Maggie has long dreamed of the world of Kair Toren, spending countless hours poring over descriptions of its dangerous winding streets, its complex political affairs and its bloody overthrow at the hands of one of the most vicious members of its nobility. So when she wakes up in the opening pages of her favorite unfinished fantasy series, Maggie knows exactly how afraid to be. It’s no surprise, then, that she’s killed nearly as soon as her story begins. It’s more startling when she rises painfully from the dead a few hours later. Stranded in Kair Toren and armed with the inability to die and the knowledge of what is to come, Maggie sets out on a dangerous quest to stop the bloodbath. She recruits the help of a retired swordsman and a ragtag crew of mercenaries, servants and criminals who give her hope that her plan might just stand a chance. But fate has a way of reasserting itself, and sometimes the plot doesn’t want to be changed for the better.
The combination of a modern main character and a medieval-inspired setting allows writing duo Ilona Andrews (husband and wife Ilona and Gordon Andrews) to play to their strengths. This Kingdom Will Not Kill Me showcases the same sharp prose and imaginative worldbuilding as their earlier works, which include the Kate Daniels and Hidden Legacy series. Maggie’s dialogue, full of 21st-century quirks and the occasional pop-culture reference, provides an amusing contrast to the formal language of her Kair Toren counterparts. And Kair Toren’s position as a fictional world allows Andrews to directly explain vast swaths of context in a way that feels natural. Andrews also weaves in a compelling romance subplot that feels fresh—it’s a true slow burn, unafraid to maintain tension right up to (but never exceeding) the reader’s frustration point.
A solid first entry in a planned trilogy, This Kingdom Will Not Kill Me combines the best of series like A Song of Ice and Fire and Outlander with the relentless pace and snappy writing for which Andrews is known.
Read our interview with Ilona Andrews about ‘This Kingdom Will Not Kill Me.’