The Girl of Fire and Thorns

by Rae Carson

Reviewed by

Elizabeth Mosolovich

Princess Elisa is special — she is the Chosen One of this century, the bearer of the holy Godstone that warms in response to her prayers and marks her as one who will fulfill the prophecies of her world's sacred text, the Scriptura Sancta.

But she is also the younger sister, the useless princess who, coddled by her nurses, has grown into a huge disappointment to her people. And she knows it. That is why, when she is married in secret to the king of another, turbulent country, she is determined to do right by her father and homeland and act on her duty, even though she has no idea what that is.

That duty soon becomes clearer when Elisa is kidnapped by peasant rebels leading a revolution against the king, and Elisa begins to realize how troubled things are, especially when an enemy people, with access to their own Godstone powers, continues to attack her adopted country. As Elisa strives to understand what her destiny is as the Chosen One, she also must juggle her duty to her husband and the feelings stirring within her towards a young rebel leader as she connects to these young revolutionaries. She wonders what could happen if she wasn't a queen and the bearer of the Godstone.

But she is, and those never have happy fates.

This was an amazing book that blended modern spirituality/religion and historical politics with fiction beautifully. Elisa's self-esteem issues and desire to not be a disappointment is very understandable; she's an easily relatable character. And many of the scenes in this book were so beautiful mostly because of the raw emotion in them; some of these scenes, however, seem to be overlooked in the sequel, something I feel is very regrettable. The sequel is titled The Crown of Embers, and a third book just came out: The Bitter Kingdom. Overall, they are still very wonderful, and I feel you should give all three books a try.