Queen of Roses by Briar Boleyn follows Morgan Pendragon, a half-fae princess who is tasked to go on a quest to retrieve a magical object. It is a retelling of King Arthur complete with magical creatures, intrigue, politics, and romance.

This is the first book in the series and as an avid reader of fantasy, I enjoyed this book immensely. I wanted to race through it, but I also didn’t want to finish it too quickly. I especially enjoyed the various characters and by the time the book ended, I felt connected with the characters and their fates.

It is to be noted, however, that the book is an adult fantasy (16+) and is not suitable for younger readers. There are numerous trigger warnings for this book so you may want to proceed with caution should this be an issue.

The writing is nice and detailed. This helped me imagine King Arthur’s world, the various characters we encounter as the story progresses and the quest that ultimately unfolds. The romance is slow burn and although I’m not a fan of slow burn, I did feel it flowed along nicely. There were times I cringed at the plot though but as I went through the book, everything eventually fell into place nicely with an intriguing ending that will definitely have me reading the next books in the series. As I write this in April 2024, the series is now complete with four books in total. Plenty to binge on!

Overall, I found the book to be engaging and I would recommend this to all fantasy readers and romance readers alike. Thank you to Saltpress Publishers for providing this book for review consideration via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

Queen of Roses (Book 1), Court of Claws (Book 2), Empress of Fae (Book 3), and the final installment, Knight of the Goddess (Book 4) are all part of a series by Briar Boleyn. If you are a fan of the ACTAR series, I highly recommend you give these a chance.  I received these ARC ebooks from and want to thank, NetGalley, Starwater Press, and Briar Boleyn, for providing them to me to read and review.  The third one caught my attention first, but to read it, I needed to read the prior two. Ok...how hard could that be?  While reading Queen of Roses, and getting to know the characters and the setting, I was intrigued, but not overly so and I anticipated this being just an ok series.  Then came the second book, Court of Claws, oh wow! It took off and I dove right into the third one, Empress of Fae, even though it was well past midnight.  The third book ended on a cliffhanger, leaving me anticipating the fourth and final book, Knight of the Goddess. As with the others, Boleyn doesn't spare our feelings and intrigues the reader through unexpected twists. The ending was...wow! Boy was it worth the wait! While I'll miss these characters and following their story, I eagerly anticipate what fabulous new adventure Briar Boleyn has in store for us next.  While you may be able to read one as a stand-alone, I would highly recommend you start from the beginning and read them all from the start.

Dark fantasy slowburn with SUCH great world building! The story definitely captivates you and keeps you wanting to read more.

Queen of Roses had me hooked from page 1.

If you're a romantasy fan add this book to your list now! When I started this book I got Throne of Glass vibes; cast-off princess who enjoys being a warrior in her spare time. The slow-burn romance was to die for, especially with the enemies to lovers added in. I look forward to seeing how Morgan's character develops over the next 3 books! Draven has all the possibility to be ranked among the shadow-daddies of our favorite genre (watch out Xaden and Rhysand!) I am personally hoping for some more spice in future books. This book ended on a cliff-hanger that had me rushing to start book 2.

This book was full of unexpected surprises and wonderful world building. It has been a great introduction to Arthurian stories and I will be back for more! Briar Boleyn has earned herself a spot in my favorite romantasy authors list.

Disclaimer: I did receive this book as an E-ARC from Starwater Press on NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. There is a list of trigger warnings, please read those before starting this book.

Thanks to NetGalley, Starwater Press, and the author for allowing me access to this book! My review has also been posted to my Goodreads account. I was so intrigued by the description and the cover I just had to request it - and boy was I right!

Before diving to far in… folxs, this is one I will suggest reading some trigger warnings for! It is a DARK fantasy romance and there was definitely some heavier content.

Queen of Roses is a DEFINITE slow burn! Not typically my cup of tea but I think the author did it well while also not revealing too much. Also, thankfully there is a pronunciation guide which is always appreciated in fantasy books! The world was fantastic with touches of Arthurian Legend and that fae fantasy world we all love. The characters are interesting with their own agendas and purpose and I think that is explored quite a bit in the book (from the perspective of our FMC).

