The Queens of Innis Lear

I received a preview excerpt of this book from the publisher, through NetGalley for a voluntary review.

I was very intrigued by this story from the Shakespeare version of King Lear that seemed to set the tone of this book and from the beautiful cover and synopsis. As I began the excerpt, I felt that the language and imagery that was invoked by Tessa Gratton was beautiful and described the lands well. I was drawn to her style of writing as the development of the characters began as you met Gaela, Reagan, and Elia. I was drawn to Gaela’s strength and confidence, but quickly got lost in what story was being told about her and why she made the decisions she had made. I did like that there was an LGBT element intertwined in the story to give a different perspective of the Gaela’s character. You see her struggle with becoming who she is meant to be and the physical and emotional pain she is anguishing over as she speaks to the White Witch to come to a conclusion. This might explain why, from the very start she was very power hungry and vowed to take the Kingdom from King Lear with the help of her sister, Reagan who would birth the heirs to the throne. I also grieved and felt the pain Reagan experiences as she tries to carry out a pregnancy to fulfill both she and her sister’s wish to provide heirs to the throne. I have to say I enjoyed the character of Elia and felt drawn to her the most, simply because she was kind, misunderstood, and seemed to have not been able to be an active participant in her own life due to outside influence from her father and her sister’s. The King was a bit of a madman, only consulting in the stars for every decision made which made sense as to why Gaela would ascertain that she should be ruler and strived to take it. Of the other characters, I really liked Ban Errigal and would like to have seen Ban and Elia together, however if Shakespeare’s King Lear’s story line was to crossover to this book, it would be difficult to hold the same opinion if he followed through with the tragic plot with his brother and father.

Honestly throughout the book the positive connotations of the beautiful imagery and character development tended to grow dull and cumbersome as the book wore on. I felt that Tessa Gratton certainly wove a beautiful story and her writing style was very unique and well written, however I have to admit there were large sections of the story I would re-read or come back to read to ensure that I was following along. There were flashbacks that were wonderful to give perspective on each character, but even those sometimes felt as though they weren’t as conducive to the story as they could have been or that it drug out the storyline and wasn’t required. I would be interested in finishing the complete book to provide a final review and will look to read it in the near future to do so.