This was unfortunately a book I did not finish.

I got about 23% of the way in, and really struggled to connect to it.

Norcliff is about a girl, her “adopted” sister/companion, and the person who took care of them and trained them to fight. On her wedding day, there is a large fight and that starts the book.

The book gets right into the action and plot, but very quickly new problems and conflict are added in. I struggled to connect with anyone because it felt like I was reading on issue into the next, with minimal world building or context. The pacing felt very rushed and things were happening out of nowhere.

I think if you’re someone who enjoys action based fantasy/sci fi/romance, without much world building and context thrown in, this may be more up your alley.

I just know the relationship dynamic between the sisters and their trainer is wonderful, but it was not enough to keep the story going, for me. I did not get a chance to connect to that relationship.

Erin, the FMC, was strong and courageous. Not scared to get into the middle of a fight. She was reading like a strong character!

I appreciate NetGalley and K.A. Connolly for the early read.

This was a quick, easy read, however, it really missed the mark for me. I found the storyline quite predictable and it didn't really capture me. The main thing I did like was the FMC, Erin, and her perseverance throughout the book. It's quite often in these type of books that the FMC is a damsel in distress who needs saving but Erin is the complete opposite and is a badass! I also liked her bond and friendship that she had with Jax and Liana, they were their own version of the three musketeers! The book was quite short which is why I ended up finishing it, but I did find some of the storyline was rushed especially the ending.

Thank you to the author, the publisher and Netgalley for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

On paper, I should have loved this, and while I didn't hate it, it just wasn't for me.

Things I did enjoy:
-The vibe and imagery of this story is beautifully done. This is such a vibrantly told story.
-The beginning of the story was really great
-The slow burn romance

Things I did not love:
-The pacing was almost too fast. I felt like I could dig deeply into anything because we were moving onto the next thing
-I though the plot got somewhat confusing and unnecessarily complicated in the second half

What's supposed to be the happiest day of Erin's life turns out to be the worst. She is on her way to her wedding when she hears fighting. Her fiancee is dead and her parents have been kidnapped.

Erin must seek an audience with the King to see if he will aid her in getting her parents back. She will need powerful allies.
Things don't go as planned, so she must seek them elsewhere.

I liked these characters, but the insta love definitely didn't work for me. I think if the book was longer, it might not have felt so rushed.

Thank you to NetGalley for an Advanced Reader’s Copy in exchange for an honest review.

Norcliff began with a strong start. I was immediately interested in Jax’s story, his mysterious background, and the contrast between his personality and that of Finley, the duke of Norcliff. Erin’s first chapter was well done as well – action packed, with a quite a shocking inciting incident.

However, after that, I struggled with the narrative. I wish the author had spent more time on each of the plot points. Norcliff is a story of political intrigue, war, feminism, and romance, yet most of the biggest plot points were lost due to the extremely fast pacing. Many of the secondary or ‘side’ characters only appeared for a scene or two and were not fleshed out – especially the ones the reader meets while Erin, Jax, and Liana are in the capital. Considering Liana’s existence and subsequent adoption were such major moments in the first chapters, I wish the reader could have learned more about her and gotten more closure regarding her love story.

I do appreciate that Erin and Hugo’s romance was more of a slow burn and not an insta-love connection. It gave their eventual coming together much more of an authentic feel.

One thing I love is a good fantasy I love a book that can make me forget what's going on in the world and go into an imaginative world where the impossible happens and you meet characters and creatures you would never meet for real and this book had ot all

This is a fast-paced, action-packed story that builds an interesting world and keeps you on the edge of your seat.

It follows Lady Erin as she seeks revenge for the death of her fiance and capture of her parents, combining court politics with action.

I enjoyed that Erin wasn't held back by the expectations of being a lady at a time that was meant to be medieval. She was happy to fight, sneak around and do what had to be done without worrying about appearances.

While the pacing was great and ensured the focus was on the action and important moments, it also meant that I couldn't get a good picture of what the world looked like. It seemed far too easy to travel quickly even by horse. I also thought Erin's recovery from her fiance dying to falling for someone else was a bit too fast.

I also found some of the language to be slightly too modern for the time in which is seemed to be set. 'Mom and dad', for example, took me out of it a little bit.

Overall, it was a fun read and very quick for under 300 pages.

Thank you to K.A. Connolly and NetGalley for the ARC copy of this book.

