The Undying King by Grace Draven

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I knew going into the Black FaRoFriday Readathon I wanted to get to one of my favorite fantasy romance authors, Grace Draven. I also had one prompt left for the 2nd board of Fall in Love, brown on the cover. I went through the books I had of hers to read and found The Undying King. This is a novella that originally was released in a duo bind up with Jeffe Kennedy called For Crown and Kingdom. For the Black FaRoFriday Readathon, this covered the prompts Epic Fantasy, Witches, Post a Cover Pic & Tag FaRoFeb and Historical Setting.

Imogen is taking care of her adoptive mother Niamh. As she is close to passing, she tells her daughter that the stories she heard growing up about The Undying King are actually true. She had taken care of him when injured before Imogen was born and received a key that would lead to him when needed. She passes the key along to her daughter with the hope that he can help with Imogen's curse. Known as Death's Handmaiden, Imogen cannot have skin to skin contact with anyone. If there is contact, the other person dies. After Niamh passes, Imogen accidentally activates the key and knows that she has to track Cededra down, if only to take the key back.

This was such a great novella. I am so impressed with Grace Draven, especially with her novellas. Do I wish it was longer? Yes, but only because I love her writing and the worlds she creates. I think that she plots out her novellas super well so while I'm left wanting more, the story still feels wrapped up and complete. There's definite room for more in the world and even with Cededra and Imogen, but at the same time I can see them living their HEA in secluded Tineroth. 

There was some time jumps here, which doesn't bother me as much here. They felt natural and if this were a movie or TV show I could see where the time jumps were as montages. We don't really need to see Imogen wandering the ruins day after day by herself. I liked seeing the moments between Cededra and Imogen and how they both were really able to open up to each other. While Imogen was innocent for the most part, Niamh did try to at least keep her learned about the relationship between men and women. I loved that even though they both ran from each other at times, they both came around. It really felt almost fated mates-esque and I loved it. The way that they were drawn to each other based on their unique experiences was so nice to see from both POVs.

I can't wait to continue reading Grace Draven and just fall more in love with her writing with every step. If you are interested in trying Grace Draven, I feel like this is a good starting point. The magic system isn't too complicated here and it's a quick read. If you enjoy fantasy and haven't tried Grace Draven yet, I couldn't recommend her more!

Have you read The Undying King?

Bookishly Yours,

Stasi🍎

Statistics: The Undying King, Grace Draven, 5-stars, 1 day, eBook, 190 pages, published in 2016