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369th out of 460 books
—
653 voters
The Born Queen (Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone #4)
In The Kingdoms of Thorn and Bone, Greg Keyes has crafted a brilliant saga of magic, adventure, and love set against a backdrop of clashing empires and an ancient, reawakened evil. Now, with The Born Queen, Keyes brings his epic to a masterly close, gathering the strands of plot and character into a stunning climax that both completes and transcends all that has gone befor...more
Hardcover, 512 pages
Published
March 25th 2008
by Del Rey
(first published February 21st 2008)
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Series review for genrebusters.com:
...throughout the entirety of (this) series, Keyes maintains (the story) with informed craft. The story rarely lags over its thousands of pages, and the many plot elements that he concocts are largely settled by the conclusion. He keeps a good handle on his principal characters and develops them with at a pace that both fits the story well and feels natural. In particular, his treatment of the maturation of Anne Dare, who begins as a spoiled adolescent and beco...more
...throughout the entirety of (this) series, Keyes maintains (the story) with informed craft. The story rarely lags over its thousands of pages, and the many plot elements that he concocts are largely settled by the conclusion. He keeps a good handle on his principal characters and develops them with at a pace that both fits the story well and feels natural. In particular, his treatment of the maturation of Anne Dare, who begins as a spoiled adolescent and beco...more
Apr 26, 2008
Felicia
rated it
4 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
epic fantasy lovers, series whores
Shelves:
epic-fantasy
Excellent ending to a FANTASTIC Quadrology? I really enjoyed this series, and if I skimmed a bit through a few of the characters, I PORED over others. Yes, some of the plot points became inevitable, but for a sprawling epic fantasy in the vein of George RR Martin, I can only wholeheartedly recommend it!
9 likes · like · see review
With 'The Born Queen,' Greg Keyes provides a suitably epic finish to his engrossing, endearing 'Kingdom of Thorn and Bone' books. Lush with well fleshed characters, mysterious figures and fantastic monsters, this series engrossed me since the start, and the conclusion was satisfying, fulfilling and poignant.
Anne Dare's quest to become empress is coming to a close, but she still must face off against her direst foes: her uncle Robert continues to make trouble, and Hansa continues to threaten mil...more
Anne Dare's quest to become empress is coming to a close, but she still must face off against her direst foes: her uncle Robert continues to make trouble, and Hansa continues to threaten mil...more
I was terrified he couldn't do it, but Keyes managed to wrap up an incredibly complex plot and bring all the strands home, comprehensibly, in a fairly short space. A splendid book, a splendid series--I recommend it to anyone who likes world-sweeping, complex fantasy involving powers not always friendly to humans, intricate characters, and thundering plots, not to mention strong women and men!
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
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After I read the first book in this series, The Briar King, I literally bought the next three together and read them straight through.
My feeling is - in spite of the fact Mr Keyes is no stranger to quadrologies - that he intended to write a six book series or maybe even something longer but either got bored with the premise and characters (seemingly unlikely) or the publisher for some reason put the kibosh on a longer series because all of sudden, his terrificly clear - if labyrinthine - story s...more
My feeling is - in spite of the fact Mr Keyes is no stranger to quadrologies - that he intended to write a six book series or maybe even something longer but either got bored with the premise and characters (seemingly unlikely) or the publisher for some reason put the kibosh on a longer series because all of sudden, his terrificly clear - if labyrinthine - story s...more
2 likes · like · see review
This is the end of certainly one of the very best series that I ever read. The story is interesting, the pacing is extremely intense, with next to no filler and very, very little that doesn't actually drive the story forward, and any complaints that may in all fairness be made regarding character development and the huge amount of extremely lucky events that happen to the characters easily get forgotten.
As for the very end... It's a whirlwind of action, a chain nightmare, a series of fever dream...more
As for the very end... It's a whirlwind of action, a chain nightmare, a series of fever dream...more
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
Feb 23, 2011
Felix
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommended to Felix by:
Dietmar
Shelves:
fantasy
The finale of the series doesn't really come up to the long build-up that raised expectations. I found the sudden change in some characters (most notably Stephen but also Anne and Austra) unconvincing and a bit forced. To me it felt like Keyes was holding back for too long, aiming to make the final revelations all the more breathtaking, thereby making the transition hasty and not very subtle. Considering the slowness of plot-development up to the finale, that is unnecessary. There was enough roo...more
I couldn't stop reading this book, but that was really just because I wanted to see how all of the various characters met their ends. Overall, it wasn't the best series I have ever enjoyed, but it was far from the worst. There was some nice subtlety in the second and third books that made up for the slow opening that was The Briar King. That subtlety seems to have been abandoned in The Born Queen in favor of an approach reminiscent of Clash of the Titans (in Claymation!).
The swordsman Cazio wi...more
Gosh. What an annoying ending to a really charming and unique quartet. A lot more of this one seemed disjointed. Some of the major plot points needed a little more fleshing out, particularly with regard to the thrones and how one character is actually three people. Very imaginative, I'm sure, but would it really have made the book so much longer if the central conflict were explained a little better?
