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Series: The Orc Prince Trilogy by Lionel Hart

Greetings and welcome to Reviews That Burn: Series Reviews, part of Books That Burn. Series Reviews discuss at least three books in a series and cover the overarching themes and development of the story across several books. I'd like to thank longtime Patron Case Aiken, who receives a monthly shoutout. Full Audio Here   An elven prince. The son of an orc warlord. In two warring nations, their arranged marriage brings peace. They never expected to fall in love. Prince Taegan Glynzeiros has prepared since childhood to fight and lead armies against invading orc forces, the enemies of elves for hundreds of years. But after a successful peace treaty, the elven prince will not be fighting orcs, but marrying one. The first words he speaks to Zorvut are their wedding vows. Despite being considered the runt amongst the orc warlord’s children, Taegan finds him to be intelligent and thoughtful—everything the stereotypes about orcs say he shouldn’t be. He doesn’t want to fall in love, but Zorv...

The Sea of Monsters by Rick Riordan (Percy Jackson and the Olympians, #2)

Percy meets one of his half-siblings and has to deal with more implications of his immortal parentage. Grover's search goes awry, Clarisse's quest is similarly troubled, and Percy is failing at his efforts to be innocuous.

I enjoy the dynamic between Percy and Tyson. Not where it is at the start of the book (Percy had to work through some things), but I like where it ends up. Grover's captivity is VERY stressful, and as much as I wish he'd gotten his answer, his quest is too big to be solved in book two, so I think that was the right choice.

There's a lot of terror and pain in this one. These are books for kids, but they are pretty deep. A lot of the depth and complexity comes from understanding the implications of various plot points, but there's enough detail that it's clear that it was on purpose. This applies to everything from Percy's mom's dynamic with Gabe in the last book (a very abusive relationship with her as the victim), to the little hints of her moving on that we get in this one. These books aren't about her, but it feels like she's a full person who just isn't the focus, rather than having thin characterization.

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