I received this book for free from Publisher in exchange for an honest review. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.
My Contrary Mary by Brodi Ashton, Cynthia Hand, Jodi Meadows Series: Mary #1
Published by HarperTeen on 6/22/21
Genres: Fantasy & Magic, Historical, Retellings, Young Adult
Pages: 512
Format: eARC
Source: Publisher
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Welcome to Renaissance France, a place of poison and plots, of beauties and beasts, of mice and . . . queens?
Mary is the queen of Scotland and the jewel of the French court. Except when she’s a mouse. Yes, reader, Mary is an Eðian (shapeshifter) in a kingdom where Verities rule. It’s a secret that could cost her a head—or a tail.
Luckily, Mary has a confidant in her betrothed, Francis. But things at the gilded court take a treacherous turn after the king meets a suspicious end. Thrust onto the throne, Mary and Francis face a viper’s nest of conspiracies, traps, and treason. And if Mary’s secret is revealed, heads are bound to roll.
Short and Sweet Review
We’re in the time of the Renaissance France and Mary Queen of Scots has lived in France since she was a young girl. Mary has always known she was going to marry the Dauphin Francis, but Mary has a secret she’s an Eðian. This gives Mary the ability to change into her spirit animal which is a mouse and she uses this ability to learn things about the other royals living in the castle. Unfortunately there’s a lot of scheming going on and soon Mary and Francis are going to be thrust on the throne and even sooner someone is going to try to get them off.
There’s a lot of characters in this book we have Mary and Francis and we have Mary’s four ladies in waiting also all named Mary so they all go by nick names and we have Ari Nostradamus and Catherine De Medici and King Henry, oh and Mary’s uncles.
Anyway the book started off a little slow which I suppose was to build everything up and things did pick up halfway through the book after King Henry met his end. Catherine De Medici is up to no good and so are Mary’s uncles but they’re not working together so at some point Mary and Francis do end up splitting up and Mary goes to Scotland and Francis is in France dealing with his mother. Ari Nostradamus was an okay character she was hired by Catherine to spy on Mary and I feel like she started the ball rolling with the trouble that came to Mary after her and Francis’s marriage. I guess Ari was useful because she could make potions but some of the things she did were annoying. Mary was an a good character she didn’t want to believe that her uncles would plot against her and Francis felt the same about Catherine.
Overall this was a good book. It definitely got better during the second half when things started to pick up and more of the plots against Mary and Francis were revealed. I’m excited to see what the next installments in the Mary series will bring!
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