Dark Breaks the Dawn by Sara Larson

Dark Breaks the Dawn

by Sara Larson

Published by Scholastic Press

May 20, 2017

320 pages

Plot: On her eighteenth birthday, Princess Evelayn of Eadrolan, the Light Kingdom, can finally access the full range of her magical powers. The light looks brighter, the air is sharper, and the energy she can draw when fighting feels almost limitless.

But while her mother, the queen, remains busy at the war front, in the Dark Kingdom of Dorjhalon, the corrupt king is plotting. King Bain wants control of both kingdoms, and his plan will fling Evelayn onto the throne much sooner than she expected.

In order to defeat Bain and his sons, Evelayn will quickly have to come into her ability to shapeshift, and rely on the alluring Lord Tanvir. But not everyone is what they seem, and the balance between the Light and Dark comes at a steep price. (Goodreads.com, 2019)

Review: Let me start off by saying that I loved Larson’s Defy series.  That was the main reason I picked up Dark Breaks the Dawn.  I definitely recommend that series if you haven’t read it! The cover for this book was very eye-catching and beautiful and was the second thing that caught my attention. That being said, I must admit I found it hard to get into this new series. Which was very disappointing for me since I loved Larson’s other books.  

The idea of light and dark kingdoms was interesting, but the fact that the queen would be fighting on the war front against the dark kingdom seemed unrealistic to me.  Especially since that if the queen was killed, the power of the light kingdom would also cease until the new queen got her powers. Which, by the way, was done by ritual and did not guarantee the heir would survive it.  This would leave the whole light kingdom very vulnerable because everyone was powerless when the queen died. So this was not something believable. It seemed too convenient a way for the queen to die and her daughter, Evelayn to take over.  

I do not remember the story of Swan Lake, but I believe that if you are going to build a romance throughout an entire book, than that romance needs to survive to the end of the series.  Especially, if a book is themed as part romance. Overall, the writing is good and the story was fine, but the characters and plot holes didn’t leave me anticipating the next book. In addition, the next book in the series, Bright Burns the Night, continues the story 10 years later.  That is quite a large gap in time from the end of one book to the next.  I still look forward to any new series that Sara Larson writes. This one just didn’t work for me.

Rating: 3 Hearts

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