2014 book 46

Cinda Williams Chima's The Exiled Queen
The second book in the Seven Realms series starts off a bit slow--at the end of the first one (spoilers!), a whole bunch of the characters are headed to joint magic-warrior school, which I was super excited about! But the first, like, third of this book deal with the arduous journey to get there--and man, am I sick of reading about arduous journeys to get places in fantasy books. Can't someone in a fantasy world invent a magic airplane or car or something? Teleportation? ANYTHING but long journeys on horseback filled with treacherous kidnappings that quickly get resolved. Sigh.  Things do pick up once everyone is in school--and running into friends, enemies, and love interests. The main guy character is kind of dumb and slow to pick up on a dangerous plot point, but the princess is pretty interesting (despite being kidnapped like three times). She's kind of dumb too, though. I guess there wouldn't be as much of a plot if they weren't so stupid and making dumb mistakes? Surely there is a way to tell an interesting story about a prudent character, especially when there's so many villains to encounter at local taverns! I mean, don't get me wrong, I liked this and will read the next one. My complaints are not necessarily about this book in particular, but about YA fantasy in general. B+.