and I love reading anything Maggie Stiefvater writes. Combined with the fact that this is my daughter and my favorite Disney story, I was sold! I was able to get the audio and ebook version, which was a blessing. My children got to listen to it with me in the car to school and back. This is why it took me a while to read and review, they wanted to listen too!
I loved how authentic the characters were. Since it is a sequel, I was worried that it wouldn't seem like the same character as the movie. IT IS! It was truly authentic.
The love that Merida has for her family is so believable that my empath feelings were picking up on it. It was so well written that I felt worried when Merida did, frustrated when Merida was frustrated, and joyous when Merida was joyous. I do not get that with every book, and usually it is only the sad parts of books that do this to me.
The story was written more for middle grade I think, and might lose readers that are young adult unless they really love reading or feel partial to the story itself.
Overall, I really enjoyed this sweet book and I was glad to share the experience of listening with my children.

ONE PRINCESS. Merida of DunBroch needs a change. She loves her family—jovial King Fergus, proper Queen Elinor, the mischievous triplets— and her peaceful kingdom. But she’s frustrated by its sluggishness; each day, the same. Merida longs for adventure, purpose, challenge – maybe even, someday, love.

TWO GODS. But the fiery Princess never expects her disquiet to manifest by way of Feradach, an uncanny supernatural being tasked with rooting out rot and stagnation, who appears in DunBroch on Christmas Eve with the intent to demolish the realm – and everyone within.

I really enjoyed this novel and story that jumps in right after the movie. Its YA- but I would say its better suited to middle grade/tweens. It does have some mature themes with the consequences of the God of destruction being death but all in all its a great story for kids 10+.

It draws you in right from the beginning, but is a tad slow in the middle. I had to push to get through the middle but it picks up again and the last 35% is a whirlwind

I'll be honest: I fell asleep listening to this. Twice.
Which isn't great. After finding my spot the first time, and re-listening to the parts before, I wasn't into it. So the second time, I barely wanted to find my spot.

Maggie Stiefvater is an author that I sometimes feel like I have to fight to finish, and unfortunately my love of Disney didn't help this time.
I'm sure some other people will LOVE this, but unfortunately it wasn't for me.

I loved this version of Merida! This story takes place after the events of Brave. Merida is a teen and her triplet brothers are older; however, they still spark of the characters you know and love from the movie. Merida lives for her family and does whatever she can do save them: even if that means making deals with the gods.

Dunbroch has become stagnant. No one changes: not even Merida. The king is still his joyful self. The queen is still prim and proper. Merida LOVES her bow and still dominates over everyone on the range. The triplets still cause trouble and have yet to find their own callings/distinct personalities. And where stagnation reigns, ruin is sure to follow at least where the gods are concerned.

Feradach is the god of ruin and destruction and Dunbroch is calling to him. So Merida will have to call upon the Cailleach, the goddess of creation, to help save all that she holds dear. Merida has a year to change everyone and everything around her. Can she do it and not lose herself? Read on to find out!

I loved all the characters and their feisty personalities, but I wasn't expecting to come to love Feradach as much as I did.

***I loved the audio version as the Irish accent is a wonderful compliment to this story! ***

🎧”This is the story of two gods and a girl.” And so it begins, a magical story set it Scotland in which Merida makes a bargain with the god of destruction to save her family. And there the quest for redemption and salvation begins.

There is just the right amount of Disney enchantment, while keeping a really nice story. Having never seen “Brave” I didn’t know I’d this would benefit or hurt me, but after finishing I think that it is just as nice having not seen the Disney movie.

Thank you @netgalley and Disney Audiobooks for choosing me to listen to this ARC copy of #Bravely. Bravo to the narrator. She was excellent!

#netgalley
#readmorebooks
#mybookishlife

What I Loved
uh… EVERYTHING??? I loved everyone’s backstories, I loved all the characters we got to meet, I loved that there was almost no romance, I loved the story, I loved the mythological aspects, I loved everything!!!

What I Didn’t
Until I read the epilogue, I disagreed with Merida’s ending. and then… 😉

Favorite Character?
LEEZIE IS THE BEST CHARACTER HANDS DOWN I WILL TAKE NO CRITICISM THANK YOU

Will I Re-Read It?
maybe? probably?

Three Words To Describe The Book
CHANGE, GROWTH, RENEWAL

Other Thoughts
I listened to the audiobook of this, and I highly recommend that! Fiona Hardingham does a lovely job with all of the accents, which is super helpful because like 70% of the words sound NOTHING like they look like!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with this ARC audiobook and a regular ARC.

Description from NetGalley:

What if you had one year to save everything you loved?

ONE PRINCESS. Merida of DunBroch needs a change. She loves her family—jovial King Fergus, proper Queen Elinor, the mischievous triplets— and her peaceful kingdom. But she’s frustrated by its sluggishness; each day, the same. Merida longs for adventure, purpose, challenge – maybe even, someday, love.

TWO GODS. But the fiery Princess never expects her disquiet to manifest by way of Feradach, an uncanny supernatural being tasked with rooting out rot and stagnation, who appears in DunBroch on Christmas Eve with the intent to demolish the realm – and everyone within. Only the intervention of the Cailleach, an ancient entity of creation, gives Merida a shred of hope: convince her family to change within the year – or suffer the eternal consequences.

