This post contains affiliate links you can use to purchase the book. If you buy the book using that link, I will receive a small commission from the sale.
My Review:Title: Royally Screwed
Author: Emma Chase
Series: Royally #1
Published by: Indie
Release Date: October 16th 2016
Format: Kindle Book
Pages: 294
Genres: Contemporary, Romance
Reading Challenges: Lenoreo's 2017 Beat the Backlist Challenge, Lenoreo's 2017 Contemporary Romance Reading Challenge, Lenoreo's 2017 New Adult Challenge, Lenoreo's COYER Winter Switch 2017/18
Find it: Goodreads ✩ Amazon ✩ B&N ✩ Google ✩ Kobo ✩ iBooks ✩ IndieBound
My rating:
Blurb:"Passion, pleasure, and princely responsibilities make this sexy fairy tale a real page turner." —Audrey Carlan, #1 New York Times bestselling author of Calendar Girl
Nicholas Arthur Frederick Edward Pembrook, Crowned Prince of Wessco, aka “His Royal Hotness,” is wickedly charming, devastatingly handsome, and unabashedly arrogant―hard not to be when people are constantly bowing down to you.
Then, one snowy night in Manhattan, the prince meets a dark haired beauty who doesn’t bow down. Instead, she throws a pie in his face.
Nicholas wants to find out if she tastes as good as her pie, and this heir apparent is used to getting what he wants.
Dating a prince isn’t what waitress Olivia Hammond ever imagined it would be. There’s a disapproving queen, a wildly inappropriate spare heir, relentless paparazzi, and brutal public scrutiny. While they’ve traded in horse drawn carriages for Rolls Royces and haven’t chopped anyone’s head off lately―the royals are far from accepting of this commoner.
But to Olivia―Nicholas is worth it.
Nicholas grew up with the whole world watching, and now Marriage Watch is in full force. In the end, Nicholas has to decide who he is and, more importantly, who he wants to be: a King... or the man who gets to love Olivia forever.
4.5 stars — I’ve been looking forward to this one since it came out, but you know how sometimes you’re so excited for something that you start to worry that you’ve hyped yourself up too much, and it can’t possibly do anything but disappoint you? That’s how I started to feel about this book. So I hesitated starting it, even though I’d already bought the set of paperbacks for the whole series…that conflict between head and heart I guess. But I worried needlessly, this book was so up my alley, it’s not even funny. And now it’s going to be hard for me to wait until later in January to read the rest of the series!!
The characters in this one were so good…I really empathized with so many of the struggles they were going through, and they felt very authentic. Their voices were very distinct, and I just loved reading from both Nicholas and Olivia’s perspectives… I also really appreciated that neither were perfect, they both had flaws.
Nicholas was definitely a horny bastard…I wasn’t expecting that, but it was amusing. I was concerned that that might take away from the romance and the connection between him and Olivia. And while there *was* a strong steam factor in this book, I totally bought into the development of their feelings for each other as well. I was also worried that I wouldn’t fall in love with Nicholas…I mean, yeah, he’s sexy and hilarious, but I was worried that that was all we were going to get. But damn, Ms. Chase just really brought it in this book. I really understood the pressures that he was under as the Crown Prince, and how he was torn between the duty that he’s known all his life, and his love for his country and WANTING to do his best for them. And while I wanted to smack him like a gagillion times for the truly dickish things he would say, or the just misguided way he would behave, or the selfish things he asked of Olivia, I could actually understand how his upbringing shaped him in that way and made him think some of those things were reasonable.
And Olivia was just the perfect foil for Nicholas. She was just so kind and good and empathic, but she was also seriously sassy and could give it back to Nicholas and meet him on his level. I can only imagine what a breath of fresh air she was to Nicholas…and I loved that even when she learned who he was, she really didn’t behave too differently towards him. In fact, she treated everyone with the same respect and kindness, but also wouldn’t take crap from ANYONE. I was worried about her, and how things were going to play out in their romance, but I really was satisfied with how that all turned out.
The other thing that I really appreciated was that the story did not always follow the usual tropes. I mean, there were definitely some things that happened that followed an expected path, but then there were other little plot twists that I expected to go one way, and I was pleasantly surprised when they didn’t. Which is not to say that I don’t like those tropes, I do…but sometimes it’s fun when things go in a different direction too, you know? I was actually a little confused about how the story was going to play out, and when we’d get the big conflict, but again…I shouldn’t have worried. I was happy with how it played out.
This book also had a strong secondary cast of characters, and I LOVE that. And not just the secondary characters that will be getting their own books, like the adorable but damaged Henry, or the irrepressible, effervescent Ellie, or the strong and silent Logan. But then there was Simon and Franny…wow, did not expect them to add so much to the story. Franny made me cry…I loved her story with Simon. And who couldn’t fall in love with Marty?? 😉 And then there’s the Queen. She surprised me. I remember reading a book not too long ago where the Queen wasn’t given depth and redemption, and so I was unreasonably happy when we got to see more in the Queen. She didn’t change necessarily, but there was just more to her.
OK, I talked way too fucking much, as usual. But I just really enjoyed this one, even if it meant 2 really late nights of reading b/c “just one more chapter.” WORTH IT.
Leave a Reply