A beautiful new story takes flight

Eragon meets And I Darken in this thrilling new fantasy debut that follows a fallen princess as she ignites a rebellion to bring back the magical elemental crows that were taken from her people.

In the tropical kingdom of Rhodaire, magical, elemental Crows are part of every aspect of life…until the Illucian empire invades, destroying everything.

That terrible night has thrown Princess Anthia into a deep depression. Her sister Caliza is busy running the kingdom after their mother’s death, but all Thia can do is think of all she has lost.

But when Caliza is forced to agree to a marriage between Thia and the crown prince of Illucia, Thia is finally spurred into action. And after stumbling upon a hidden Crow egg in the rubble of a rookery, she and her sister devise a dangerous plan to hatch the egg in secret and get back what was taken from them.

We’re in the Kingdom of Rhodaire who happen to have elemental crows which are part of their everyday lives. There are Storm Crows, Battle Crows, Earth Crows etc. Our protagonist for this book is Thia (Anthia), she’s a princess who has always dreamed of having her own Storm Crow. She has trained and the night where she gets to choose her egg is fast approaching.
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Little does she know that things aren’t going to go as smoothly as she wants. They have been betrayed and attacked with the rookery burned. Her mother and her tutor murdered and she is left with her guard and best friend Kiva and sister Caliza. Caliza is forced to become queen and has difficult decisions to make to save Rhodaire now that their Crows are gone.
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I loved how Kalyn depicted Thia’s depression in this and didn’t shy away from it. Thia is suffering and rightly so but she manages to turn that into a focus to save her kingdom. She isn’t perfect, doesn’t try to be, she is just herself and I love that. She is forcibly engaged to Prince Ericen from the kingdom that destroyed theirs and needless to say, they don’t get on. Thia leaves her beloved Rhodaire for Illucia with a secret in tow.
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I do think that there is more to Ericen than we initially saw and I’d love to see his character play out in the sequel. Caliza is making the best of a bad situation and is the ice to Thia’s fire. They aren’t the best sisters and I think both of their circumstances strained their relationship but their goals are the same.
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I love the world building and how richly described the crows are. There are more kingdoms to explore which have been hinted at within this book which are yet to be explored. It is a little slow on action (after the initial destruction) but I feel like this doesn’t impact the story at all. It’s a good pace. ⠀

I cannot wait for the sequel to this, Kalyn has written a wonderful book that had me hooked from the start. It’s rich, enchanting and a breath of fresh air