Book Review – The Princess Will Save You by Sarah Henning

Title: The Princess Will Save You (Kingdoms of Sand and Sky #1)

Author: Sarah Henning

Publisher: Tor Teen

Publication date: July 7th, 2020

368 pages

3/5 stars

Goodreads Synopsis

The Princess Will Save You is a YA fantasy adventure inspired by The Princess Bride, in which a princess must rescue her stable boy true love, from the acclaimed author of Sea Witch, Sarah Henning.

When a princess’s commoner true love is kidnapped to coerce her into a political marriage, she doesn’t give in—she goes to rescue him.

When her warrior father, King Sendoa, mysteriously dies, Princess Amarande of Ardenia is given what would hardly be considered a choice: Marry a stranger at sixteen or lose control of her family’s crown.

But Amarande was raised to be a warrior—not a sacrifice.

In an attempt to force her choice, a neighboring kingdom kidnaps her true love, stable boy Luca. With her kingdom on the brink of civil war and no one to trust, she’ll need all her skill to save him, her future, and her kingdom.

Review

“True love is the most powerful force on this earth- we just forget it because those with power here deal in fear rather than love.”

Sarah Henning, The Princess Will Save You

The Princess Will Save You is billed as being inspired by the Princess Bride, which should have told me from that jump that this might not be my favorite – because I didn’t like the Princess Bride! But, I’m an optimist at heart & I simply can’t refuse a YA fantasy with a cover like that. I mean come on, it’s gorgeous! Charlie Bowater’s work is amazing and for someone who definitely judges a book by it’s cover, Charlie sure gets the job done.

But continuing on with why it wasn’t my favorite. It’s not bad as a YA fantasy, at all. There is a lot of intrigue, political motivations and backstabbing, adventures with pirates and kidnappers, and all in the pursuit of finding your one true love. The world-building is incredibly interesting and the writing is evocative.

So you may be asking, if all these great characteristics are alive and well in this book, why the average 3 star rating? Why wasn’t it my favorite? Well friends, I introduce you to the main characters – Amarande and Luca. Who both barely have a personality to speak of and don’t even seem to have chemistry, even though they’ve supposedly been in love since they were children. But they never talked about it. But they knew. Really, my main issue with this book is how little time was spent on giving the MC’s any interesting qualities.

However with that being said, there was an interesting reveal at the end and I do intend to read the sequel, The Queen Will Betray You, which publishes July 7th with Tor Teen as they kindly sent me an ARC to review.

Happy reading, folks!