Throne of Swans is set in a kingdom – actually, a world, which is one of the things that made me perk up and pay attention – where humanity is split in two the Flightless, who are what we’d think of as normal humans, and the Flighted, who can transform into birds, and who also rule as the noble class. That ‘twist’ makes me so damn angry.īut if you can let those things go – and it’s surprisingly easy to do, to be fair – this is a book with surprisingly well thought out worldbuilding, and seriously gorgeous prose. I don’t like including spoilers in reviews, so I won’t spell it out for you, but seriously. And I knocked a whole star off my rating for a completely unnecessary, lazy ‘twist’ that was meant to be an oh-so-shocking reveal about the villains.

A romance that doesn’t seem to be based on anything but looks the emotional aspect kind of comes out of nowhere. Whatever the reason, I’m so glad I started reading it, because I really loved this book!Įven though it ticks quite a few boxes of my nope-list – first-person present-tense narration, which I normally despise. All things that should have made me pass this book by.īut the blurb also mentioned ‘rich detail and evocative language’, for which I’m an absolute sucker.

The cover is fairly dull (for my tastes). I guessed this was going to be some kind of Swan Princess retelling. I’m honestly not sure what made me pick this up – I’m a lot more wary of YA than I used to be, and the blurb made Throne of Swans sound very predictable. Written in rich detail and evocative language, this is the start of an irresistible, soaring duology about courage, broken loyalties and fighting for your place in the world.

Driven by revenge and love, she must venture into the malevolent heart of the Citadel in order to seek the truth about the attack that so nearly destroyed her, to fight for the only home she has ever known and for the land she has vowed to protect. With the benevolent shelter of her mother and her father now lost, Aderyn is at the mercy of her brutal uncle, the King, and his royal court. But she has not transformed for years, not since witnessing the death of her mother - ripped apart by hawks that have supposedly been extinct since the long-ago War of the Raptors. When her father dies just before her birthday, seventeen-year-old Aderyn inherits the role of Protector of Atratys, a dominion in a kingdom where nobles are able to transform at will into the bird that represents their family bloodline. Representation: Secondary Bi/Pan character, Normalised queerness A Throne of Swans by Katharine Corr, Elizabeth Corr