The Courting of Bristol Keats by Mary E. Pearson
Series: Book 1
Pages: 541
Format: Hardback (Special Edition)
After losing both their parents, Bristol Keats and her sisters struggle to stay afloat in their small, quiet town of Bowskeep. When Bristol begins to receive letters from an “aunt” she’s never heard of who promises she can help, she reluctantly agrees to meet—and discovers that everything she thought she knew about her family is a lie. Even her father might still be alive, not killed but kidnapped by terrifying creatures to a whole other realm—the one he is from.
Desperate to save her father and find the truth, Bristol journeys to a land of gods and fae and monsters. Pulled into a dangerous world of magic and intrigue, she makes a deadly bargain with the fae king, Tyghan. But what she doesn’t know is that he’s the one who drove her parents to live a life on the run. And he is just as determined as she is to find her father—dead or alive.
The stunning cover of this book, along with the intriguing jacket blurb, had me really excited to read this, even though I knew it might take a bit to work through the five hundred pages around schoolwork. I wish it had lived up to the promises and expectations.
Whether you’re a fast or slow reader, over five hundred pages is still a decently hefty book. It’s no Stormlight Archives, but that many pages leave room for a rather extensive narrative if you know what you’re doing. Even so, it’s not enough for eight (or more – to be honest, I lost count) different POVs that still convey a complete story. The numerous POVs could have worked if the story had been paced differently.
For one, the slow-burn romance did not remain slow-burn for very long. It went on for a while, but eventually, there comes a point where the complicated relationship turns from restrained longing to a full-blown courtship, which is a bit odd, since everyone (including the MMC/love interest for Bristol) is hiding very important information from her. Maybe it’s just me, but I struggle to get invested in a fictional relationship with that much miscommunication going on between everyone.
Also, there was a distinct lack of action in the novel. I’m not referring to only fighting scenes, but anything between the characters or the broader world that was more than conversations and filler activities. Which seems odd, doesn’t it? It’s a romantic fantasy novel, and those rely on action sequences to balance out the romance elements. Except most of the “action” elements were relayed through conversations and exposition after the fact. And the few action bits we get are “resolved” or dealt with extremely quickly. The threats aren’t gone, but we lose any sense of the urgency that the novel wants us to have. Bristol is supposedly on a tight deadline of three months, and it did not feel like she was in any real hurry to accomplish her goals (the number of days and weeks that passed while she was trying to hook up with the MMC should have caused her a lot more worry than it did).
Despite all my problems with the final product, the premise and beginning of the novel are very interesting. The start got me hooked, and I was too interested in the resolution of Bristol’s initial goals to DNF the book. It also reminded me of other romantasy series I’ve read in the past, like ACOTAR and The Folk of the Air, so there was some nostalgia from the familiar and heavily used romantasy tropes. I probably won’t read the second book, but this one is good enough for a casual, fun read as long as you don’t take it too seriously.
AMBER BUDD - Author 