Prince of Ruin (The Wayward Sovereigns Series Book 2) by Maxine Rivers


Can Clav, Aden, and Tarsus work together to save the fae realm? Or will they and their world dissolve into ruin?


From the blurb:

CLAV

It’s not that I’m trying to fool anyone into believing I’m some naïve human with no memories of ruling a Fae world as an evil king who hated humans. It’s that I actually am a naïve human with no memories of ruling the Fae world. As an evil king. Who hated humans.
I mean, how could I even hate humans when I, myself, am human? But the prince regent, Tarsus, who claims to be my step-sibling-turned-lover-turned-enemy isn’t buying it. And I’m not sure how much time I have to convince them that I have no intentions of stabbing them in the back before they run me through with their terrifying antlers.

TARSUS
Clav has got to go.
Not only is he making old feelings for him resurface—feelings that I thought were long gone, you know, after he betrayed me all those years ago. But he is a threat to Aden, my human boyfriend. The goddess demanded a human sacrifice. Not just any human sacrifice, she wants Aden. She threatens to bury our continent in ash and lava if we don’t meet her deadline. And somehow Aden believes Clav is our key to making Mother Terra drop her demands. But then, Aden has always been one to see the good in others—even when that good is essentially non-existent.

ADEN
Tarsus wants Clav gone.
Clav wants Tarsus to calm the fuck down.
I just want some peace between the two hotties that I’ve been boning all week.
But how can I convince Tarsus that Clav truly has forgotten his past as a cruel Fae king? And how can I convince Clav to grow the balls to face our goddess and convince her to spare me—to spare all humans—from being thrown into the volcano?
Yeah, see, living as a human in a Fae world among sexy princes, witches, vampires, and giant bat warriors with massive cocks isn’t the hype it’s made out to be.
Well, maybe it is, but I’m not sure it’s worth risking my life for.


Angel's review:

Maxine is a new-to-me author, I've never read their work prior to this story and I'm impressed! While this is technically book two in this series, I didn't read book one and was able to fully enjoy this book as a standalone.

Now onto the characters! Clav has grown up in the human realm not knowing there are other realms that exist. He's a bookworm who loves fictional romance and dinosaurs. When he meets Aden his whole life changes in a way he could have never been prepared for... But will that change be for the better or for worse?

Clav's character is a sweetheart, he's awkward, shy, smart, and perceptive. I adored the fact that both him and Aden are book worms, it made me happy to read about two characters who love getting immersed into stories. I liked being able to see Clav grow and develop throughout this story, he made mistakes but learned from them and apologized for them.

Aden was sweet too in his own way, he sees the good in Clav and believes he isn't the horrible person Tarsus believed him once to be. Overtime Aden's beliefs switches and evolves as the story progressees and we get to see him think for himself and he took the time to truly listen to what Clav was telling him. I liked how he was so supportive of Tarsus, and even while he was weary of Clav, he still cared for his wellbeing.

Tarsus... Tarsus's character didn't win me over. They were very brash and harsh, quite cruel too. While I do understand there was a lot of bad history that occured between them and the person Clav once was, their behavior was very harsh. Even towards Aden they became quite rude and spiteful. Overtime I thought their character would give Clav a chance, and get to know who this version of Clav truly is... But they just held onto the person Clav was and hated him for it for almost the whole story...

I will say that I don't know if I would necessarily call this a romance book in the conventional sense... There doesn't really feel like much romance is occuring between these characters, yes there is lust and steamy times but there isn't much of a connection between them. I didn't feel as though they actually had romantic feelings for each other, it felt like they just lusted for one another.

Even though I didn't love Tarsus's character, the story itself I thought was good. The world building was detailed nicely, and I loved the variety of mythical creatures that got introduced. I liked reading about these characters figuring out a solution to stop the volcano from destroying their world, when one plan didn't work, they came up with something different. Clav embracing his past self and his present self was definitely the best part of the story in my opinion, it was what all the build up was leading up to. It was done so well! Overall a decent story that kept me intrigued the whole time, I'm looking forward to what's next.


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