Book Review: House of Striking Oaths (The Kingdom of Crows #3) by Olivia Wildenstein

Rating: ★★
Audience: Fantasy Romance
Length: 591 pages
Author: Olivia Wildenstein
Publisher: Self Published
Release Date: June 29th, 2023
Image & Other Reviews on: Goodreads

BOOK SUMMARY:

I WILL BECOME QUEEN OF LUCE… OR DIE TRYING.

There are few people I loathe more than Dante Regio, but my aunt Bronwen, my former grandfather Justus, and my Shabbin grandmother Meriam sit right alongside the Faerie monarch on my list of despicable beings. Especially after they assist the pointy-eared ruler with my kidnapping.

Locked in an obsidian underworld no Crow can reach, not even their king, I soon learn things aren’t as they seem. People aren’t as they seem. And history… I’m still attempting to reconcile the truth with what I was previously told.

My new allies have an agenda, but I have one of my own. Though there’s overlap—we all agree Dante must die—what I desire more than anything is to return to Lore before he levels the kingdom to find me… or loses his humanity trying.

I may favor crowns over coffins, but I refuse to live in a world where my mate only exists as a bird.

Strap in for one last romantic and pulse-pounding adventure in a world governed by magic and hearts.

BIGGEST DISAPPOINTMENT.

I don’t even want to write this review. I am incredibly frustrated by this one.

First of all, why did we spend so much time with Dante? He’s THE FREAKING WORST. And took up way too many pages with his over the top dramatics and trying way too hard to be a villain. It didn’t work. I missed Lore.

Lore is the only aspect I remember liking. I enjoyed his possessive and protective side, per usual. Aaaaand that’s about it.

Fallon got on my nerves some more. And the plot took a bunch of random directions with info dumping (in this, the third book mind you) to try to create more story??? I don’t know. I was confused. Disconnected. And just begging this book to be over.

And now that I know who the spin-off is about I thought it was an odd choice too? I wanted to be able to say, read this series, and now I feel like I can’t say that. Books one and two were very enjoyable. This one left me wanting in about 100 different ways.

Overall audience notes:

Fantasy Romance
Language: heavy and strong
Romance: 3-4 open; high explicit
Violence: high
Trigger/Content Warnings: loss of life, murder, physical/magical/weapons violence, small battle themes