Still, I have to hand it to the author, unlike a lot of speculative fiction writers, he does an e...more
Still, I have to hand it to the author, unlike a lot of speculative fiction writers, he does an e...more
2.5 stars
Not a completely satisfying end to the series, but I had suspected that the more I got into it. The first book was fairly good and made me want to keep reading to see what would happen. The next two slid downhill and seemed more a parade of the established characters--walking around and seeming to do stuff when they really were just going in circles. This last book DID resolve all of the loose ends, but almost every time, it was done in a way that was confusing, rushed, or just plain we...more
Not a completely satisfying end to the series, but I had suspected that the more I got into it. The first book was fairly good and made me want to keep reading to see what would happen. The next two slid downhill and seemed more a parade of the established characters--walking around and seeming to do stuff when they really were just going in circles. This last book DID resolve all of the loose ends, but almost every time, it was done in a way that was confusing, rushed, or just plain we...more
This is a very difficult review for me to write. On the one hand, I do not want to give you the impression that it is a bad book, it is not. On the other hand, I do not want you to go into expecting it to be like books 1-3, because it is not. This is where the whole preconception thing comes into play and in this case, preconception will hurt you. You need to go into this book with NO expectations, about anything. You also need to be prepared for an almost overwhelming flow of information, twist...more
why do good fantasy writers go so bad, so consistently? i get hooked on the tale of magic, the sarcastic protagonists, the witty repartee, the underlying quest for good, and then BAM! It's all spikey, nightmare monsters and misery. I read the 1st and 2nd books in this series in a couple of days. this one has taken me 3 weeks to realize I hate it. all the more annoying that it is a library book and I am a librarian and I will have to pay for it because I took such bad care of it at the beach. bec...more
why do good fantasy writers go so bad, so consistently? i get hooked on the tale of magic, the sarcastic protagonists, the witty repartee, the underlying quest for good, and then BAM! It's all spikey, nightmare monsters and misery. I read the 1st and 2nd books in this series in a couple of days. this one has taken me 3 weeks to realize I hate it. all the more annoying that it is a library book and I am a librarian and I will have to pay for it because I took such bad care of it at the beach. bec...more
Overall I thought this series started out with a lot of promise, but by the last book I was reading just to see what happened. I felt like the final resolution was rushed, and like the character development just stopped at the beginning of book 3, so I was hard-pressed to care too very much about what was going on. One bias I should mention is that, though I love sword-and-sorcery worlds, I am not actually big on descriptive battle scenes and tend to skip through them quickly. There are lots of...more
A great finish to a better than average series! My only issue was that it felt rushed and could probably have used another book to fully flesh things out. A few previously important characters felt a bit left out of the action towards the end and as a result it feels a bit like their character arcs didn't quite resolve as well as they could have. I also felt like the first book in the series promised an a apocalypse that was never quite delivered. Other than that the climax was suitably weird, d...more
Taken as a whole, FANTASTIC! Individually, they suffer a bit from continuity. The first book hooks you in and makes you care about some really incredible characters, then they wane a bit. Sadly, it feels like there should be another novella to explain some of the events in the Born Queen. It begins to feel a bit rushed half-way through and then...ends. And stuff happens. You get the idea. Worth the journey though and in fact have read the series several times now (twice just to make sense of eve...more
Book: 4/10 - 3/31/11
Series: 5/10 - 3/21/11
This is another series that started out well but ended terribly. The first two books were excellent - great fantasy with interesting and detailed characters; a good plot with an interesting world with a big back story. It kind of reminded me of A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin, but focusing on fewer characters with a less intricate plot. The third book was still solid, but there was less character and plot development...still interesting and...more
Series: 5/10 - 3/21/11
This is another series that started out well but ended terribly. The first two books were excellent - great fantasy with interesting and detailed characters; a good plot with an interesting world with a big back story. It kind of reminded me of A Song of Ice and Fire by George R.R. Martin, but focusing on fewer characters with a less intricate plot. The third book was still solid, but there was less character and plot development...still interesting and...more
Dec 28, 2012
Dirk Grobbelaar
rated it
5 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
books-i-own,
fantasy
Greg Keyes manages something very special here, and that is to tell a big and fairly complex epic fantasy tale without allowing it to become bloated. This is a sleek and sure footed affair. It’s all here: intrigue, pitched battles, fearsome creatures, likeable characters, sorcery, and then some, and written very competently to boot. All this, without resorting to tomes of 900+ pages stretched over 10 books? Impressive.
The story started in The Briar King and continued through The Charnel Prince a...more
The story started in The Briar King and continued through The Charnel Prince a...more
(This review is for the whole series)
This fantasy saga is fairly long and has a complicated plot, many characters, and a lot of different concepts and themes in play. It could have been a huge sprawling mess, but Keyes does a remarkable job of maintaining control of all his many and disparate threads. He has consistently snappy pacing, a good grasp of when to apply humor and when to apply poignancy, and a well-built world. There were some things that I would have liked a little more explanation...more
This fantasy saga is fairly long and has a complicated plot, many characters, and a lot of different concepts and themes in play. It could have been a huge sprawling mess, but Keyes does a remarkable job of maintaining control of all his many and disparate threads. He has consistently snappy pacing, a good grasp of when to apply humor and when to apply poignancy, and a well-built world. There were some things that I would have liked a little more explanation...more
This novel finishes up what has been one of the better series that I have read in this genre recently. I've rated all the books as four stars, but really I'd say the Briar King was a 4+, the middle two books are 4s, and the last book is a 4-.
