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A review by catmeghum
The True Queen by Zen Cho
5.0
I absolutely loved Zen Cho’s Sorcerer to the Crown when I read it a couple of years ago, so I was utterly delighted to hear there was a sequel on the way – and even more thrilled when I was approved for a proof copy from the publishers!
It’s been a little while since I read Sorcerer to the Crown, so I was worried I’d struggle to get back into it, but this is a book that starts off far away from the Sorceress Royal and her husband, so by the time I encountered anyone terribly familiar I was used to the world once more.
The characters at the heart of this book are almost all young women – I didn’t even realise until afterwards, but it’s incredibly entertaining and delightful to read a book and realise that the only men in it are fairly peripheral characters, or dragons. I did really love Zacharias Wythe in Sorcerer to the Crown so it was good to see him back, but he definitely played second fiddle to the inimitable Prunella, Sorceress Royal and professional scandal-maker. Of course, we all should have known that things weren’t going to be resolved by Prunella’s rise to the Sorceress Royal position, and this book deals somewhat with the aftermath. It also features a return of the wonderful Mak Genggang, Rollo Threlfall and Poggs, and plenty of other characters who fans of the previous book will recognise.
I don’t want to spoil too much, but suffice to say that this book explores much more of the world than Sorcerer to the Crown did, starting off on the other side of the world (in the Malay Archipelago) and heavily concerned with the lands of Fairy. There’s a lovely Regency-esque romance (you know, where it’s all very understated until the last minute), some excellent mysteries to unravel, and a lot of fun. Between Prunella, Mak Genggang, and some fantastic new characters, how could it not be?
It’s been a little while since I read Sorcerer to the Crown, so I was worried I’d struggle to get back into it, but this is a book that starts off far away from the Sorceress Royal and her husband, so by the time I encountered anyone terribly familiar I was used to the world once more.
The characters at the heart of this book are almost all young women – I didn’t even realise until afterwards, but it’s incredibly entertaining and delightful to read a book and realise that the only men in it are fairly peripheral characters, or dragons. I did really love Zacharias Wythe in Sorcerer to the Crown so it was good to see him back, but he definitely played second fiddle to the inimitable Prunella, Sorceress Royal and professional scandal-maker. Of course, we all should have known that things weren’t going to be resolved by Prunella’s rise to the Sorceress Royal position, and this book deals somewhat with the aftermath. It also features a return of the wonderful Mak Genggang, Rollo Threlfall and Poggs, and plenty of other characters who fans of the previous book will recognise.
I don’t want to spoil too much, but suffice to say that this book explores much more of the world than Sorcerer to the Crown did, starting off on the other side of the world (in the Malay Archipelago) and heavily concerned with the lands of Fairy. There’s a lovely Regency-esque romance (you know, where it’s all very understated until the last minute), some excellent mysteries to unravel, and a lot of fun. Between Prunella, Mak Genggang, and some fantastic new characters, how could it not be?