Now I Rise is the second book in The Conqueror’s Saga and if you haven’t started this series you should definitely consider picking them up. Don’t let the size/length of them scare you off either – yes they are lengthy but the story is so good. If you haven’t read book one yet, you might want to hold off on reading my review. While I won’t spoil Now I Rise, I can’t promise the same for book one.

Book two picks up shortly after And I Darken wraps up and Lada is still driven to get the Wallachian throne back no matter what. She and her men are attacking anyone they cross paths with so they can survive and she quickly realizes what she is doing isn’t getting her what she wants. What she really needs is her brother, Radu, and his ability to be more diplomatic and connect with others around him. Unfortunately for her, she left him behind with Mehmed and he isn’t in any position to join her…even if he wanted to.

As I mentioned, Radu is with Mehmed but things aren’t the same for them. Radu still loves and Mehmed and Mehmed still loves Lada and I couldn’t help feeling bad for Radu. He kept letting Mehmed take advantage of him and I just wanted Radu to stand up for himself. Unfortunately for Radu, his feelings put him in a position where he ends up in Constantinople as a spy and it is expected that he do whatever he needs to in order to help Mehmed take control of the city. The struggle he has with this is that Radu has built friendships with the very people he has to betray.

Mehmed is super manipulative of both Radu and Lada and I didn’t like a lot of the choices he made. He was so determined to get what he wanted that he didn’t care who he hurt along the way. I’m still not sure how I feel about him knowing everything about what he knew and what he asked of everyone.

As characters, I don’t think any of them changed very much from book one to book two. If anything Lada showed the most growth and I would attribute that to the fact that if she hadn’t changed the way she was attempting to get the throne back, she may not have had any success. By recognizing the need to partner with someone who had a bit more diplomacy she wasn’t stuck in the same place she was when she left her brother and Mehmed behind..

This book gives you two different stories that eventually intersect. With Lada on her own mission, her story is very separate from that of Radu’s/Mehmed’s and I think her story interested me more. The rotating chapters from Lada’s story to Radu’s story slowed everything way down and I found myself struggling not to skim over some parts. What helped move things along were the secondary characters that White developed. They not only added to the story, but also helped me connect more to the main characters and learn more about them.

Overall I enjoyed this book but wish the pace had been a bit faster. The details were necessary but it was a struggle to stay fully interested in some of the slower parts. If you are looking for a story about a strong female warrior, definitely check out the entire series and if you have already read And I Darken, you will want to read Now I Rise so you can see what happens amongst the characters and whether they achieve the goals they have set for themselves.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the review copy.