Princess Diaries but make it gay…shut up!!
(See what I did there) 🤔😉

I was fortunate enough to get an ARC of Rules of Royalty by Cale Dietrich. The cover and premise immediately caught my eye so I was quite happy getting to read this. This was such a cute and fun read, essentially we meet Jamie who finds out on his birthday that he’s royalty (now I want a crown). We’re whisked away to meet the king and royal family and along the way meet Eric, who is also a prince of a neighboring country. As luck would have it, our two leads are both gay and catch each other’s eyes. I really liked the whole pining and will they won’t they do something about their feelings! I enjoyed watching their relationship evolve to a cute love story. There’s plenty of cute and tender moments that just make your heart beat. Apart from the romance, I liked how our leads also grow as individuals; I thought that was important for their development. I liked all the characters in this with the exception of one, the Queen, but oddly enough I wanted to know more about her lol. Something I didn’t like was a certain trope being used in the third act (it’s a me thing), but even with that I had an enjoyable time reading this. I really loved Jamie and Eric together, I’d definitely love to know more about them in any future installments (hint hint Cal). Sometimes you just need a really good book with great characters to take you away, to laugh, smile and just make you feel good inside; this will do it!

This was my first read from Cale and certainly won’t be my last. This will be available December 10th so add to your tbrs and plan on getting this!

Thank you to Netgalley, Wednesday Books and Cale for providing me this ARC for an honest review.

This was a sweet, fun, feel-good romance about a 17 year old American boy who learns his father is the king of a small European country. Jamie is so wholesome and kind, you just can't help wanting good things for him. Almost everyone he comes in contact with is nice and welcoming. If you need a feel good escape with a happily ever after, this book is for you. Recommended for grades 8 & up.

Review: Overall, I really enjoyed this. I loved the interactions between Erik and Jamie. I really loved how Jamie adjusted to his new role as a prince and realized that he there is power and privilege to that. My literal only complaint is that this felt very insta-love for me, and I just personally don’t love that. I do understand that this is a YA book and that the entire thing happens over the span of like three weeks, but at one point it felt like Erik just woke up and was suddenly absolutely enamored with Jamie. Even with that, I think this is a really, really cute book and I enjoyed Cale’s writing and I’ll definitely be reading more of Cale’s books in the future.

Synopsis: Jamie Johnson has never been the centre of attention, and he’s perfectly okay with that. His entire world unravels as a hidden truth emerges: he's the heir to the throne of Mitanor, a sun-drenched southern European country, and the press is ready to expose this secret to the world. An invitation to spend the summer in his father's palace arrives, giving Jamie a chance to get to know the man he never thought he’d meet.

Meanwhile, in a northern European kingdom known for its cold climate and stoic royals, Erik Von Rosenborg, the spare prince, grapples with the upcoming marriage of his golden-boy elder brother. With the country’s spotlight trained on his family more than ever, Erik feels sidelined and tightly controlled. So when he receives an offer to tutor the newly found American prince in the ways of royalty, he accepts without hesitation.

At a magnificent summer palace, Erik guides Jamie through the intricacies of royal etiquette, politics, and history. What neither prince anticipates is the connection that sparks between them—one that challenges both of their futures. Now each must make a choice: follow their hearts, or the time-honored royal path where crown and country reigns supreme, no matter the personal cost.

I love royal romance, but honestly, for a traditionally published book, this one should be better. I absolutely adored “If This Gets Out,” so I’m hoping the published version of this book will be better than the ARC.

Honest review: This book is Young Royals meets gay The Princess Diaries meets Red, White and Royal Blue. A queer YA romantic comedy. While the premise of this book intrigued me, the writing became a bit repetitive and I found myself skimming through parts subconciously and nodding off. A lot of telling instead of showing and that created a very underwhelming and shallow story imo.

The story is told through the two characters POV, interchanging each chapter. Unfortunately, the characters had no disntictive voice as they are very similar to each other and they felt very one-dimensional. The relationship between the characters was more akin to a middle-school type of boyfriend/boyfriend than an actual fleshed out romance of two high schololers. Maybe that’s the target audience? Although there are very heavy makeout scenes… so not quite sure…

Overall the story is cute albeit trope-y, and I caught a few references to the story’s inspiration which was fun. But this missed the mark for me in terms of its writing execution.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC.

