About this book:
“Beware the waters. The dangerous deep brings
ruin to all.
Emme has spent her life avoiding
anything to do with pirates. But the fates are cruel, and now a hidden sickness
leads her to partner with pirates for the one thing that can save her—a cure on
an island none are certain exists.
The pirate captain’s secrets are
darker than the deep and threaten to kill them all. His obligations are tinged
with betrayal, for his oathbind must be fulfilled. To ignore it is to invite
peril of unimaginable destruction.
As
the adventure unfolds, the sea takes more than she expects and the sea gives
more than he wants.”
Series: Book #1 in the “The Royal Rose Chronicles” series.
Spiritual Content- Mentions of prayers & praying (some to the Sea King and
one to the Fates, but for most of the prayers, who they are praying to is not mentioned);
Mentions of sins (including Arn’s plans to commit more sins); A mention of “whatever
afterlife awaited” for someone who died; A couple mentions of miracles; A mention
of a building’s ceilings looking like a cathedral and that the devil himself would
think twice about entering;
*Note: A magic boot that talks to
people; Using & mentions of magical weapons/items; Receiving visions
(nightmares) of terrible things from someone who uses dark magic & this darkness
being able to make people go crazy (more in the Negative Content section, the
characters wonder what someone did to be tormented so) & herbs that help
keep away evil spirits (called enchantments by Arn who makes them for his crew);
When someone dies, their body is slid into the sea (and it’s said “we give this
body back to the sea and to King Valian. May ye find peace in your next life.”
For a later funeral, the people’s belonging are sent into the sea and the “waters
shared a piece of their souls”); Fighting a ghost (up to semi-detailed); Fighting
a person with devilish magic and strength (up to semi-detailed); *Spoiler* Emme
is told that she has a potential for great darkness and the person with
devilish magic says the Fates have told her it’s not safe to leave Emme in this
world (Emme thinks that it’s a false future that has been shown) *End of
Spoiler*; Many, many mentions of the devil, making a deal with the devil, and a
devil’s ship haunting people (using dark magic that gives people
nightmares/visions of terrible things, up to semi-detailed); Many, many
mentions of ghosts (including a rumor of a man who gave up his mortality to
become a ghost); Many mentions of a Sea King (treated as a god that people
mention believing/not believing in and praying to), thanking him, & being
blessed by him; Mentions of a healing nut; Mentions
of the Fates & them being cruel; Mentions of devilish gleams, grins & good
looks; A couple mentions of a story about a group of pirates that either live
in the stars or in the dolphins; A mention from Emme that the Fates, the gods,
the Sea King Valian or whoever controlled the world is dark and twisted to do
something to the crew; A mention of the evil in someone’s heart; A mention of hypnosis.
Negative Content- Minor cussing including: a ‘bejabbers’, a ‘bloody’, an ‘idiot’,
a ‘shut up’, two ‘what in the name of the dark seas’s, three ‘stupid’s, three
forms of ‘what the devil’, four ‘blimey’s, four ‘stars and seaweed’s, five forms
of ‘stars’, and fourteen forms of ‘blast’; Cursing based off of the Sea god/King:
a ‘for King Valian’s sake’, a ‘who in King Valian’s name’, and three forms of ‘By
Valian’s Crown’; Many mentions of curses (said, but not written out, including ones
said by Emme and Arn); Some eye rolling & sarcasm; Fighting fantasy
creatures & killing them (including shooting and pushing them into a fire, up
to detailed); Cutting a man’s head off (barely-above-not-detailed); *Spoiler*
Arn’s left hand is cut off in a fight (up to semi-detailed) *End of Spoiler*; Lots
of Pain, Injuries and Major Injuries, Blood/Bleeding, Fighting, Shooting/Harming
others, Passing out, Nearly Dying, & Killing (semi-detailed to detailed); Seeing
others harmed & killed (up to detailed); Being kidnapped, threatened, &
held at knife-point (up to semi-detailed); Nightmares/Visions of horrible
deaths, dead bodies, & illusions that mess with a person’s mind (including
one that tries to drown a person, semi-detailed); Getting tattoos & pain (barely-above-not-detailed);
Arn justifies some of his actions (lying and killing) based on the person his
actions are towards (such as lying to a man that isn’t honorable so it doesn’t
weigh on his conscience or willing to kill someone who wronged him or hurt
someone in his crew); Emme doesn’t like killing and when Arn asks if it’s okay
that he kills a fantasy creature, she says yes because it’s more beast than
human (she struggles with killing for a large part of the book but decides she
needs to protect herself and not have to be saved); Arn is drunk at the opening
chapters & takes another swig of his flask even though he’s being reminded
why he often avoids getting drunk; Many, many mentions of deaths, killing, almost
being killed, bodies, hiding bodies, blood/bleeding, injuries, & pain (up
to semi-detailed); Many, many mentions of fighting, fights/battles/attacks,
weapons, gunfire, aiming to kill, & self-defense (up to semi-detailed); Many,
many mentions of fantasy creatures, how they eat humans, bones, & fighting
and killing the creatures (up to semi-detailed); Many, many mentions of nightmares/visions
of horrible deaths, bones, bodies (up to semi-detailed); Many, many mentions of
taverns, alcohol, drinking, drunks, hangovers, & being sober; Many, many
mentions of tattoos (looked upon as normal for pirates and giving courage to
the wearer and others to fear them), getting tattoos, & piercings; Many mentions of drowning, those who have
drowned, thinking someone has drowned, & their bodies (up to semi-detailed);
Many mentions of how a man kills the people that own him money (up to semi-detailed);
Many mentions of threats, traps, & tricks; Many mentions of lies, lying,
& keeping secrets; Mentions of fires, burns/injuries, pain, pushing
people/creatures into the fire & the smell of burning flesh (up to semi-detailed);
Mentions of a story of a group of pirates eating the bones of those they’ve
killed (up to semi-detailed); Mentions of a death from an illnesses (barely-above-not-detailed);
Mentions of a man’s lover being killed in front of him & his reaction (barely-above-not-detailed);
Mentions of killing (teasing/not serious); Mentions of kidnappings; Mentions of
revenge & wanting to chop off a man’s limb; Mentions of mutiny; Mentions of
slavery & being sold as a slave; Mentions of robbing/stealing, smuggling,
& cheating; Mentions of poisons & being poisoned; Mentions of hatred; Mentions
of gossip & rumors; Mentions of throwing up; A few mentions of gambling; A mention
of war; A mention of tobacco; A mention of urine.