But what are we really all here for? The romance! So I’ll say it, but I really love it when the MMC is a “touch her and I’ll kill you” kind of guy. And Kairos Draven is DEFINITELY one of those. This book was mainly me thinking, okay whatcha hiding Kairos?! Tall, dark, mysterious… of course he’s got secrets! But I think most importantly he was always on the FMCs side. (Of course I reviewed the love interest before the FMC?) Kairos definitely has his own agenda which we get a peek of at the end but looking forward to revealing more of his background and that agenda in book 2!

I am so interested in reading more to see what the heck is going on in this world. While book one presents a lot of info a some backstory, we have the unreliable narrative of the FMC, so she clearly doesn’t know too much about the realities of her own world. Fair warning, definitely a bit of a cliffhanger in the end because we haven’t learned much about who some of the big players are (looking at you sketchy fae lady). So I feel that there will be some much bigger plot points revealed in the coming books.

Morgan, the FMC, definitely showing some of her naïveté throughout this book. Which, what do we expect of someone who was brought up the way she was? But I think she grows some teeth towards the end but will definitely do more of that soon. I have a feeling that throughout the series Morgan becomes that powerful, strong, leading lady we all love to read!

While on her adventure the realization that she was pretty much being shoved into this box her whole life was one of my favorite things. It makes me really wonder how she got where she is in the first place… Again, first books are always there to leave with more questions than answers!

Will definitely be reading the next book to continue on this journey and hopefully get more insight into world built by Briar!

(PS - never hated a character more than Florian! What a despicable dude!)

3.5 stars. I just want to jump right in and say the world building is probably one of my favorite aspects of <i>Queen of Roses</i>. Boleyn paints a rich picture of Morgan's life in Pendrath, and later the lands she travels through on her quest to find Excaliber. The novel is a retelling of the legend of King Arthur, but with a fae spin on the tale. The mythology of the novel is interesting, especially when the fae are practically extinct. Draven was a very intriguing and mysterious character, and his story is on track to drive anticipation for the next book in the series. Morgan was an interesting character. She went through so much, and was still sheltered (to an extent). <spoiler>I appreciated that she didn't come into her powers immediately or become superpowered without any training or effort</spoiler>. Morgan's naivety was frustrating at times (especially regarding her blind trust in Vesper), but it makes sense considering she has never left Pendrath before the story begins. Regarding Vesper, so much is explained in the last few chapters, so I won't say anything else. All I can say is that the ending sets up the next book nicely.

Thank you to the author and publisher for providing a copy of this book.

I first want to say, I was incredibly intrigued that this book was described as "perfect for fans of Holly Black, Jennifer L. Armentrout, and Sarah J. Maas". I was really excited to see how that translated into the book. I realize now, it's another case of an author using other authors names and books to sell their own. I'm really not sure where the crossover is supposed to happen. The characters lacked depth and I was so distracted by trying to remember what the rooms looked like (because surely with that much description that's part of the plot?) that I didn't even really understand what was happening the whole time. This book reads as if it was written once and never looked at again. or as if someone took every single tiktok trend, tried to shove it into a book.
I tried to pick this book back up so many times, considering it was my first ever NetGalley book, I really wanted to give it a great review but I can't lie.
I felt like Morgan was supposed to read as a character that is closed off due to trauma she's been through but it's never explicitly said. All the information I wanted was left out. Anything with any depth to it felt like it rushed through. I was expecting to gain more understanding throughout the book because it does take me longer than most to grasp the concept of most fantasy but I just found myself more and more confused and questioning things with no answers. I got about 30% through and got to the point where I was only still reading because I got the book from NetGalley.
Any other book, I would have seen the writing style in the first chapter, seen it was compared to T H E Sarah J Maas and DNFed immediately. I understand that your target audience is that audience but if you're going to compare yourself to an author who has done what SJM has, you should be ready to deliver and this book just did not.

Thank you Netgalley and publisher for a digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

I like to make notes as I read along, so I’ve made a list of pros and cons. These do contain *SPOILERS*.

CONS:
- Main character kinda unlikeable. Too many rhetorical questions all the time. Doesn’t speak up or try to defend herself. She spars well against potential knights, has a good aim while hunting the boar, but acts like she is defenseless for the first half of the book.
-Too many character clothing descriptions that are not relevant to the story building.
-Florian is the villain but doesn’t have a lot of development as to what makes him the villain. He is just unnecessarily cruel out of nowhere. I will say I was glad that Morgan FINALLY stood up to him.
-The wound was not “pussing” it had purulent drainage.
-Inconsistencies in the story. The FMC would know something in the story, but then in a later chapter act shocked about hearing what she already knew.

