Interesting premise with a familiar pay-off
You'll LOVE it if...you've always wanted a fantasy/murder mystery mash-up.
Scholte combines a unique world — a kind of cross between the districts in The Hunger Games and the factions in Divergent — with a twisty murder plot. Readers might be spoiled by the title alone that yes, four Quadaran queens will wind up dead, but exactly how and why remains shrouded in doubt. These are arguably the two most difficult genres to combine. A fantasy requires extensive world-building and well-crafted exposition so that readers feel comfortable in a new environment; mysteries require careful plotting, with just enough foreshadowing to make the grand reveal plausible, but not so much that you can predict the ending well in advance. Scholte balances both responsibilities nicely, making for a fantasy-mystery mash-up that I suspect many readers have been waiting for!
You'll LIKE it if...stories with multiple perspectives intrigue you.
Multiple narrators can hinder a narrative as much as they help it. Too much information can confuse readers, while voices that sound too similar to one another start to blend together over the course of a novel. Four Dead Queens predominantly follows street thief Keralie, occasionally peppering in the perspectives of each of Quadara's four queens. Every woman has a distinct personality and voice, as well as a few secrets to keep hidden; they're also all experiencing different facets of the mystery, which keeps the chapters from turning repetitive. Keeping a mystery intriguing when you already know the victims can be difficult, but introducing several perspectives outside of the main protagonist's keeps the story interesting.
You MAY NOT LIKE it if...you're expecting an atypical YA plot.
The unique arrangement, however, doesn't fully make up for the fact that Four Dead Queens ultimately follows a familiar, reasonably predictable trajectory for YA fiction. It's a shame considering all of the excellent work that created a new world and built up a great deal of anticipation around the four murders, but by the final page characters feel like often-used tropes and the plot has taken several turns telegraphed too obviously, too far in advance. While far from bad or boring, the initial chapters had me longing for a conclusion as singular as what came before.
Scholte combines a unique world — a kind of cross between the districts in The Hunger Games and the factions in Divergent — with a twisty murder plot. Readers might be spoiled by the title alone that yes, four Quadaran queens will wind up dead, but exactly how and why remains shrouded in doubt. These are arguably the two most difficult genres to combine. A fantasy requires extensive world-building and well-crafted exposition so that readers feel comfortable in a new environment; mysteries require careful plotting, with just enough foreshadowing to make the grand reveal plausible, but not so much that you can predict the ending well in advance. Scholte balances both responsibilities nicely, making for a fantasy-mystery mash-up that I suspect many readers have been waiting for!
You'll LIKE it if...stories with multiple perspectives intrigue you.
Multiple narrators can hinder a narrative as much as they help it. Too much information can confuse readers, while voices that sound too similar to one another start to blend together over the course of a novel. Four Dead Queens predominantly follows street thief Keralie, occasionally peppering in the perspectives of each of Quadara's four queens. Every woman has a distinct personality and voice, as well as a few secrets to keep hidden; they're also all experiencing different facets of the mystery, which keeps the chapters from turning repetitive. Keeping a mystery intriguing when you already know the victims can be difficult, but introducing several perspectives outside of the main protagonist's keeps the story interesting.
You MAY NOT LIKE it if...you're expecting an atypical YA plot.
The unique arrangement, however, doesn't fully make up for the fact that Four Dead Queens ultimately follows a familiar, reasonably predictable trajectory for YA fiction. It's a shame considering all of the excellent work that created a new world and built up a great deal of anticipation around the four murders, but by the final page characters feel like often-used tropes and the plot has taken several turns telegraphed too obviously, too far in advance. While far from bad or boring, the initial chapters had me longing for a conclusion as singular as what came before.