*Grabby Hands* Release & Review - My Lady Jane by Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton & Jodi Meadows

  

 Title: My Lady Jane
Author: Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton & Jodi Meadows

Publication Date: June 7th, 2016
Category/Genre: Young Adult Historical/Paranormal/Humor

Publisher: HarperTeen

The comical, fantastical, romantical, (not) entirely true story of Lady Jane Grey. In My Lady Jane, coauthors Cynthia Hand, Brodi Ashton, and Jodi Meadows have created a one-of-a-kind fantasy in the tradition of The Princess Bride, featuring a reluctant king, an even more reluctant queen, a noble steed, and only a passing resemblance to actual history—because sometimes history needs a little help.

At sixteen, Lady Jane Grey is about to be married off to a stranger and caught up in a conspiracy to rob her cousin, King Edward, of his throne. But those trifling problems aren’t for Jane to worry about. Jane is about to become the Queen of England.

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Buy Links: Amazon

4 “Hilarious historical retelling” Stars

Dude, this book is completely bonkers—in the best way possible. If you have a sense of humor, you’ll love it.

Something I noticed and LOVED from the start were the narrative choices that made it incredibly easy to engage with the story and made me feel like I was reading a history book written by insane people who knew how to make others laugh. My favorite kind of people!

This is supposed to be the story of Lady Jane Grey (the Nine-Day Queen) and Edward VI (the king who died young and tried to keep Mary and Elizabeth away from the throne), but it’s nothing like you’ll find on history books or the Internet (in my case, Wikipedia, since I didn’t know anything about Jane prior to reading this). 

In My Lady Jane,  three hilarious authors completely throw history out the window and create a paranormal world involving shifters—called Eðian—that directly influences the events involving the English throne.

My Lady Jane is told from three POVs – Jane, Guildford (but call him G) and Edward’s; and that was one heck of a great choice. It allowed us to get to know these characters better and understand their motivation, while also helping with the pacing. It didn’t hurt that the three POVs were super funny and distinctive. Unlike other times when I read multi POV books and  end up connecting with one more than the other, or skipping chapters that focus on a character I don’t particularly like, My Lady Jane gave me POVs I absolutely loved! I wanted all three of them, and I can't imagine this story written in any other way.

At first I thought Edward would be my least favorite character out of the three, but that quickly changed. I loved reading about the young king who had no freaking idea of how to rule a country, but still had a great heart. His protectiveness and love for Jane was really sweet. And so was his relationship with the people around him—his grandmother, the dog, the Scottish girl who won his heart…  I really liked Edward and I was so glad the authors found a way to give him a happy ending. Yay!

With Jane, I knew I was going to like her from the start. She was really funny and smart. Everything about her worked. Her love for books, the way she cared about people, how she wanted to make a difference. She could be really stubborn at times (and there were quite a few times I wanted to shake some sense into her), but even those parts made me smile.

Guildford (G) was also a great character. A horse by day and a man by night, G always managed to get himself in the craziest situations. He was the perfect match for Jane—just as stubborn as she was. Shipping them made reading this book even better.

The second half of the book -- where history was really left behind -- was even better than the first, and the ending was perfection.

The best way to go into My Lady Jane is not knowing too much about the plot... Just be ready to throw history out the window and laugh a lot, because you’ll be surprised and entertained from beginning to end.

*If you liked this review (or not), if you read the book (or not), come say hello and leave your comments bellow.