I might have been a little outside of the age range for this book. I thought it would skew toward the older side of YA, but it was definitely aimed at the younger end.

That's not to say it's a bad book, it was just a bit too young for me. It's very light-hearted and low stakes. I'm sure most readers have seen all the tropes before, especially if you've seen The Princess Diaries, but they're classics for a reason.

The main characters were decent. I much preferred Erik over James if I had to choose, but most of the supporting characters felt like they blended together and I couldn't really tell you who was who.

In the end, it mostly felt like a PG rated Red, White, and Royal Blue. That's not a knock against the book, and it's nice for younger gays and girls to have something like this to read, it just wasn't for me!

I really enjoyed this book. I loved Jamie and Erik’s story and their roller coaster of emotions. It felt like this was a Hallmark movie in the making. The characters were so sweet and the story woven together nicely!

Thank you to St. Martin's Press | Wednesday Books and NetGalley for an electronic advanced readers copy of this novel.

The Rules of Royalty by Cale Dietrich is a fun mashup of the Princess Diaries and Red, White and Royal Blue. It is fun and formulaic at times but in a good way. I really enjoyed it.

Jamie is living a regular life with his adopted mom and stepfather in the United States after his mom passed away when he was young. Hanging out with his friends and crushing on cute guys are the two things usually on his agenda, until his 17th birthday, when he finds out his late mother was a well-off aristocrat from a (fictional) country and his dad is the King. Thrown into a unique situation, Jamie is reeling but excited to find out more about his family. The King drafts a prince from a neighboring country to show him the ropes, and sparks fly! Erik helps Jamie navigate how to be a royal while still keeping his distance as he is used to following his grandmother's (the Queen) rules about what is expected from him.

This is a fun, quick and entertaining read! I hope it finds a wide audience. It's very charming and fun.

I had some issues with this one. There are text message convos in the book but they aren’t shown differently from the normal font being used and it threw me off and bothered me. It very much reads like a YA novel and some might really enjoy this one (it was cute don’t get me wrong) but I personally don’t love a lot of YA books (and maybe I’m just too old for them?). I felt like it read very slow until the end 3-4 chapters and then it felt rushed. Overall it was cute but I don’t think it was life changing for me personally

An off-brand trope salad harvested from “The Princess Diaries” and “Red, White, and Royal Blue.” But “Rules” is uncompelling. Its stakes never get high enough to get the reader invested. Every character feels like a stock cardboard cut-out. Though told in alternating narration, the voices of the two leads are flat, indistinct, and disingenuous. (For instance, the supposed European prince speaks in vernacular that is distinctly American.) And though it is about two fictional countries, nothing about this world or its “rules” feels rooted in reality. Overall, this reads like a fanfiction that had its serial numbers filed and was rushed to print.

*Received as a free ARC*
I'm gonna go with "I'm too old for this". I feel in my bones that I would have absolutely loved a queer romance like this in high school. But as an adult, it fell a little flat. I went in expecting the characters to be a little older, but they are very much high schoolers and I am very much not. Still, I think it's a solid read for the age group and a solid purchase for a collection.

This was a fun light read. It echoes Red, White and Royal Blue, Playing the Palace, Duke for a Summer, and others where the couples consist of an American and a royal--in this case, Jamie, an American who finds out at age 17 that he is actually a prince of a fictitious Spanish-ish country. He falls in love with Erik, also 17, who is the spare heir of a Scandinavian-ish country. Fish-out-of-water and conservative royal dilemmas ensue. The main strength of the book is the characters. We root for Jamie and Erik--they are both so sweet and try so hard-- and Jamie's two sets of parents are also very sympathetically drawn. I wanted the writing to be a little stronger--the descriptions of feelings were all pretty generalized and the book needs a good editor (hopefully that will happen post-ARC). Still a fun read with some nice feels---and the author's way with characters would make me want to read more by him.

light fun gay romance told by Jamie and Erik. Jamie was shocked when at 17 he's told he's actually a prince. He's sent to Erik, another 17 year old Prince, to learn protocol but finds love. This has all the tropes- the sunny Jamie. the chilly Erik, the fake dating, and so on- but it's also got a mushy heart. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. It's meant to be YA but it's enjoyable across the generations.

