You know that super cliched quote about not judging books based on their covers? Well, I'd say that's largely true—I've been sucked into a complete dud more than once by a pretty cover—but in this particular instance, being shallow and drawn to pretty things really worked in my favor.

As for the book itself, in a nutshell, it was sort of retelling of the legend of King Arthur but with added magic in the form of faeries. Which I found to be a really nice twist and interesting take.

Admittedly, I'm not overly familiar with the OG tale, so take everything I say on that front with a pinch of salt, but I still know enough to recognize a few of the major players. For example, the book's main character and sole narrator was Morgan, elder half-sister to King Arthur, ruler of Camelot. Merlin was a priestess and Lancelot was actually Lancelet and one of Mogan's besties, Galahad being the other one. The only glaring absences, at least for now, were the round table and Guinevere.

But a big departure was made from the original legend of noble King Arthur, since in this retelling, he was a major villain. He was a bigot, terribly intolerant and quick to extreme violence. A good counter point to Morgan, the relegated sister, denied her right to take the throne by her father because of her "tainted" blood. Where he was entitled, brutal and cruel, she was humble, generous and empathetic; hard-working and self-reliant.

I liked how, even if she wasn't overly strong or exceptionally physically gifted, and could get overpowered and overwhelmed sometimes, she could still save herself when it really mattered. She wasn't a doormat and she wasn't a damsel in distress, and I always appreciate that in my leading ladies.

In some aspects, Morgan reminded me a little of Aelin (or Celaena, rather) from Throne of Glass. Both had rough pasts and rocky childhoods, both had to hide away part of themselves from people they considered family. Also, her first interactions with Draven reminded me of when Aelin first met Rowan, which was a total win in my book, since they're one of my top favorite fictional couples.

As for the writing, while I liked the narration style, I did come across some grammar mistakes in the form of mixed verbal tenses ("his small frame made him seem younger than he is"), but luckily these were all clustered in the first few chapters, and will probably be fixed in the final version, since the one I read was an ARC, and they sometimes have these types of mistakes.

Another thing I liked was how the story was told in very short sentences and paragraphs, which made it easy and super quick to read (the book didn't feel long at all!). Aside from a few fancy words, it used very few embellishments, which I thought was a plus—I'll take an unpretentious, uncomplicated book over the alternative any day of the week.

Let's quickly talk about the TWs. I'm generally not easily triggered so, to not spoil myself, I skipped them. I'll say this: this book is certainly not suited to people with an aversion to animal cruelty. Keep that in mind.

Structurally, the book was divided into two parts. The first encompassed the introduction of the world and all main players, tackled most of the worldbuilding and did a good job of familiarizing the reader with the core personalities of the key characters. But the second was when the fun really started. Part two was all about adventure, a seemingly herculean quest and stepping into the unknown.

An evil King; a struggling, unhappy kingdom; an ostracized princess and a dangerous mission to boot! To find a God's magical sword (called Excalibur, because, duh, of course!). I'm confident this book will appeal to romantasy fans everywhere.

Check out my blog to read the full review: Multicolored Book Reviews

I couldn't make it past 120 pages.
That's not to say it was poorly written, I just really didn't dig the story!
I think my biggest issue with it is that when you're writing about characters with existing lore, you can humanize the typically evil characters without turning the typically "good" characters evil. I just had a hard time with the character dynamics and also am tired of LIs being huge dark, broody, kind of rude men.
I should have figured this was what I was getting into based on the description, but I love Arthuriana and feel the need to give every Arthurian story I come across a try.

Let me start off by thanking both Briar Boleyn and the publishers for the opportunity to read this story!

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Spice : 🌶️

I wish I could say I absolutely loved this story as I was so looking forward to it! Unfortunately somethin about this story just didn’t click for me. I am in no way saying that is the authors fault, this simply was not the book for me.

One thing I must get out of the way before I start this review is that I absolutely believe that the trigger warnings should not have been left at the end of this book! I read the authors trigger warning and content warning page where it said the trigger warnings could contain spoilers so I thought well as an avid reader of dark romance and dark fantasy romance it would be nothing I hadn’t encountered before. Unfortunately, there are multiple on scene graphic animal deaths. Animal deaths that truly added nothing to the story and *spolers* multitude of horse deaths and after having just dealt with losing one of my own horses I wish I had been warned of that before I began this story as I would not have read it. In fact while the author warned of spoilers in her trigger warning after looking over them I personally don’t think that they would’ve spoiled anything in this story.

