There was a lot I liked about this book, but also a lot that frustrated me. I enjoyed it but at the same time am disappointed that it wasn't quite what I wanted. 

The premise I love. The book picks up at the point where most classic fantasy ends, where the hero (who of course lived in small village until a wizard told him he had a destiny) has fulfilled the prophecy, slain the evil villain and become king. I love that we don't see all that story - we don't need to, we've read it a million times before. I love that we get to see what's next. I also love that this book is a romance between the new king and his mage/chief advisor (it was impossible not to think back to the hundreds of Merlin fanfics I used to read). 

The execution was not quite what I wanted. I was hoping for politics and worldbuilding but both of those were fairly muted. I was also distracted by the writing style, which read more like contemporary high school romance - words like "sucked" and "jerk" feel out of place to me in a high fantasy setting. The plot also relies heavily on the miscommunication trope, which is a trope I really dislike especially in romance - the book would have been half the length if the two main characters had simply had a honest conversation. 

The strength of the book is that I did very much like the characters and rooted for Arek and Matt to get together. The supporting characters were mostly interesting too. It was also very easy to read and helped to raise my spirits on a day when I wasn't feeling very well. 

I have to bear in mind that this is YA and I'm not part of the target audience, I'm not sure whether or not I would have reviewed this book differently when I was a teenager. Ultimately I had a good time but I wanted to absolutely love it and it's frustrating that that didn't happen.