Sexual Content- Five almost kisses
(two semi-detailed and two border-line semi-detailed // detailed), two head/forehead
kisses, a barely-above-not-detailed kiss, and a border-line barely-above-not-detailed
// semi-detailed kiss; Imagining a man kissing another girl (barely-above-not-detailed);
Recalling almost kisses & nearness; Touches, Embraces, Dancing, Hand Holding,
& Nearness (up to semi-detailed); Blushes; Noticing & Smelling (barely-above-not-detailed);
Emme wonders if she’ll die without being kissed; Arn thinks his devilish good
looks must have swayed Emme & that he knew that one day she wouldn’t be
able to resist; Mentions of women being kidnapped to breed (the men think they’ve
being fair to the women as she gets to pick her husband); Mentions of kisses
& kissing; Mentions of blushes & liking someone; Mentions of jealousy; A
few mentions of lovers; A few mentions of wondering what a man did to a woman
for her father to be upset and chasing him (nothing sexual happened, a slight
misunderstanding); A few mentions of men saying that doing something with “earn
them many ladies” at the port; A couple mentions of a lad and lass going to a
room together at night (nothing sexual happened, but teasing happens from another
man); A couple mentions of Arn not liking how a man leers at Emme; A couple
mentions of flirting; A mention of a couple kissing; A mention of Arn spending
the night in Emme’s bed when he was sick/healing (prior to the book starting); Some
love, falling/being in love, & the emotions;
*Note: A handful of mentions of Emme’s
figure (from her and Arn, barely-above-not-detailed); A mention of a woman’s long
legs.
-Emme Salinda, age 18
-Arn Mangelo, age 21
1st
person P.O.V. switches between them, Emric (once), & Ontario (once)
Fantasy
304 pages
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{ These
ratings are for all content in this book, a person or family’s sensitivity
to the topic of magic is not accounted for in these ratings. }
Let’s first get it out of the
way: There’s no Christian faith shown in this novel. Enclave Publishing
seems to publish more clean fiction (typically Young Adult Fantasy) written by
Christian authors, but I haven’t heard of a strong faith theme in any of their
books. (If you know of one, please let me know.)
There’s magic and dark magic, lots
of fighting and killing—and some of it’s cleaner than some other books I’ve
reviewed on here, the chopping of limbs and killing others were written in a
blunt fashion that if the reader dwells on it for longer than a moment, harsh unwanted
images may come to mind and sadden or upset the reader.
There is a sea king/sea god
mentioned often (both as a god figure and as a fill-in for a curse) and whether
people believe in his existence, but I could not find it to be an allegory for
God based on different comments. The devil (little ‘d’) is mentioned just as
often—if not a bit more—because of swearing and calling other people the devil.
I wasn’t sure what to think about
Arn. Our first introduction of him is a rare moment (according to Emme) of him
being drunk. Which didn’t endear him to me at all. I never rooted for them to
be together and I can’t imagine that changing even if I read the next book in
the series. He was more of a controlling-type of protective towards Emme and him
begging her to join his trip—that she had been vocal about not joining in the
past—so that he could feel comfort by her being with him, made my
opinion of him continue to lower. None of their romantic parts felt right to
me, from their terribly timed almost kisses (and there was quite a few
of those) to him saving her from something he started then receiving her
thanks. He kept a major secret and lies to her, but her peace offering was that
she was keeping a secret as well—which wasn’t even on the same level (his
affects everyone, hers only affects her). I really wasn’t a fan of him or the
romance elements.
If the topic of magic bothers you,
then this book probably isn’t for you. For me, it was more of the parts with
dark magic sending visions (nightmares) of horrible deaths, bones, and bodies
to people and tormenting their minds that I didn’t like reading about. Along
with the creating of “enchantments” (made with herbs and cloths) that were
supposed to help keep said visions away…which it’s unclear if those worked or not
(leaning towards not), but Arn put a lot of stock in them for his crew.
Those more major issues aside: There
were more than a few moments that Emme and Arn did somethings that were just
plain dumb. The pacing was odd at times. I was enjoying the beginning (let’s
say the first third) because it was very clean compared to past secular
pirate-themed books I’ve read, but as the story progressed, there was more and
more parts I was feeling uncomfortable with reading. While there were a couple
parts I would be interested in learning more about, I’m uncertain if I’ll continue
with the series as the rest of the books release.
See y’all on Friday with a new
review!
*BFCG may (Read the review to see) recommend this book by this
author. It does not mean I recommend all the books by this author.
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