PROS:
-history and the stories of the gods/goddesses is interesting.
-My favorite character is Draven.
-The plot has potential. But overall the story seems like it has a lot of unnecessary fluff. The best part of the book was the last 25%. The ending set up for an interesting next book!

Overall there were some issues with the writing, but this series has a lot of potential, so I do plan to read the next one.

Love love love this book!!! I read this within one sitting! If you like From Blood and Ash then I definitely recommend this series. It is a dark fantasy with lots of adventure with connections to King Arthur e.g. Pendragon, Camelot. It is a slow-burn addicting relationship with lots of tension, it also explores the themes of friendship, humour and lots of twists.

I cannot wait to read the rest of the series!

Thank you Briar Boleyn, the publisher and NetGalley.

I was really excited to get several books in this series all at once. This first book started out really intense, and then to me the pacing kind of slowed down as the author began to build the world. I love all books about Fae and this one makes the Fae almost forbidden, where they are not seen in a positive light at the beginning. I can appreciate that since most books portray them as all powerful.

There was a start to a little romance in this first book, but I can sense that may increase as the series goes on.

I am looking forward to reading more of the series.

Let's begin with TW because there are a few mainly including abuse (domestic and attempted SA). I will admit that the plotline with Florian had my stomach in knots but I'm glad he died off quickly enough and we could all move on from that.

Okay, onto the review. I enjoyed this book entirely more than I thought that I would.

I love that it was loosely based on King Arthur and the Knights of the round table. I went into this thinking that this was going to be very much like every other fae story on the market right now, but it really gave the fae plot a type of freshness that had me hooked from the beginning.

I am obsessed with an enemies to lovers slow-burn plot line and I think this one is done extremely well. I loved the back and forth banter of Draven and Morgan. I think it was realistic and it wasn’t too flirty too quickly. Like I loved that they hated each other to the very end of the book but still looked out for each other. It wasn’t rushed and that was honestly one of the highlights of the book.

However, my favorite part of the book was the world building. I think in fantasy books of this caliber the author kind of just dives into everything assuming that we will just understand the magical world, but the author really does a fantastic job of building this world in a way that we can understand the magical rules of the land without being over explained. Like we understand the dynamics between the characters and the notion of the fae through authentic interactions without the author having to spoon feed it to us, but also in a way that’s so descriptive and imaginative. I loved it.

Now, if I did have to give one complaint of the book it would be that I think that it seemed a bit unrealistic that Morgan would trust Vesper that fully and quickly after barely meeting him. After past experiences with the men in her life you would think that she would have just a bit more trepidation when it came to strangers (especially male strangers). But maybe that’s the point? That she wanted to believe that there was one good guy that she could put her trust in? Either way, the twist of him being evil in the end was good (though probably a bit predictable).

What wasn’t predictable was the twist of the little girl being a goddess! That was an incredible plot twist and a FANTASTIC set up for the next book. Very excited to see how the story continues to unfold. I can’t wait to see Morgan come into her own powers. (Not excited to see her reaction to Lancelet dying because I was absolutely gutted by that). All in all loved this book and cannot wait to read the rest of the series. Thank you so much to NetGalley and Briar for the ARC. This was brilliant x

Queen of Roses is a King Arthur retelling with a Fae twist.

Tropes:
- slow-burn romance
- enemies to lovers
- morally grey MMC
- found family
- “Who did this to you?”
- Touch her and die

This story follows Morgan Pendragon, a part-fae princess that has been cast aside by most of her family. Her brother, King Arthur, hates all those with fae blood. As the kingdom sits on the brink of war, he persuades his sister to travel to gain a weapon. However, she can only go with two of the Kings trusted, one of those being Draven, a man she does not particularly get along with.

Queen of Roses has a captivating plot with decent world building. This book introduces the characters but not much character development takes place. I’m hoping the FMC goes through much needed character development in the coming novels. The slow-burn romance begins well, but a wrench gets tossed in that had me screaming at the FMC. Overall, I couldn’t put this book down, claiming I would only read ‘one more chapter’ but in fact stayed up to read 5 or more.

I would recommend this book to anyone that is a fan of Arthurian stories, Sarah J. Maas, Holly Black, Stacia Stark, and Game of Thrones.

Thank you NetGalley and Starwater Press for granting me access to this book in exchange for an honest review.