I came into this novel prepared for a spicy slow-burn romance novel… and this is probably where I got lost because there’s really no kinds of romance between these characters. There is some banter between them but I found that in my opinion even that fell flat as it felt more like siblings bickering rather than enemies-to-lovers type of bickering. There’s maybe one or two scenes in the whole book that could’ve been categorized as romantic between are two main characters. There was also a small side romantic interest between our main character and a side character that as an avid reader I didn’t trust from the beginning. While I do believe I see where the author wanted to make this a truly slow burn, for me it missed the mark.

One of the thing I did like about this book was the plot, and the descriptions. For the most part, there were a few instances when the descriptions became a little wordy or drawn out for my liking but overall they were great. I loved the world building and the fantasy characters!! Amazing! I loved all the creatures and their descriptions from the exmoors to the harpies! They were all described so well I could picture them in vivid detail, and couldn’t wait to see what creatures we would see next! I also loved the fight scenes they were very well written, and kept me flipping pages!!

Now for the characters… I have mixed emotions on the characters until we reach about the last 20% of the book. Starting with Morgan. When we first met her I loved that she was a caring princess but who seemed to have a bit of a backbone when it came to helping her people, but that backbone seemed to come and go. There were moments she’d stand strong against her tyrant brother and then a scene later she just seemed to cave in on herself until the very end where she was making the decision to protect someone. Same thing in a bit of a different sense with Draven. He had a very alpha male personality that I typically love but there were times when this came off more sexist and less protective. Such as when he was telling Morgan she should be at home where she belongs… even as the story progressed and some of the alpha did turn to protective instincts he seemed to not trust her in a fight as if she was incapable of fighting and not a princess who had been training for years to fight. Then something happened, that I won’t spoil, that changed both of them in my opinion and actually was a very good ending to the whole book. Based on that last 20% I may give book two a chance to see if the romance doesn’t pick up a bit more.

Overall, I highly suggest reading all trigger warnings in this book before starting. And enter this boo with the knowledge that while the plot, creatures, and fight scene are all very entertaining if you’re looking for a in depth love story this may not be the book for you! Still I give high props to the author for writing an interesting take on the King Arthur/ Camelot story!


HAPPY READING 📖

This is such a unique retelling of King Arthur which includes fae. I loved the main characters as well as the plot line which was so fun. I can't wait to read more from this series and this world.

Queen of Roses is a loose retelling of King Arthur mixed with the Fae world.

You follow Morgan Pendragon, the first born child of the evil king. When she witnesses her father killing her (part fae)mother at a very young age, she learned to keep her head down. Her father then has two more children from two different women. He eventually decides that Morgan is a tainted heir and the crown should pass onto his second child; Arthur. Arthur grows to be just as mean as him, but Morgan keeps hope her brother is still 'in there somewhere', she once saved his life and holds on to this string of hope that he can indeed be good.

Morgan, the true heir to the crown, is promised to the temple of the three due to her part fae dna and is under guidance of the priestess named Merlin. Despite her not having much faith, she follows the path she's been given freely. Her little brother - the third child - Kaye is a precious, kind soul who she tends to be very protective of. She sees him stirring away from Arthur slowly as he is confronted with his cruelty. For example, in the beginning of the book he tortures (whips) and beheads a young part fae boy for stealing an apple, just out of hatred for the fae. Despite being part fae herself, she doesn't fear that Arthur will ever hurt her but quickly learns, this may not be entirely the case.

She learns that Arthur knows about the torment that Florian, son to the kings adviser, puts her through and even threatens to marry her off to him instead of gift her to the Three. Ultimately she is given the task of retrieving a weapon of unlimited power for Arthur and departs with two guards to the Bloodlands; Kairos Draven, the royal guard and Whitehorn the right man of the kings advisor; Agravaine. Whitehorn is known to follow orders blindly, no matter what, and this ends up being a problem for Morgan's health. As she has been taking a medicine to surpress her fae tendencies for a while now, she is forced by him to take it more often, daily (on the king's orders) and nearly kills her in the process. Draven, who has been tasked with her safety then ends up in a confrontation with Whitehorn and kills him. After that he tosses away her medicines and tends to her health. She quickly learns she is changing from this point, her grey hair is turning more silver and eventually there are runes on her arms.

