Year One

Year OneKingmakersSofie Lark

Apr 13

Written By Ally Talley

Kingmakers #1

By Sofie Lark

~Do not recommend reading as a standalone (although technically you could)~

TheStory

Leo and Anna have been best friends for their entire childhood, the families so close, they consider themselves blood. But when Anna and Leo are accepted to Kingmakers, a secret university for children of mafia families, their relationship dynamics change.

Having not realized their true feelings for each other until recently, Leo and Anna both mishandle each other. When one thing leads to another, their friendship falls to ruin, causing a rift that might never be repaired.

TheReview

This book is the next generation of the families from the Brutal Birthright series. Leo is Sebastian and Yelena’s son; Anna is Mikolaj and Nessa’s daughter. So they aren’t actually blood related. Only “cousins” by marriage. Right in the beginning, there is a huge dump of information about the families and how the relations to one another came to be. Not super important to the story as you will get more background on the main characters as you read.

As the beginning progressed, it was just really simple. In a good way! Leo, Anna, and Dean all arrived at Kingmakers and then they were just getting their bearings. It was slow as the author set up the student and school dynamics to build us a picture of what the world of Kingmakers looks like. It wasn’t overcomplicated, just took time to get the visual built for us readers. You have plenty of time to wrap your head around the world the author is creating here.

Dean was a problem. Of course, he fell for Anna. But that’s expected. She was beautiful, loyal, loving but with a hint of darkness. Who wouldn’t fall for her? Dean did want to take Anna away from Leo but he also fell for her before ever considering Leo. He didn’t want to lose Anna to Leo once he already had her. Leo is kind of selfish and a lot ignorant. So, it’s also his fault that Anna wound up in Dean’s arms. Dean is a monster but a broken, redeemable monster who just wanted the object of his affection to love him back. Obviously, because the author said so. Anywho, I digress.

On the note of Leo being selfish, the Quartum Bellum (The War of Fours), school-sanctioned battle where each year competes to win, is a big part of the story. It consists of big competitions that matter deeply to the characters. For us readers, it was ultimately the catalyst for Leo’s growth and development as a character. He realized his mortality and became more humble throughout the year, mainly following each Quartum Bellum battle.

In the beginning, Leo and Anna really did seem like just friends. They don’t know what they feel but they feel something. So it was a reeeeally slow burn. In fact, it didn’t even ember really until about half way through. Because of the way Leo and Anna’s relationship fell apart, there just wasn’t a whole lot of room for the tension to develop.

At the point where Anna’s heart was broken, she was a vicious little thing. It was a miscommunication trope but it was so well written. It wasn’t really either of their faults but it was heartbreaking to see them fall apart because of it. After this point, it really was just a sort of “pining from afar” thing.

Something that I thought there would have been more of was actually men and women squaring up, facing off, being all dramatic in the name of being the most badass person at school. I mean, it is a school full of young mafia children who have been trained to be brutal and fight dirty their whole lives. But alas, there wasn’t a whole lot of that. But it’s only Year One so maybe more of that will come later.

This is a story about two friends finding themselves and dealing with the challenges they’ve never had to face at home. Before they can find love in one another, they have to discover who they are and start becoming the best versions of themselves. Now that they are on their own and being forced to grow up and confront themselves, they also had to figure out their relationship together.

I loved the storyline here but I truly believe the best ones are yet to come in this series. This was a great introduction to the world of Kingmakers. I felt for the characters and enjoyed every moment I read of it. I can’t wait to continue the series.