Behind the Throne by K B Wagers

3 stars
R-1 (no actual sex, but blunt about sex in terms of conception and gay/lesbian relationships)
Language (with a capital L, holy cow)

Good voice-- there were things about the voice that reminded me of Lisa Shearin, and you know I love Raine, but it wasn't maybe as fully developed as would be nice.

World building.... sigh.  It wanted to be better.  I couldn't decide if it just wasn't fully developed or if the author's desire to stick with the "it's INDIA but in SPACE" hampered the development.

Honestly, overall it kind of felt like the writing got better and more mature (to some extent) as the book went along, but then the earlier parts didn't get fixed to match. (If that makes sense... it's getting late as I type this, lol)

Ultimately, though, it was the language that determined the rating here.  There was no way this book was getting more than 3 stars from me.

There were so many F-words in the first 10 pages I almost didn't keep reading.

Now please, no lectures on how it's realistic.  I'm not naive enough to think there aren't people that speak that way in the world, but in my life there aren't.  At least not that speak that way around me.

And at the end of the day, I could maybe forgive the level of language if it hadn't felt like such a forced affectation.

It was ridiculous.

Which is sad, because the book could almost have been a 4.5 star story by the end.

But just no.

The profanity tapered, gratefully, so I'll probably give book 2 a try, but we'll see.

(For the record, this was a Reader's Choice title that I grabbed more for my husband, because it's far more his thing genre-wise.  The development issues bugged him even more than they bugged me, lol.  And even though he DOES know people who talk like that, the profanity irritated the living daylights out of him.)