Title: The Last
Princess
Author: Galaxy
Craze
Publisher: Poppy
Publication Date: May
1, 2012
Genres: YA,
Dystopian
Reviewed by: Books4Tomorrow
Source: Purchased
My rating: 4/5
SUMMARY
A series of natural disasters has decimated the
earth. Cut off from the rest of the world, England is a dark place. The sun
rarely shines, food is scarce, and groups of criminals roam the woods,
searching for prey. The people are growing restless. When a ruthless
revolutionary sets out to overthrow the crown, he makes the royal family his
first target. Blood is shed in Buckingham Palace, and only sixteen-year old
Princess Eliza manages to escape. Determined to kill the man who destroyed her
family, Eliza joins the enemy forces in disguise. She has nothing left to live
for but revenge, until she meets someone who helps her remember how to hope-and
love-once more. Now she must risk everything to ensure that she does not
become... The Last Princess.
REVIEW
I’m
tired of dystopian novels but it seems I went through a phase where I
accumulated post-apocalyptic books like nobody’s business, and now I’m stuck
with it and have to read them all. Luckily for me this turned out to be a
surprisingly good book.
The Characters:
I didn’t
really connect with any of the characters, because there wasn’t much
opportunity to really get to know any of them, other than making the
distinction of which characters fought on which side of the battle lines. The
good guys were really good and the bad guys were caricatures of the evil villains
we find in every other movie. But, I really liked Eliza and her siblings, Mary
and Jamie. What I didn’t like is that it’s never explained why the bad guy has
it in for the royals. Yes, he offered a flimsy excuse to Eliza of his motives,
but once it is proven later in the story that that isn’t the real reason why
Cornelius wants to be king, no other explanation was ever offered to satisfy my
curiosity.
The Setting:
This is
the first dystopian novel ever I’ve read which takes place in England and Scotland
respectively. That is one of the main reasons I enjoyed it so much. For some
reason this author managed to do something no other author whose dystopian
novel I’ve read this far, managed to do. Craze made this English dystopian
setting feel realistic and possible. For a welcome change the world didn’t end
by some unexplainable virus, plague or war. Though the Seventeen Days natural
disasters felt a little over the top, I rather appreciated this ending to the
world, to the usual.
The Plot:
The
reason I don’t give it a solid five-star rating is because of three reasons. First,
before reading this book, throw all logic out of the window. If you, like me,
are going to ask questions about elements and happenings in Eliza’s world, you’re
not going to enjoy this post-apocalyptic novel. Don’t expect things to make
logical sense. Secondly, the “twists” and “reveals” can be spotted a mile away.
Well, I saw it coming a mile away. That predictability sort of dampened my
enjoyment of this original tale just a tiny bit. Lastly, a lot of the scenes –
especially the execution scene – felt a little rushed. I don’t know if there is
a sequel in the works, but I for one would like to know what happened to Portia
and her two sidekicks, and to Vashti. I’m definitely not on the series
bandwagon, but I have to admit that because the story is rushed in so many
places and some parts of it are mostly skimmed over, this would’ve actually
worked better as, at the very least, a trilogy.
The Romance:
This is
not a book I’d recommend to readers looking for swoony romance. I was more than
happy to find that the romance in this story was so miniscule, it’s hardly
worth mentioning. It was used more as a plot device to get Eliza out of sticky
situations, than to move the plot along. Needless to say, I was overjoyed to read
a book where the romance was pretty much non-existent (which just proves my
point that a book can work very well with little to no romance in it).
Conclusion:
Compared
to a multitude of dystopian novels, The
Last Princess offers the reader something different. I’m always complaining
that dystopian novels are all the same, but I was delighted to find that this
quick read – which I finished in a couple of hours – had elements I haven’t
come across in other dystopian novels. I highly recommend it to fans of the
dystopian genre looking for something slightly different, and to those who like
their heroine to kick butt and rise as the justly deserving victor after she
has been put through hell.
READ more REVIEWS
The Last Princess by Galaxy Craze has 402
reviews on Goodreads. Read it here.
PURCHASE LINKS
ABOUT the AUTHOR
Galaxy Craze (born 1970) is an actress and
writer. She moved to the U.S. with her mother in 1980. She appeared in a few
independent films in the late 1990s, and wrote a novel, By the Shore, published in 1999. She is a 1993 graduate of Barnard
College.
Craze told an interviewer that she "didn't say I wanted to be a writer, I just knew that's what I like to do." Another interviewer described her "beauty (as) a quiet, dreamy, and ethereal sort."
Craze told an interviewer that she "didn't say I wanted to be a writer, I just knew that's what I like to do." Another interviewer described her "beauty (as) a quiet, dreamy, and ethereal sort."
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