The book is solid, and the stories of all the characters are moved forward to a conclusion. Unlike the other books, however, this one seemed a little 'busy'. I think this is because for most of the other books, multiple characters were traveling together/adv...more
The book is solid, and the stories of all the characters are moved forward to a conclusion. Unlike the other books, however, this one seemed a little 'busy'. I think this is because for most of the other books, multiple characters were traveling together/adv...more
Mar 09, 2009
Terence
rated it
3 of 5 stars
·
review of another edition
Recommends it for:
Keyes fans; general SF fans
Shelves:
sf-fantasy
I really don't have much to say about this book or the series as a whole except that it's very good escapist literature. Keyes is a good author who keeps the action moving and writes generally believable and interesting characters.
In this series (which started with The Briar King and continued with The Charnel Prince and The Blood Knight), Keyes tackles the problem of power, its use and how it corrupts the user. I was particularly impressed with his handling of Anne Dare and her growth into pow...more
In this series (which started with The Briar King and continued with The Charnel Prince and The Blood Knight), Keyes tackles the problem of power, its use and how it corrupts the user. I was particularly impressed with his handling of Anne Dare and her growth into pow...more
What a lackluster finish to a decent series. While the first few books were good, I felt the author dragged this out a lot longer than he originally intended. The storyline seemed to shift several times over the last couple of books as if he had no real end in sight. In my opinion, he could have ended it a book or two ago and called it good.
Series have to end at some point (someone tell this to Mr. RR Martin), but the endings in this one just didn't work for me. I won't reveal plotlines but nee...more
Series have to end at some point (someone tell this to Mr. RR Martin), but the endings in this one just didn't work for me. I won't reveal plotlines but nee...more
This book was not QUITE as good as I was hoping for. Although I applaud an author who dares to make his characters flawed, it is always very uncomfortable when they start veering quite close to unlikeable.
Also, the end was simultaneously epic and anti-climactic which is an impressive and strange feat I've never seen before.
All in all, I enjoyed this series and this was a decent end to it, but I was hoping for something a bit more satisfying.
Also, the end was simultaneously epic and anti-climactic which is an impressive and strange feat I've never seen before.
All in all, I enjoyed this series and this was a decent end to it, but I was hoping for something a bit more satisfying.
I didn't find this to be a particularly stunning ending to a four book set, but the complex plot lines were all tied up to some sort of satisfaction. All the characters have so much moral ambiguity (and in some cases rather unsettling personality shifts) towards the end that I found myself not really caring what happened to them. I'm glad I read the series, as it was a quite imaginative and intriguing world, but I don't think it really sets itself apart from others in the fantasy genre.
This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it,
click here.
This series is similar in style to the George RR Martin's Song of Fire & Ice books - the plot line follows a number of different characters in different places/situations; it's rather dark (although a little confusing at times too); lots of action and the series builds nicely to a great resolution. The ending didn't seem rushed and pretty much all of the loose ends were tied up. If you like Martin, you'll be a fan of this series as well :)
I almost didn't finish this book, but I have a really hard time doing that, so I trudged through. In this book, I didn't know which of the many plot lines were supposed to advance and which were supposed to end. Was Anne supposed to keep ruthlessly killing the Hansans wherever they appeared? Was the composer supposed to write the death song? Was the woodsman supposed to find the Briar King's home? Sometimes, the element of the unknown can make the book better, but it seemed so heavy-handed in th...more
Dec 03, 2008
Nathan
rated it
3 of 5 stars
Recommends it for:
fantasy fans
Shelves:
reviewed-2008,
fantasy
This book wasn't what I expected the series to end like, and I was pretty disappointed that there seemed to be no real winners in the story when everything is said and done.
The people that you care about through the whole series don't end up happy at the end, though the ending does fit with the rest of the story.
Not a great book, but well written and worth reading if you liked the previous books in the series.
The people that you care about through the whole series don't end up happy at the end, though the ending does fit with the rest of the story.
Not a great book, but well written and worth reading if you liked the previous books in the series.
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| can't wait ... | 2 | 15 | Aug 03, 2008 04:47pm |
Gregory Keyes is a writer of science fiction and fantasy who has written both original and media-related novels under both the names J. Gregory Keyes and "Greg Keyes".
Greg Keyes was born in to a large, diverse, storytelling family. He received degrees in anthropology from Mississippi State and the University of George before becoming a fulltime writer.
He lives in Savannah, Georgia.
More about Greg Keyes...
Greg Keyes was born in to a large, diverse, storytelling family. He received degrees in anthropology from Mississippi State and the University of George before becoming a fulltime writer.
He lives in Savannah, Georgia.
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Jul 12, 2008 10:49am
updated Jul 12, 2008 03:46pm
Jul 12, 2008 04:24pm