Oh I loved every second of this book. It really gave me the vibes of the Red White and Royal Blue movie. I highly recommend and will be buying a physical copy when it’s available.

thank you netgalley for giving me an arc in exchange for an honest review!

okay so here's the thing. i have a very deep reverence for red, white and royal blue so therefore it is a hobby of mine to read every quote-unquote "knockoff" of that novel as possible. so, of course, this book was on my raydar.

it wasn't necessarily bad, per se. the prince character (like the one who was established royalty. forget his name) was an interesting pov to read from. but the OTHER guy was so annoying. the writing was amateur at best, cringe at worst. all the other characters blended together into an amalgamation of mediocrity. i didn't really get far enough to dig into any plot stuff, but i just didn't care about the characters or what was going on in it. simply couldn't do it.

I received an ARC from the publisher via NetGalley and am voluntarily posting a review. All opinions are my own.
I enjoyed the last Cale Dietrich book I read, so I was optimistic that I might like the next book in the same vein. But sadly, I was really let down by The Rules of Royalty. It comes down to a number of factors, from life just being chaotic right now (personal stuff kept me from really engrossing in the book), picking this up after another bad read I fortunately DNFed, and the fact that this book skews toward younger YA.
The leads have reasonably interesting character arcs, but that’s let down by them having virtually identical narrative voices, so it’s easy to forget whose head you’re in. And that resulted in me not really caring when things happened, either on a personal level for either lead, or about their romance, since neither was really fleshed out or given their own voice.
I did like the strides made to make the monarchies a bit more progressive by acknowledging children born out of wedlock and them being queer not being a massive deal, but the result was the book lacked a lot of the royal intrigue and stakes to keep the story interesting.
But given I didn’t like the Red, White & Royal Blue to begin with, a “tamer” version that does more or less the same thing for a younger audience falls flat for me.
While I really wasn’t a fan of this book, I think it’s great that readers who may not be ready for/interested in the more explicit content of RWRB have this as an alternative. On the off chance queer royal romance is your thing, and you don’t mind that it skews a little younger in terms of its target audience, I recommend giving it a chance.

The Rules of Royalty was a light-hearted, queer YA story that was very reminiscent of The Princess Diaries. If you are in search of a fun, easy to read, low angst story, Jamie and Erik’s story is the perfect one to dive into.

Jamie Johnson had no idea who his father was, or that his birthday this year would be any different than his birthday last year. When his mother sits him down, he finds out he is heir to the throne of Mitanor and his biological father is the King of Mitanor.

Erik Von Rosenborg has had his entire life mapped out in accordance with what the crown expected of him. When he is asked to help Jamie adjust to his new role as not only as prince, but as a queer royal like Erik, he does what is asked of him. He doesn’t expect the fondness for Jamie, nor for his feelings to be as deep as they were that he would challenge the Queen’s orders.

This is definitely geared towards a younger YA audience, 12-14 years old. While there were social issues, and conflicts that both Jamie and Erik must address, it felt as if this would be perfect for a 6th or 7th grade student. Now that I say that there was a good bit of kissing, but I did read some crazy fanfic back in the day that was definitely not meant for my eyes.

It was fun seeing how Jamie and Erik both had awkward fumbles, and there was a good bit of will he or won’t he moments. When they did finally decide to jump in, I kicked my feet up with a giggle.

There were a couple aspects that I feel like could have been left out and the story would have been perfectly fine. Some filler, some odd moments and underdeveloped secondary characters.
Overall, this was a fun read!

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!
*Note: I've rated this a 4, but it probably falls closer to a 3.5.

Non-spoiler synopsis:
Imagine going out to a local American diner for your 17th birthday, then coming home to find out you are a Prince of a small European country. In The Rules of Royalty, The Princess Diaries meets Red White and Royal Blue meets Romeo and Juliet. Jamie is your average gay American teenager, who comes to find out he is royalty; Erik is the spare heir, European Prince, who is tasked with bringing Jamie up to speed on how to act and what it means to be a young, gay prince. Together, they find themselves and learn how to navigate the challenges of (re)discovering who they are and what exactly they stand for.

