Du Livre: Les Petites Revues [#39]

Happy New Year friends! Gonna start the year off right by getting caught up on reviews. This week, I have a YA thriller that was just as good as the first and a YA fantasy that needed just a bit more.

One of Us is Next took place one year after the final events of One of Us is Lying with a splash of some of the original characters thrown in, but not so prominent that they took away from the development of the new characters. Told from varying perspectives, One of Us is Next was a tale of secrets, lies, and the scary immediacy of social media. Much like One of Us is Next, McManus took us on a twisty turny ride where everyone was a suspect and it left the reader second-guessing who could have possibly dunnit. One of my favorite McManus traits is her shocking ends and One of Us is Next did not disappoint!

Nameless Queen sounded exciting from the synopsis, but the book did not deliver the high-stakes fantasy I expected. Nameless Queen was based on a caste system that was interesting but never fleshed out, instead the reader had to do the leg work on what these different castes meant and the magic system. There was never a moment where anything felt high stakes either. Coin, the main character, was named the next royal even though she was from the Nameless class, the lowest of the low. Through her sarcasm and desperation to do good by her friends she was able to get others to join her side and nothing felt dangerous about the situation. Although Nameless Queen is being compared to titles like Furyborn and Everless, I thought Nameless Queen read more like lower YA rather than upper YA. I had higher expectations for this book, but I do think a younger audience would enjoy it more.