Some Good and Some Bad | Mini YA Reviews

I’ve been reading more young adult lately and I thought it would be fun to review some of my recent YA reads. I had some good and some bad times with my latest reads. There is one that I loved reading and had a good time with. And then the other was sort of DNF for me. Anyway, check out my thoughts now.

Prince Charming (Royals #1) by Rachel Hawkins

Pages: 296
Publish date: May 1st 2018
Publisher: Penguin Books
ISBN: 9781524738259
Purchase: Book Depository – Amazon UK – Amazon US – Amazon AU – QBD

Meet Daisy Winters. She’s an offbeat sixteen-year-old Floridian with mermaid-red hair, a part-time job at a bootleg Walmart, and a perfect older sister who’s nearly engaged to the Crown Prince of Scotland. Daisy has no desire to live in the spotlight, but relentless tabloid attention forces her to join Ellie at the relative seclusion of the castle across the pond.

While the dashing young Miles has been appointed to teach Daisy the ropes of being regal, the prince’s roguish younger brother kicks up scandal wherever he goes and tries his best to take Daisy along for the ride. The crown–and the intriguing Miles–might be trying to make Daisy into a lady . . . but Daisy may just rewrite the royal rulebook to suit herself.

Prince Charming:

I’ve been wanting to read this one for a while now and I finally picked it up recently. Ely picked this book as one of the books on my best friend picks my tbr. I bought it when I was in the States last year. And I’m so glad that I did pick it up because it was such a nice read.

Dasiy was a pretty easy protagonist to get along with. She was fun and entertaining and I liked her a lot. She tried to not let people tell her who she should be. Even though her sister and the royal family did try to change her. She tried to be herself the whole time, but she also knew that this is her sister’s life now. I liked that she challenged everyone. It wasn’t in a bad way, but she tried to challenge everything that the royal family wanted for her.

Dasiy’s family was hard to get along with. She just wanted to be herself, but that is hard when her sister is marrying a prince. But that was hard to see Daisy forced to change herself. I felt that her sister was a pain in the ass most of the book and all I wanted was for Dasiy to be herself.

Miles was such a fun character. He made me laugh quite a bit and that just made reading Prince Charming much more fun. He acts like a spoilt brat at times and while that frustrated me. I think it made great banter between him and Dasiy. But I also loved that he had a soft side and that was lovely.

The romance in Prince Charming was pretty adorable. It had a little bit of a love to hate vibe, but nothing too intense. The best way to explain the romance is sweet. It’s fun and Daisy and Miles are adorable together. They have great chemistry and they made me laugh quite a bit. In saying that I wish that were was a little more focus on the romance. I felt like it was going there and then it fell flat. I just wanted that little bit more.

Overall, I enjoyed reading Prince Charming a lot. It was fun, entertaining and made me smile a lot. Daisy and Miles were adorable together, but I like I said I wished I was able to see more of them. I felt there was room to add a lot more. In saying that I do want to pick up the next book in the series for sure. It sounds like it’s going to be as fun reading as this one.

Dark Secret (Darkhaven Saga #1) by Danielle Rose

Pages: 184
Publish date: 9781642631654
Publisher: Waterhouse Press LLC
ISBN: February 18th 2020
Purchase: Book Depository – Amazon UK – Amazon US – Amazon AU – QBD

There’s no wrath like that of a witch scorned.

Seventeen-year-old spirit witch Ava López is the self-appointed guardian of the witches and humans of Darkhaven, an idyllic village nestled between the forest and the sea. Her watch: vicious and bloodthirsty vampires.

Ava is a novice in the eyes of her coven. If she expects to protect them and the secrecy of their powers, she must gain better control of her own. When a full moon ritual goes awry, control may be lost forever, and Ava is exiled from her coven. Forced to seek refuge among the beings she had always sworn herself to hunt, she vows revenge on those who have upended her life.

But the more time Ava spends away from her coven, the more she discovers a startling truth: the witches haven’t been honest with her. Ava’s quest to strip the truth from everything she’s ever known begins with the toughest realization of all—coming to terms with who she has become.

Dark Secret:

I was looking forward to picking this up. I didn’t know much about it, but it seemed right my alley. Sadly I was very disappointed with the outcome. It lacked on a lot of different levels for me.

I call this a DNF because I just scanned through the second half of this one. I wanted to see if I was going to be able to get into it better, but it wasn’t for me. And I was just confused most of the book. The reader is thrown right into the action. Which I wouldn’t have minded, but it all felt rushed and nothing was explained.

This is a tiny book and I felt that it tried to put way too much into one book and everything suffered for it. It was like one thing was happening after another, and then was no room for a break to explain everything that was happening.

One of the things that I felt did suffer was the characterisation. I feel like I didn’t know her at all. She feels flat and didn’t feel real. I wanted to like Ava. And like the rest of the book, the reader is thrown into her character arc. And we don’t get to know her. I didn’t feel that she grew throughout the book and annoyed me a fair bit.

The world of Dark Secret was also confusing. I wasn’t able to get an image of the world. Normally it takes me a little bit to get an idea of what a world looks like, but this book was moving too fast that I wasn’t able to fall into it and grasp it.

Overall, Dark Secret isn’t the book for me. I wanted to like it. But nothing stuck and everything feel flat. The characters weren’t great and the plot just confused me. I have seen people that have enjoyed it, but it wasn’t for me.

And that is it for these mini young adult reviews. As you can see I’ve had some bad and some good times lately. Have you read any of these? Are you planning to? Let’s Chat!