American Royals by Katharine McGee

E-Audio, 13:53:03

Narrated by:  Brittany Pressley

Release Date:  September 3, 2019

Published by: Penguin Random House Audio Publishing Group
Read from: November 6-10, 2019

American Royals, #1

Source: Library 

TW: 

For fans of: Royalty, Romance, Audio, 

     What if America had a royal family?
When America won the Revolutionary War, its people offered General George Washington a crown. Two and a half centuries later, the House of Washington still sits on the throne.
As Princess Beatrice gets closer to becoming America’s first queen regnant, the duty she has embraced her entire life suddenly feels stifling. Nobody cares about the spare except when she’s breaking the rules, so Princess Samantha doesn’t care much about anything, either . . . except the one boy who is distinctly off-limits to her. And then there’s Samantha’s twin, Prince Jefferson. If he’d been born a generation earlier, he would have stood first in line for the throne, but the new laws of succession make him third. Most of America adores their devastatingly handsome prince . . . but two very different girls are vying to capture his heart.

*MY THOUGHTS*

My initial thoughts on starting this were “this is weird.” When I hear George Washington, I think of the 1700’s. But hearing this in conjunction with
laptops, the internet, and their phones, it threw me for a loop at the very
beginning. But as time went on, I got more used to it. And that’s when I
started to enjoy the story so much more. 

All we’ve ever known for America is a democracy. But what if America was run by royalty instead? What is George Washington was a king and not an elected President and has run America for 200 years? Suddenly things are changing. Princess Beatrice is the next up on the throne and she’s the first girl to do so. Then there’s her sister, Princess Samantha, who is “spare” no one cares about. And Prince Jefferson, who missed the throne by one generation, is spending most of his time fighting off girls who are fighting over him.

            I hate the saying “it was like watching a train crash and not being able to look away,” but that’s exactly what this was. I didn’t hate it, but at some points it
was just way too much drama. I get that this is the more than likely how things
would happen,  with all the rumors and
backstabbing and Instagram drama, but that’s normally what I would stay away
from. My anxiety spikes when that stuff happens IRL, so I was pretty surprised
when I listened to all of this.

            As for the characters, I don’t remember really liking any of them except Beatrice. She was willing to do whatever it took to remain herself. She didn’t let anyone change her. She was tough as nails and still stood tall after it was all said
and done. The one I despised the most was Daphne. I don’t feel like she deserved
anything she had and I really hoped she ended up with nothing. I’ve said it
once and I’ll say it again… If she ends up with the thing she wants most, I
will DNF book 2. I don’t care where I am in the story. That’s how much I didn’t
like her. To go as far as she did? Yeah, she’s unhinged. And I don’t like that.
Maybe that’s just me, but no, I can’t do it.

            And all those POV’s with characters I didn’t really like, this was not fun. This is hard for me when there’s only 2 POV’s and one of them is someone I don’t care for, so having 3 out of 4 that I don’t like was troubling. It just didn’t work
for me and if I had been reading a physical copy, I would have skimmed it
instead of listening all the way through.

            As for the ending, there is a cliff-hanger, and I hated it. I don’t like
cliff-hangers because it usually means that nothing was resolved in the book, that
it just ended, and that’s exactly what happened in this one. There was so much
going on and then it was just over. Nothing was resolved and Book 2 is going to
be just another long continuation of this one. And this book was already long.

            What mostly saved this for me was the amazing narrator. Brittany Pressley is one of my favorites, and I had actually just finished something else that she had
narrated, so it seemed like destiny when she I found this one by her too. So
because I love her work, I could overlook the fact that I don’t really like
history and that this wasn’t exactly something I was really interested in.

            This wasn’t something I particularly loved or something I particularly hated, but I read it. I’ve added Book 2 to my TBR, but we’ll see how things go with that. I’m not sure if I’ll be continuing this or not. Unless that is, someone tells
spoiled Daphne no and they continue with using the same narrator for Book 2 lol

Overall, I give this