akacya 's review for:

The Enemy's Daughter by Melissa Poett

3.0

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2025 reads: 145/300

i received a finished copy from the publisher as part of their influencer program. this did not affect my rating.

thirty-seven years after the republic was destroyed, two settlements, the five clans and the kingsland, fight for control. the five clans are outnumbered, which is why it takes everybody by surprise when kingsland’s brutal leader is killed. in the war that follows, isadora, the daughter of the clans’ leader, sets out to use her skills as a healer. after stopping a kingsland assassin named tristan, she’s poisoned and captured by his soldiers. to make matters more complicated, the only way to survive the poison is to become bound to tristan. isadora wants to make the most of the situation to help her people, but as she gets closer to tristan and learns more about the history between the clans and kingsland, her end goal becomes harder to keep her mind on…

this seemed like a YA romantasy full of tension, which is primarily what draw me to it. i also liked the promise of a dystopian element, especially since most dystopians i’ve read are far disconnected from the start of “the new norm,” whereas this book took place only thirty-seven years after. while i did end up somewhat liking these elements of the book, as well as the magic system, overall i thought this book was just okay. while i enjoyed some aspects of the romance between isadora and tristan, the start of their relationship was a bit too insta-love/lust for my liking. i also found the plot to be a bit basic, though i did like how it made room to discuss misogyny and the patriarchy, and i thought this book ended well.