I absolutely loved this book, I’m so glad the next one is already out because I can’t wait to jump straight into it. There is fae, magic, magical creatures, slow burn enemies to lovers with “who did this to you” everything I was looking for. This book is perfect if you’re looking to ease yourself into fantasy as the world building is easy to follow. 4 star read and a great start to this journey, can’t wait to continue.

This series is off to a great start! I love the legends of Camelot and am thoroughly enjoying this new Fae twist on the tale. Excited for the next book!

Thank you NetGalley and the author for this ARC!

The series has so much potential! I enjoyed the storyline and the world building but I find it needs more depth and character development for this to have the wow factor I'm looking for. I will be reading book 2 and keeping my fingers crossed that it will just get better as we go!

Briar Boleyn’s “Queen of Roses” weaves together the Arthurian legend and the allure of fae mystique, resulting in a mesmerizing and suspenseful tale. This book is a must-read for anyone who loves high-power fantasy and is a fan of Sarah J. Maas and Jennifer L. Armentrout’s works.

Boleyn grabbed me from the start, taking me into a world where Camelot and the Fae collide. The author’s ability to create a detailed and immersive world is showcased through their meticulous approach, effortlessly transporting you to a realm overflowing with magic and suspense. The descriptions of the landscapes and courtly life are so vivid that you are transported to the core of the story.

At the center of this tale is Morgan Pendragon, a captivating protagonist with a unique blend of enchantment and royal lineage. As she embarks on a mission entrusted to her by King Arthur, you go on an extraordinary adventure filled with peril and unexpected twists. Accompanying Morgan is the enigmatic Kairos Draven, whose mysterious aura adds tension and depth to the story.

The romance side plot in ‘Queen of Roses’ is exceptional, offering a delightful slow burn that will leave you eagerly turning the pages. The dynamic between Morgan and Draven is brilliantly portrayed, with witty banter and moments of undeniable chemistry. As the plot develops, you are given a nuanced portrayal of their bond, laying the groundwork for an enchanting love story.

While there may be some predictable moments in the story, the overall enjoyment factor is immense. Boleyn’s ability to subvert expectations and breathe new life into familiar tropes is commendable. As the first book in the Morgan Pendragon series, ‘Queen of Roses’ sets the stage for an epic saga filled with betrayal, heartbreak, and dark revelations.

In conclusion, ‘Queen of Roses’ is a captivating and imaginative retelling of the Arthurian legend that will appeal to fans of fantasy and romance alike—romantasy at its best. With its richly drawn characters, immersive world-building, and irresistible romance, this book is sure to leave you eagerly anticipating the next installment in the series.

2.5 stars

Despite its promising premise, 'The Queen of Roses’ fell short in execution for me. While the protagonist faces numerous trials, each one resolves with unsettling ease, leaving little room for tension or character development. The slow-moving plot further hampers engagement. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the copy!

Wow, this book was amazing! This was an easy fast paced fantacy that hocked me from the start. There was no tedious world building chapters to get through, just captivating story. Don't let the length of the trigger least fool you this is a light fun read that doesn't dwell on the things listed just brushes past enough to make it interesting.

This book here….I was not prepared but in the best way possible!

This amazing story had everything I didn’t know I needed; enemies to lovers, forced proximity, “who did this to you?” - not to mention superior world building and character development.

The FMC was extremely relatable and finally began coming into her own during her journey. The story was not only inspiring but kept me on the edge of my seat.

The history that we learn in this book provides a great stepping stone into book 2 and I absolutely cannot wait to dive in!

If you are looking for a new series with magic, fae, romance, adventure and a little spice- this is definitely one for you!

This review has also been posted on Amazon and Goodreads.

To begin, thank you for allowing me to read this. This was a great start to the series and it’s definitely making me consider buying the rest! | loved the modern edge that Briar Boleyn gave this story as well as the fae twist that was included, the blend of the two was excellent executed.
One thing I will say is that it took me a sgile to get into with all the world-building that was going on. Morgan was interesting but I do wish that she would have been a little more defined in a sense. She was all for fighting and learning how to fight - but then at the same time she was so timid and mild when it came to listening to every word that her brother said. There were plenty of times where she could have stood up for herself and she didn't, but then other things she did in secret.

This was said to be a dark fantasy fae series and while I feel this is just the beginning, there wasn’t much darkness or steaminess in this one. However, I’m sure there’s lots of that to come later in the series, as this simply sets up the plot. By the end, I was hooked, and I definitely want to find out more.