You know what’s a mess? America.
Which is why I’m super fond of alternate reality versions of it in books. BLESS American Royals for entertaining the notion of George Washington having accepted a crown and thus starting a long line of kings (and now an upcoming queen!) to rule America under a monarchy.🙌🏻😌
I really liked the premise of this book so I was super excited to dive into my ARC (thank you Penguin AUS) although I was late to start it…because life ate me. It’s still eating me, mostly my leg, but I’m mangling along despite it. Anyway.
I wanted to do a bit of a different review today. I’m going to do a “if you like THIS, then you’ll like American Royals!” and list some different tropes and things in it! The best part of book recommendations is figuring out if a book has collected all the sorts of things you personally love. Someone just has to whisper, “snarky princess” and like, I am tHERE.
1. Modern Royal family drama!
I only just realised that I kind of do love this. 👀 I’ve read plenty of YA books starring famous families (celebrities or president’s kids or some such) and the pressures etc, but it puts a whole new level of high stakes on it when the family is ROYAL. Also when the kids are disasters.
We have Bea (the next and FIRST queen of America) who is 21. And then the twins, Samantha and Jeffery, who are 18 and just finished their gap year and are supposed to start taking up royal duties…except they’re total trouble.
2. Multiple narrators
If you’ve read The Thousandth Floor, you’ll know Katharine McGee loooooves having a stack of narrators to weave in and amongst each other as their lives tangle. We have four in this one: Bea, Sam, Nina and Daphne. They all had such different roles to play, some resentful, some claustrophobic, some ambitious. I kind of didn’t care about Daphne’s? She wasn’t villainous enough to love-to-hate her, so she just came off drippy. Sam was 100% my FAVOURITE. She has fire and passion and is a collection of bad decisions waiting to happen.
3. Sibling love and strife
I kind of am trash for sibling books and won’t even deny. Sam and Jeff (prince and princess twins) are close, but Jeff is kind of oblivious to how social media swoons over him and judges Sam for everything. So tension there. And then Bea is just so so far removed from Sam’s life (Sam is the spare, Bea is the most important person here). Their dynamics are full of misunderstandings and tension, but with some surprising develoments…
4. ALL the romance tropes!
We have (1) Forbidden Romance with Bea making heart eyes at her bodyguard, (2) Catastrophe Romance, with Sam accidentally making heart eyes at one of Bea’s forced suitors, and (3) Friends-To-Lovers with Jeff chasing Nina, the treasurer’s daughter, who isn’t sure she wants the fame and drama of being in love with a prince. And then at the side there’s (4) Daphne chasing the prince and social climbing, but she keeps getting tangled up with his BFF, the hot and suave Ethan, who sees right through her schemes.
5. Some society critiques amongst the glitzy drama
Look, it is a soap-opera/drama type, with all the beautiful balls and dresses and scheming and whispers and prettily disguised backstabbing. But it also put forth some harder thoughts: like what it’s like to live life under a spotlight. The harassment faced. How it feels to be judged, to be the brunt of rumours. The PRESSURES, and how it cracks you. I really liked how it addressed how the media hounds women very very differently to how it praises men.
It’s an alternate reality, but ooooOOOoo does it say things that are super accurate for today.
What if America had a royal family?
When America won the Revolutionary War, its people offered General George Washington a crown. Two and a half centuries later, the House of Washington still sits on the throne.
As Princess Beatrice gets closer to becoming America’s first queen regnant, the duty she has embraced her entire life suddenly feels stifling. Nobody cares about the spare except when she’s breaking the rules, so Princess Samantha doesn’t care much about anything, either . . . except the one boy who is distinctly off-limits to her. And then there’s Samantha’s twin, Prince Jefferson. If he’d been born a generation earlier, he would have stood first in line for the throne, but the new laws of succession make him third. Most of America adores their devastatingly handsome prince . . . but two very different girls are vying to capture his heart.
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| what about you? |
does this tick off anything on your “need to read” list?! do you like alternate reality books?? should America have a queen? 😂
Wow this is such an interesting concept. I’m definitely going to try and read this book someday (when life is done eating me, too).
MB> keturahskorner.blogspot.com
PB> thegirlwhodoesntexist.con
Haha is life ever done eating us :’) I swear I will never catch up on my TBR 🙈
Everyone has been raving about this book and I absolutely loved The Thousandth Floor series so I finally remembered to request that my local library get it, which they have; it’s on order so I’m super excited to read it as soon as it comes in! Just everything about this book makes me want to read it badly.
Oh if you loved The Thousandth Floor, you’ll love this!!
I have this book high on my TBR list, it just sounds really fun! I love to hear how well developed the characters and their relationships are, it definitely adds much depth to the story. I love this review, everything you mentioned are my favorite things so now I’m even more excited to read this one!
Ahh I’m glad it made it pique your interest!!
OOOH this sounds so good!! AND ALL THE ROMACE YES PLEASE!!!
It’s definitely got aaaall the romance. 😌
AH YES YES YES I’m so happy you enjoyed American Royals! I loved The Thousandth Floor and was SO!Hyped! To read this book and… I wasn’t disappointed. I’m such a fan of all the drama and the royalty and the twists and turns and relationships and ahhhh, I loved this so much as well 😀
I’ve discovered I actually really like royal-modern-drama?!😂I want more books like this. I’m glad it didn’t disappoint!
Dunno if America should have a Queen, but yes please to this book! It sounds like exactly the sort of book I need in my life right now (even though I should be studying so please stop me). I love a good old modern royalty with a bit of drama so I shall definitely be checking this out!
I’ve started to really enjoy a bit of royal-modern-drama 😂
I love the concept of this book! So glad you were able to read it! I’ll have to keep an eye out for it when it drops and read it once I’m able to find time to do so!
Yay! I’m glad it caught your eye!
I’m SUPER excited about reading this one. It sounds fun, and I’m eager to see if I enjoy this one by Katharine better than I did “Thousandth Floor.” We shall see!
I didn’t really mesh with The Thousandth Floor and this is definitely the same style, but I liked the story more. 😂
Haha, what an interesting premise! Somehow this book completely slipped my radar, although it sounds absolutely delightful.