Morgan is now traveling alone with the man she heard had killed all that stood between the current king of Dreghed, including women and children, even babies. She doesn't trust him but learns that he has a protective side to him and finds herself fantasizing about him. Draven is trying to hide his wound that Whitehorn inflicted on him, possibly with a deadly poison. Morgan finds out and they set out to find a healer asap. There is a bit of tension and interest between the two, after all Morgan never experiences any intimacy, until they reach a town and a fertility fest. Where she drinks a special drink and parties with the locals. A man with a lute attracts her attention and she nearly kisses him, until she is pulled away and they continue their way. When in the 'inn' they're meant to be in for the sake of a healer, Draven is too ill to do anything and an ambush is set up where she finally gets to meet her magic. She manages to set ablaze a few of the attackers and heals Draven, when the man with the lute - Vesper - enters the room and extends a hand. He'd been helping her get rid of some of the attackers outside and thus she trusts he has their safety in his mind. They join up for the rest of the journey, to retrieve the weapon, which Vesper learns about along the way.

Vesper is quite taken with her and Morgan finds herself to be equally entranced by him. He represents a warmth in the cold, a spark of light in the dark and they end up experiencing some sexual intimacy together. When they reached a point that Vesper said he'd been before with his caravan of merchants, they find a little girl in between a mass of dead people attacked by fenrirs and take her with them on their journey. Here they escape harpies and find other monstrosities, learning the true history of the fae - along with their beautiful structures - and eventually finally retrieve the weapon of unlimited power, the blade of Perun, also known as Excalibur. Until the plot thickens towards the end.

I find Queen of Roses to be an interesting read. I have to say I went in rather blind, I saw a cover and quickly glanced over the summary and decided to just request the book for a review. Didn't think I'd be given the chance to pick this up - so thank you for the opportunity!
Sometimes the pacing was a bit slow but I usually don't mind to take my time to learn dynamics, worlds and character morals. The characters are very well written and consistent throughout the book. Ofcourse there is growth to them aswell. The author writes fluently and the world easily forms in your mind. I don't know too much about the legend of King Arthur, but the names ofcourse stood out immediately. I think the mix with the Fae world is an interesting choice and generally it's well done! I quite liked the journey they went on and the dynamics between the characters. The plot is interesting and really leaves you thinking about what happens next. I'll definitely pick up book #2.

A few notes though; apart from the slow pacing here and there, I did think the book could use a bit more editing. Here and there the book has writing flaws, grammar or spelling mistakes or the sentence could be more fluently written. Also, some of the things the main character did, didn't make much sense to me. For example; how she still holds on to the idea that is a perfectly fine choice to give Arthur - who she knows to be extremely violent - Excalibur. Even after her friend, Lancelet comes through a portal Merlin created to warn her of the war he has waged against several kingdoms, she still holds on to the 'mission' she was sent on, for a bit. This doesn't make sense to me, especially how she was taken with her people and her little brother Kaye who was left in Arthur's "care". She seems smart enough to see that it would only lead to more trouble.

Thank you @netgalley for this beautiful book!

Camelot meets fae - I loved it!

For those who adored Blood and Ash, this is the book for you. I absolutely adored the main character and cannot wait to see what happens in the next book.

The animals and magic were easy to follow and it wasn't overloaded with pages and pages of fae/human history.

And the author promises more spice in the future, so for those who love that, book 2 sounds ever better. :)

🥀 Queen of Roses 🥀
Thankful to receive an early copy of @briarboleynauthor ‘a debut novel Queen of Roses which just came out! This novel is a King Arthur, Camelot, Excalibur retelling, if King Arthur was a giant jerk of a tyrant sending his abused and shrouded half-fae sister on a quest to find a god power infused sword to win his nonsensical war. And of course she’s sent with a hot, broody, protective guard to accompany her on this pursuit. I enjoyed this story. I thought the pacing of the story was really nice, and the plot had enough action and mystery to keep me entertained. I am excited to see where the second book goes, because I need a little more character development to decide whose side I’m really on! I was wary (maybe rightfully so?!) of the FMC’s potential suitors, and I was surprised by (some) of the cliffhangers at the end! Also disappointed that we almost got the one bed trope, but then all hell broke loose. Recommend downloading now on Kindle Unlimited!

A CAMELOT RETELLING??? SIGN ME TF UP

wow okay so many things to enjoy here. firstly im blown away that this is her debut, truly such a fast paced, well developed story with SUCH amazing characters

there’s diverse representation, strong world building (thank god), the ROMANCE (she a little spicy 😏) and overall a great time stored in these pages

An amazing retelling of Camelot, Arthur and Excalibur. Had me hooked from the start.

