Things are more interesting now (about halfway through) but I’m just still not invested in the story :/ the thing is, I *should* be. The plot is intriguing and I really like the character tropes (our main girlie is very much morally grey badass and the prince is a cinnamon roll/ golden retriever) but for some reason I feel disconnected from them. What’s making me not want to finish is that an inarguably very cute thing happened (duck scene) and then a very scary scene and I should’ve felt things while I was reading. But my heartbeat didn’t waver at all. I should’ve been giddy and holding my breath but it was like I was a passive observer instead of feeling what they feel. Maybe it’s just me and not this book. Or maybe it’s a combination of both. But I don’t want this review to stop you from picking this book up because it’s really not bad. I will say some pretty dark things happen so I’d only recommend this for older YA (That being said I do really appreciate the more violent inclusions- older teens can deal with gruesome death and gore, I’ve seen the shows they watch and video games they play lol. And I think often people downplay violence in YA books more so than in other media. I’m not saying a 10 year old should be reading about slicing and dicing, but YA is a diverse genre and I’ve often found that even books targeted towards the older end of that really smooth over the violence even when the book is focused around war).