Review:
I thought this was such a sweet and wholesome queer coming of age and love story. I really enjoyed getting to know Jamie and Erik and getting a glimpse into their family dynamics. I think Cale Dietrich did a wonderful job of representing the gay experience and social strife that many queer people experience, regardless of class or status, while simultaneously showing that queer people are just people too in The Rules of Royalty. Some other relevant and important topics were touched on as well, like wishing people with higher status / more resources would do more to support important causes within their communities, which was really refreshing.

I will say I was worried that this would feel too similar to other stories with similar premises, but I was happy that this felt unique despite some overlap! I do, however, think the story suffered a bit from some repetitive writing. There were also many instances where the author told instead of showing us what was happening (and some instances where they showed and still told us anyways immediately after the fact, which contributed to the repetitiveness). I also felt that both characters’ POVs were written very similarly so it didn’t feel like there were strong enough differences to differentiate between reading the two besides the fact that they obviously lead very different lives.

Please read The Rules of Royalty if you loved The Princess Diaries, Romeo and Juliet, and/or Red White and Royal Blue; it publishes on December 10th! I’d love to hear what you think of it if you do!

4 stars

This is such a cute read! A YA m/m romance set within the royal palaces of Europe, it’s a sweet and heartfelt love story, and I loved this one.

Jamie is a well-adjusted 17 year old living a happy life in the USA when he learns that he is actually the son of European royalty. His biological father is the King of Mitanor, in southern Europe, and he and his adoptive parents have been invited to visit to get to know his newly-discovered family. Erik is the Prince of Sunstad, in the north of Europe, also 17 years old, and he has been asked to help Jamie adjust to royal life – show him the ropes, help him with the customs and etiquette, and be somebody for him to lean on. It helps that Erik is openly gay, as is Jamie, so they can also talk about the unique challenges that brings to life in the public eye.

Jamie and Erik initially chat over text, but it’s when they meet up in Mitanor that their friendship truly blossoms. They find that despite their different backgrounds, they have a lot in common, and as Erik helps Jamie find his way, the two boys grow close and attraction blossoms. But their situation is complicated – Jamie’s whole world has just been turned upside down and he has no idea what he’s doing or what his future looks like, and Erik’s family is a lot more stoic and ‘proper’ than Jamie’s. While they accept his sexuality, the still want to hand pick a partner for him, and outright refuse to allow him and Jamie to get involved. Their attraction soon becomes impossible to resist though, so we get the most beautifully sweet and innocent forbidden romance that absolutely warmed my heart, and that means so much to both of these boys.

"So much about my life has always felt like work: carefully analyzing every interaction, making sure I’m presenting an appropriate version of myself, one that represents myself, my country, and the crown, with the appropriate amount of reverence.
With Jamie, I don’t feel that way. My walls are down in a way they’ve never been before, and spending time with him is simply easy. It just works, in a way that feels special."

I loved these characters! Jamie is a sweetheart who embraces all of the changes in his life with maturity, intelligence and an open heart. And Erik’s story is so gorgeous as he comes to realise how stifled and controlled he has been in his life as “the spare heir”. Both of them get the opportunity to branch out and experience life like they have never experienced, and they embrace it with all of the wide-eyed enthusiasm of teenagers, and it was gorgeous to see.

There is a great bunch of side characters – family and friends – who support and guide the boys through their journey, and they’re really enjoyable. Perhaps a little bit too unrealistically perfect at times, but I enjoyed the different relationships. And though I did think that the reason behind the secret of Jamie’s birthright was a bit weak (I can’t believe any devoted father choosing to be out of his son’s life for so long), it paved the way for such a delightful read that I just forgot about that and happily lost myself in the story.

These boys have a gorgeous romance, and they work through their issues honestly and openly, and I loved seeing them get their happy ending.

This was a gorgeous read, appropriate for young readers and old, and I really enjoyed this book.

4 stars.

An Advanced Reader Copy was generously provided by the publisher via NetGalley for an honest review.

very cute and cozy romance! not particularly deep, but it doesn't really need that at all. nice and refreshing read. 4 stars. tysm for the arc.