THREE VOYAGES. Under the watchful eyes of the gods, Merida leads a series of epic journeys to kingdoms near and far in an attempt to inspire revolution within her family. But in her efforts to save those she loves from ruin, has Merida lost sight of the Clan member grown most stagnant of all – herself?

FOUR SEASONS TO SAVE DUNBROCH – OR SEE IT DESTROYED, FOREVER.

I am a huge Disney/Pixar fan, so I’m extremely excited that I got an advanced ebook and audiobook for Bravely. This felt like a natural extension of Merida’s story from the movie. I really enjoyed the writing and character development.

Overall: 4/5

ALL THE STARS. This narrator was amazing and this book was amazing. As someone who isn't incredibly familiar with the source material, I still fell in love with this tale. The magic of Maggie Stiefvater, I'm telling ya.

Maggie Stiefvater is amazing. I hope we get more princess tales retold by her. I loved the continuation of Merida's story. Growing up and changing which can be exciting but also scary. I love the interpretation!

Years after the conclusion of Brave, Merida finds herself making a deal with a god, Feradach. In order to save her family, Merida has one year to change all of them. Merdia sets out on three journeys to satisfy the mortal deal with another kingdom. Along the way, Feradach keeps showing up wherever she goes.
Opinion
Being a fan of Brave and Maggie Stiefvater, I just had to read this book. The book told a fantasy worthy of a Disney movie. (Disney, can you turn this book into a movie?) With a quest and lessons to learn, Merida sets out on a royal quest. This book is ideal for fans of fairy tales.
If you plan on listening to the audio book, prepare to be enchanted. The narrator does such a superb job. The accent makes it that much more fantastic.
Many thanks to Net Galley, Disney Audiobooks and Disney Publishing Worldwide for providing me with an ARC of both the e-book and the audiobook.

Audiobook review - As a fan of Brave I was very excited to listen to this book sequel to the movie. I appreciated that Stiefvater kept the many details true to the plot in the movie, facts about the characters as well as references to Merida's past adventures. I had high hopes for this book, but found the story to be lacking in action at times and to really drag. Not my favorite audiobook, unfortunately.

WOW they really did that didn't they--they gave you 95% of a book that canonically follows the character's identity (Merida is the ONLY princess coded as asexual and it meant a lot to so many people) and then throw in a romance in quite literally the last 5 paragraphs because it's Disney. I'm actually disappointed that I expected anything more from this. Without this egregious misstep, the book was interesting but not amazing, but I still would have given it a decent rating because it was interesting. However, the writing was incredibly repetitive, there is inconsistency with characters, and the whole point of the story is never quite explained?There's a lot of talk about people not changing, and this causes the destruction from the Feradach, yet there are people burning villages to the ground and those people aren't destroyed? There's no consistency. For a book that took its time with pacing, a lot was left out in terms of explanations like this.

As a side note for the narrator, I really didn't care for her. Why choose a british narrator, and have them speak with it except when people are talking in dialogue? Merida has a Scottish accent (not well might I add) in dialogue but in her head she's British? It's bizarre, and we know Disney could afford to pay a Scottish narrator. Most Scottish accents weren't very well done.

I loved the story of Merida when the movie Brave came out. Now we get to see what happens after she saves her family and becomes the independent young lady we fell in love with. Merida is given a chance to make a true change in her family but she must do it without telling anyone of the deal she made with the Gods. I enjoyed how Maggie Stiefvater stayed true to the characters. It is definitely one I would recommend to anyone who loved Brave.

The narrator of the audiobook did a fantastic job of making Merida come to life. I would like to listen to other stories she has narrated.

Thank you to the Disney Publishing and to NetGalley for an ARC of this audiobook.

I really enjoyed this sequel to the movie Brave. In this story, Merida has a year to save her family from ruin, when a god, Feradach, shows up at Christmas and threatens her family.

I really enjoyed this story, especially listening to it as an audiobook. I have never read anything by Maggie Stiefvater before, but will definitely be checking out some of her other work. The narator was fantastic as well, and it make listening to this a lot of fun.

First line: This is a story about two gods and a girl.

Summary: Merida, the princess of DunBroch, challenges a god to save her kingdom and her family. She vows that if the god will give her one year she will be able to change her family and her home. With this mounting task Merida travels around Scotland with members of her family in the hopes that their adventures will lead them to live different lives than the stagnant ones they have so far led.

My Thoughts: I went into this expecting to love it. I really like the movie Brave and Maggie Stiefvater is a wonderful author too. But I was much underwhelmed. It seemed to drag on and very little seemed to be happening until the very end. I listened to the audiobook and I was not impressed with the narrator. They should have had a Scottish rather than English narrator since the events take place in Scotland. In all the story was fine but very slow going. But the cover is stunning!

FYI: Pretty cover but rather boring book.

Advanced Reader’s Copy provided by NetGalley, Disney Audiobooks, and Disney Press in exchange for an honest review.

Having read other novels by Stiefvater, I was interested to see her take on Merida and Disney's BRAVE. While I enjoyed this novel, I felt like some of the magic that is typically in Stiefvater's stories, especially when she writes about Scotland (and Ireland), was lost here. I'm not sure if that's because she was confined by Disney created characters or not. But something just wasn't quite right. It's still a good story, just... a little less magical.

I loved the dynamic between Merida and Feradach though! And seeing a little more of the triplets was fun. The plot drags at points but once time starts running out for Merida, the story gets going and is engrossing.

I thought Fiona Hardingham did a really good job with the audiobook performance and this novel lends really well to the audiobook format of consumption.