Norcliff has a fun premise, but from the jump the slightly clunky writing style and the flat characters makes it hard to engage with. Every character has little to no background or development. The reader is TOLD who these people are and how we are meant to feel about them, but we are never SHOWN anything on page.

The best example of this is early on in the first four chapters. We are told that Jax has been training Erin in stealth and combat since she was three. The first two times conflict the resulted in violence happens, Erin freezes up and just watches it happen. While I understand the first time (nerves get the better of all of us sometimes), it’s the constant reassurance from the other characters that Erin is capable making it all feel incredibly forced.

Besides the lack of character development, the pacing is all over the place while the plot turned out to be extremely predictable. I could have forgiven one of these issues, but both together is impossible to look past. Every event is happening at light speed so nothing is rewarding. It comes across more like a storyboard outline than a completed narrative.

My final note: if you are going to write a medieval setting either commit to the bit or purposefully subvert expectations. Half committing leaves everyone, characters and readers alike, confused.

Norcliff is a romantasy with deep roots in the classic, swords and sorcery fantasy tradition. It follows Erin, the inheritor and heir apparent of the duchy of Norcliff, who finds herself ensnared in a plot of political intrigue after her wedding is interrupted by the targeted assassination of her fiancé by the man who wants Erin and her lands for himself. After losing face in court, Erin needs to find allies in alternate places to save her parents and protect her people, only to discover that the political situation is worse than it appears. And amidst all of this toil and tribulation, she finds new love along the way. While nothing about this premise is particularly groundbreaking, Norcliff promised to be a familiar, comforting type of tale, so that’s what I hoped for going in.
Unfortunately, despite the premise being the sort of thing I like, the execution is where Norcliff falls short for me. While reading, I felt as though I was being told a story secondhand, or reading a sparknotes summary of the book, more than reading a complete story in itself. The plot relies on telling over showing, making the pace breakneck throughout but without earning any emotional payoff. This lead to scenes of battle, the romantic leads wooing, travel, and training all lack any tonal differentiation and left me with an overall one-note experience while reading. There was also a seeming avoidance of building up conflict in service of getting the story to move more quickly. Erin arrives at the palace, is immediately welcomed by the nobles (no court intrigue or hidden intentions from the other courtiers?), then is assaulted by the prince and everyone’s opinion turns on a dime (again, no sympathies or anyone else knowing the prince is a predator?) in the course of, like, four pages. There’s no time for any of those events to sink in before they’re each brought to some sort of resolution and all the potential tension is dissipated, leaving the characters to be whisked to the next series of un-nuanced, cause-and-effect-but-no-feelings-or-complications plot events.
The speed also didn’t allow for differentiation between characters. Most everyone shares the same mannerisms of speech regardless of social class or geographic difference, and information and skill are granted to or withheld from characters seemingly at random. There’s scenes where Erin, purportedly the heir of Norcliff and thus raised to be at least aware of her surrounding duchies, has to be told about the politics and customs of her neighbors. Erin is also trained enough at swordplay and strategy that she can hold her own in a battle or scale castle battlements undetected but inexplicably has soft lady’s hands. Inconsistencies like this further broke my immersion in the story, and kept me guessing as to what the actual traits, fears, wants, and feelings of the characters actually were.
And since this is a romantasy, where the central relationship between Erin and Hugo should be at the heart of most of what’s going on, it’s imperative that I know at least about what makes the two of them tick. I found myself feeling like their relationship was instalove-y and bland to the point where I didn’t even mind the instalove, because to mind it would meant I cared about it at all.
However, while it didn’t work for me, I think Norcliff could still very much fill the comfort-read romantasy niches for people who want quick, uncomplicated reads with all their favorite fantasy tropes making an appearance. The writer clearly knows and cares for their genres. Their scenes of riding horses on a journey, chivalrous courtship practices between the romantic leads, character tropes like the poisoneer madame and turncoat advisor, and a badass Princess female lead kept me reading instead of DNFing outright. With just some more fleshing out, showing to balance out the telling, I think Norcliff could’ve been quite good. I would be interested in seeing more from this author and seeing whether that element of their writing style evolves.

