Ember Queen

Ash Princess, Book 3

By: Laura Sebastian

Narrated by: Saskia Maarleveld

Length: 13 hrs and 19 mins

Publisher's Summary

The thrilling conclusion to the New York Times best-selling series "made for fans of Victoria Aveyard and Sabaa Tahir" (Bustle), Ember Queen is an epic fantasy about a throne cruelly stolen and a girl who must fight to take it back for her people. 

Princess Theodosia was a prisoner in her own country for a decade. Renamed the Ash Princess, she endured relentless abuse and ridicule from the Kaiser and his court. But though she wore a crown of ashes, there is fire in Theo's blood. As the rightful heir to the Astrean crown, it runs in her veins. And if she learned anything from her mother, it's that a Queen never cowers. 

Now free, with a misfit army of rebels to back her, Theo must liberate her enslaved people and face a terrifying new enemy: the new Kaiserin. Imbued with a magic no one understands, the Kaiserin is determined to burn down anyone and everything in her way.

The Kaiserin's strange power is growing stronger, and with Prinz Søren as her hostage, there is more at stake than ever. Theo must learn to embrace her own power if she has any hope of standing against the girl she once called her heart's sister.

©2020 Laura Sebastian (P)2020 Listening Library

Critic Reviews

“Sure to be one of the summer's most talked about YAs.... A darkly enchanting page-turner you won't be able to put down.” (Bustle)

“Tense and imaginative, this story of a diminished yet vengeful princess inciting a rebellion to recapture her rightful place of power strikes a timely chord. Ash Princess is a smart, feminist twist on a traditional tale of a fallen heroine, with plenty of court intrigue, love, and lies to sweeten the deal. Good luck putting this one down.” (Virginia Boecker, author of The Witch Hunter series)

“The story leaps and twists like a swordswoman, and its blade carves the characters anew and divides them against themselves. This searing page-turner is a compelling examination of the complexities of both evil and resistance.” (Sarah Porter, author of Vassa in the Night)

Mixed messages

I had a hard time trying to figure out what age this book was geared toward. If adult, then why have characters that become often petty and childish? If child, then why is there a sex scene in the book? I was drawn into the story and the author has a good imagination, so I finished the series. However, one of my pet peeves is when every other character is gay. It isn’t that I am homophobic. It’s just that it isn’t realistic. It goes beyond representation and begins to feel preachy, as if you MUST experiment with someone of the same sex. Literally half of the main characters are gay, lesbian, bisexual, or experimenting with one or the other. And again, I wondered who the book was geared toward. If adults, then do we have to go through each type of sexuality to find ourselves, or might we already have figured out what we want? If for children, why is the author pushing ANY kind of sexuality so hard? What might have been an enjoyable, fun, interesting series quickly made me realize that I wouldn’t be purchasing a book by this author again. I don’t want any agenda pushed on me or my kids. And please, just be realistic. The straight person starts feeling completely out of place. Perhaps, she said kindly, this book was actually meant to target only people who were gay, etc., so that they could have a special romance story and relate to absolutely all characters? Still, I would rather that people were relatable for being strong, brave, etc., not just for their sexual identity. If I were gay, I think that I would rather be identified by being a cool person in general, not for who I sleep with or was in love with. Again, this makes me feel like it’s simply an agenda being pushed, instead of just an author encouraging people to be open to caring about all people in general, no matter who they are or what their sexual identity is. Maybe it’s just that sex sells, and that’s what the author cares about.
Oh, and I do wish that the author hadn’t stolen so many ideas from Harry Potter. (Small spoilers:) Writing on coins, and the writing then shows up on another coin far away? Check. Good guys and bad guys that flit into one another's dreams? Check. There were more that I can't recall. Let’s keep it original, folks. Maybe it’s a contract thing, with deadlines in place…just rush through and grab from other stories. It's really too bad, because I feel that this author has lots of potential!
The good points: strong, courageous female character. People acted selflessly, which I appreciated.

Disappointing ending

The final battle was disappointing and anticlimactic. :-( Theo was robbed of her moment in my opinion.

I just don't understand...

the last stand in this book is so frustrating. It was so frustrating. I don't understand why the "heroine" of this story just stood around while the villain said her evil monologue and hurt more people. She just kept shouting "nooo" which obviously isn't going to do anything. she's supposed to have this awesome power that she's been honing and she doesn't even freaking use it. she just keeps letting other people sacrifice themselves. It was so incredibly frustrating.

Boring

Couldn’t finish it because it was too boring. Theo is so vanilla. Not interesting at all.

just glad to be finished

Although the story had a lot of twists and turns it did drag on... the main character was so annoying and so indecisive that I wanted to stop reading quite a few times... spoiler alert, the ending was very anti-climatic!!!I would have given it a two but it had a good story line and a good overall performance.... basically not that impressed with this book .

Loved it!

This book is a great way to end a captivating trilogy (even though I would like to know how Theo runs her country, and I would love to see more of Soren)!

Wonderful

I truly enjoyed this book! When I was reading reviews for it I was skeptical about getting it because the reviews weren’t good, a lot said the book was predictable and boring. While I would say yes there were times it was predictable it made me enjoy the book all that much more. I wasn’t having to yell at the characters I was applauding them and for me that is definitely a point I liked about this series! Definitely sad it’s over but soooo happy I ignored the bad reviews! If you thinking about reading this series DO IT!

Least favorite of the series

I was very much looking forward to this book! It was good. But not near as good as the rest of the series. The story tends to jump around more but still a great book!

Tear Inducing

This beautiful book broke me quite a bit. This harrowing battle for the throne and an oppressive regime is over and now I'm not sure what to do with myself. There wasn't as much loss as I had anticipated and for that I'm grateful, but for each loss that Theo felt, I wept with her. This entire series was unputdownable and breathtakingly plotted. I felt the things that our Queen did and her determination and grit were captivating.

I'm devastated for a certain heroic death and didn't see a romantic way forward without its having taken place. But still... it was such a powerfully moving scene.

I'm pretty certain that no matter how much time passes and how many additional books I read, that this series is going to stick within my thoughts as it pricks my heart.

Great ending

Loved this series although I do feel like this last book drew out a little bit in the middle. I felt myself wanting to skip chapters to get to more interesting parts. Still a great listen when you have a long time to wait.