Review: The Tears of the Rose by Jeffe Kennedy

The Tears of the Rose 
by Jeffe Kennedy
Series:  Twelve Kingdoms #2
Pub. Date:  Nov. 25, 2014
Publisher:  Kensington
Pages:  352
Format:  eBook
Source:  Purchased
   

My Rating:  
Sultry Scale:

Three sisters. Motherless daughters of the high king. The eldest is the warrior-woman heir; the middle child is shy and full of witchy intuition; and the youngest, Princess Amelia, she is as beautiful as the sun and just as generous.

Ami met her Prince Charming and went away to his castle on the stormy sea-cliffs—and that should have been her happily ever after. Instead, her husband lies dead and a war rages. Her middle sister has been taken into a demon land, turned into a stranger. The priests and her father are revealing secrets and telling lies. And a power is rising in Ami, too, a power she hardly recognizes, to wield her beauty as a weapon, and her charm as a tool to deceive…

Amelia has never had to be anything but good and sweet and kind and lovely. But the chess game for the Twelve Kingdoms has swept her up in it, and she must make a gambit of her own. Can the prettiest princess become a pawn—or a queen? 

Warning: This review will contain spoilers from the first book, The Mark of the Tala. You should read it first; this series is a continuing story arc, not ideal to read as a standalone.

The Tears of the Rose continues where The Mark of the Tala left off, with the death of Princess Amelia's husband and the return of his body to her by the oldest sister, Ursula. The Tears of the Rose is the story of Amelia, the vain and beautiful youngest daughter of King Uorsin.

Amelia has lost her husband, Hugh, whom she believed to be the love of her life, and she is consumed with grief but cannot weep. She finds herself pregnant, feeling alone, and unsure of her place for the first time in her life. Amelia has always been extremely naive to the world around her, something she can no longer afford. Her father, King Uorsin, again solidifies himself as a power-hungry villainous monarch, by announcing huge plans for Amelia's unborn child.

This book follows Amelia's path to self-discovery. She starts out as a vain and vapid creature, whom I was afraid was on a horrid path to lunacy after listening to the wrong advisors. However, she came into her own as the book progressed and I actually liked her quite a bit by the end.

There was also some romance in this installment, despite Amelia losing her husband. The romance was understated and sweet, and the love interest (Ash) was the perfect counterbalance to Amelia's beauty. My one regret is that we didn't get to see more Ash in the story, but I can see the reason for it.

The plot is continuing nicely and is well-paced, but ends on a bit of a cliffhanger. So I will be moving on to the Talon of the Hawk, Ursula's story, straight away. 

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Twelve Kingdoms Trilogy

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