Things I enjoyed:
Definitely a slow burn romance, can’t wait to see what book two holds for Morgan and her love life.
The betrayal at the end, my god that was a twist I wasn’t expecting.

Honestly can’t wait to see what book two holds, as soon as it comes out I’ll be reading it.

Would definitely recommend to others that enjoy fantasy and a slow burn romance.

Thank you netgallery and Briar Boleyn for a copy of this ARC.

Camelot meets fae lore in this unique addition to the fantasy/romance genre.

With an enthralling combination such as that, where can you go wrong?

I am absolutely enchanted with Briar Boleyn's ability to seamlessly weave together descriptive scenes without the writing feeling dense or overbearing. From the prologue, I just knew this was going to be a good read just from the amount of emotion seeped into every paragraph.

With that said, I read fiction primarily for the characters, and I had a difficult time connecting with any of the characters in this book. I liked Kaye, but the rest fell flat for me. The FMC, Morgan (this novel's take on Morgana from Arthurian legend), reminds me a lot of the FMCs that were popular to write about a decade ago: pretty but doesn't know she's pretty, a quietly-raging activist, yet someone who is afraid to step on toes (except when it comes to the love interest, of course). I understand that her character is meant to develop and grow into herself, but these aspects of her personality make it a bit arduous to read from her perspective for a long duration of the novel.

As for the other characters: I really just didn't like Lancelet (Morgan's best friend) or the love interest. Lancelet was unapologetically rude and unperceptive- not traits one really wants in a best friend. The love interest is also needlessly rude, which makes sense for the beloved enemies-to-lovers trope this story is going for, but rather than it feeling natural, it comes across as a bit contrived here. I just couldn't feel their chemistry. For the first 25% of the novel, I found myself wanting to skip to the part where Morgan and Arthur finally speak to each other because her villainous brother seemed to be the character with the most promise.

Speaking of, the true inciting incident doesn't feel like it begins until at least 25% of the way through. There are smaller antagonisms for that first quarter that keep your attention, but it doesn't feel like the story has truly begun until after that first quarter. On the one hand, this is nice because it allows for the necessary world-building and character relationships to be established. On the other hand, it makes this story more ideal for readers who enjoy slow-paced novels. Fortunately for me, I do, so my enjoyment was not hindered by this, but I could see how it might put other readers off.

Overall, I really enjoyed how unique and immersive this book is. I wish the characters were given a bit more depth, but I can see this becoming a popular series regardless.

First of all Wow!
I have to admit i went into this completely blind and wasn’t expecting a lot. But this took me by surprise.
We follow Morgan in an Arthurian retelling.
There is action, our FMC uncovers a bit of who she is. A quest, love, betrayal. And a cliffhanger at the end.
Such good writing, a lot of worldbuilding. The characters were so well developed! Even if the FMC was a bit dimwitted at times.
I can’t wait for the second one !

If you're looking for a book that gives the same vibes as From Blood and Ash this is what you've been waiting for.

Queen of Roses has everything. Fae, sword fights, spice. It was incredibly easy to pick favorite characters and root for them. The way they were written really makes you feel invested. Who doesn't want to cheer for the damsel in distress finding herself and the morally grey warrior.

It ended on a cliffhanger that will definitely make you wonder what you're going to do until book two comes out.

Queen of Roses by Briar Boleyn is a captivating and thrilling fantasy novel that will transport readers to a world of magic, danger, and romance. The story follows Morgan Pendragon, a cast-off princess rumored to carry the tainted blood of the fae in her veins. Her destiny has never been her own, but when she is commanded by her brother to seek out a fae weapon of legendary power, she sees an opportunity to break free from her fate. As she embarks on her dangerous mission, Morgan finds herself drawn to a group of outcasts, including a dark and enigmatic warrior who stirs her heart.

Briar Boleyn's world-building is rich and immersive, and readers will find themselves easily lost in the intricate web of lies and mysteries that she has created. The characters are morally gray, adding to the intrigue and depth of the story. The slow-burn romance between Morgan and the warrior is well-developed and adds a satisfying layer to the plot.

However, it's important to note that the book features mature situations and adult language, with a slow burn romance that gradually builds to a more intense level in future books. The book also contains trigger warnings, so readers should check the table of contents for more information.

Overall, Queen of Roses is a fantastic start to an action-packed new series that will leave readers eagerly anticipating the next installment. Fans of Holly Black, Jennifer L. Armentrout, and Sarah J. Maas will find much to love in this book.