This fell very flat for me, I did not like Erin at all. She was confusing for me.. your fiancé dies and you’re laughing.. 2 weeks later we love someone else😐 not adding up for me.
This also felt all over the place, we went from wanting to help our parents to revenge on the prince..
Allies we met at the beginning are forgotten for the rest of the book.
We lost a lot of the story cause we had characters hurt the MC or her family and it’s this big betrayal but we don’t know them.. so we as the reader have no reason to care.
The little missed details also didn’t help, we have a poisonous kiss, then don’t take the antidote but kiss our love interest? That seems so small but it’s definitely important and it’s just not there..
Not for me

Norcliff is a quick and easy read. This story had a lot of promise, but the plot is overly rushed and is honestly lacking any real depth. There were elements I enjoyed, especially the main character reaching court and the potential for political intrigue. However, this like many areas fell flat. I wish we had pushed literally any aspect further, because every challenge or issue was resolved incredibly quickly. Erin has the potential to be a interesting main character; I just wish we had the opportunity to develop a stronger relationship with her.

Overall, this was a story that left me wanting, but I do believe it will appeal to the younger end of the YA romantasy demographic.

I found myself fantasizing about the love Erin and Hugo have for each other and how after her fiance/husband passing she never thought she could love so deep again with all the challenges she came across with, with her parents being captured. I found myself in Erin's shoes and wish to find love like Erin and Hugo❤️. It's a great book.

This book is a solid YA fantasy. The dialogue really threw me off, because it is written highly and I had a hard time connecting with it. I’d let my niece read it, but it’s not a rave.

Thanks to netgalley for this ARC.

I wanted to like it. I really did. The premise had promise.
The FMC is raised/trained as both a kick ass warrior and a lady. The issue is she’s raised in a medieval land where women aren’t supposed to be warriors. Misogyny ruins the day yet again.
The story started off great and then sorta fell flat. The battle scenes were lacking interest and the end was meh.
There are lots of holes in character development, too.
I kept reading hoping the spark of the first half would reignite. Nope
It’s like the author had a character limit and needed to wrap it up quickly.
Disappointing, overall.

Unfortunately this is a DNF for me at 40%. I tried to read as much as I could before making the decision to not read any further and I feel that I’ve hit my limit.

The cover and premise for this book were fantastic and I was really excited to give it a go but the writing just fell so flat. I felt no connection or care for any of the characters, the plot seems to jump forward very quickly which gives readers no time to react, reflect or think about important events. It’s written in a very “tell not show” style which comes off quite juvenile and doesn’t allow readers to visualise. The dialogue was also very clunky and unrealistic for people who have known each other their entire lives.

I think the story has real potential, the writing just needs a fair bit of work.

If you liked learning about royalty in school and enjoyed films like Brave, this book is for you. I enjoyed the way this was written and I was constantly wanting to know what else was going to happen.

Lady Erin is preparing for the most important day of her life, the start of something new. Little did she know that the new was not exactly what she was expecting. Lady Erin has been brought up with the skills to fight for herself unlike most lady's of the land which is unusual in this time and due to this she really stands up for herself and her family.

I really enjoyed the strong female character that Erin became and how she truly grew within the book. I am really hoping that this becomes a series as I would love to know how Lady Erin gets on as well as her rag tag team of friends.

I loved this book so much. I loved the relationship between Erin and Liana and how they trusted each other and uplifted each other throughout the story. I think the way that Erin's grief is depicted throughout the books is phenominal and the depiction of her internal struggles relating to her grief was amazing as well. While I do think that Erin's strength and communication skills on the battlefield were not then reflected in her conversations with her family and friends, it still did not take away from how much I loved this story and this cast of characters.

A story with great potential but a clear lack of editing and it low-key makes me sad, because this book could've been great. Aside from the many typos, there were also some glaring mistakes such as a prince being addressed as "your majesty"? And that wasn't the only time such. thing happened, which truly sucks in a fantasy book with a monarchy. The book also felt very rushed and I think that is partly because of its length, it definitely needed 100 more pages. 2.5 stars

For me, this is a 3.5 stars rounded up to 4. It was filled with fantasy, exciting battles and heart. It is captivating. I personally think as someone who has been getting into fantasy but still is a bit inexperienced, this is a great book as the magic system and clan set up was something I felt familiar with and could understand easily. The plot was well-crafted and I would definitely recommend it.

Thank you to Net Galley for this ARC.

I was interested in this book as it had an intriguing premise but unfortunately I found that the writing let it down and ended up DNFing after only 13%. While the story itself featured some darker aspects the writing style itself felt very young, especially considering that the book is marketed as a New Adult novel. I’m sure that had I continued the story itself would have still been enjoyable but unfortunately the actual writing made me unable to continue.