I am so, so, SO glad that I got approached to be a tour host for Audiobookworm Promotions and this was the firs tour that I asked to take part in. Who knew that I would get to join my first pick?! That was extremely lucky, and I am so grateful for this opportunity. I miss audiobooks and I plan on listening to a lot more with this company. Thank you so much to Jess for this opportunity again, and I appreciate being able to be a part of this.

Oh to the review and guest post!

Reid has spent her whole life pretending to be a man so she can inherit her father’s estate, but when a chance encounter threatens to expose her lie, she is forced to risk everything.

In the kingdom of Marsden, women are subservient to men, and land can only pass from father to son. So, when Reid Ellington is born, the fifth daughter to one of the wealthiest landholders in the kingdom, it’s announced that Reid is a boy.    

Eighteen years later, Reid struggles to conceal the fact she’s actually a young woman. Every day, her secret becomes harder to keep. When one of Marsden’s princes sees her sparring with a sword, she is forced to accept his offer and lead her father’s soldiers to the border. Along the way, she discovers a covert organization within the army known as the Knights of the Realm. 

If Reid wants to save her family from being arrested for treason and robbed of their inheritance, she will have to join the knights and become a weapon for the crown.    

To protect her family, Reid must fight like a man. To do that, she’ll need the courage of a woman.

This is the first book in a new fantasy series from best-selling author Jennifer Anne Davis.

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Jennifer Anne Davis graduated from the University of San Diego with a degree in English and a teaching credential. She is currently a full-time writer and mother of three kids, one weimaraner, and a tortoise. She is happily married to her high school sweetheart and lives in the San Diego area.

Jennifer is the recipient of the San Diego Book Awards Best Published Young Adult Novel (2013), winner of the Kindle Book Awards (2018), a finalist in the USA Best Book Awards (2014), and a finalist in the Next Generation Indie Book Awards (2014).

Publishers Marketplace listed Jennifer as one of the best-selling indie authors in June 2017. She has also been ranked among the top 100 best-selling authors on Amazon.

Website

Kim is an accomplished and award winning actress and director with West End/Broadway theatre credits. Kim has narrated over 35 audiobooks and counting. She is also an in demand voice over talent in the commercial and corporate arena and owns her own class A recording studio in Nashville. Kim is from the UK but has lived in NYC, L.A. and now Nashville TN. She continues to work in Theatre, Film and TV as an actress and a director alongside narrating audiobooks and commercial voice overs.

Disclaimer: I received this audiobook as part of my participation in a blog tour with Audiobookworm Promotions. The tour is being sponsored by Jennifer Anne Davis. The gifting of this audiobook did not affect my opinion of it.

I’ve never actually done an audiobook blog tour before so this was really cool to do. Yes, I’ve listened to many audiobooks before, but never participated in an audiobook blog tour specifically. So I am sooooooo glad that Audiobookworm Promotions exists because that was the coolest thing ever.

I was so into this book like you wouldn’t believe! It’s a pretty decent length audiobook – 8 hours so you could technically listen to it in a day if you wanted to – and the pacing just really worked for me. I loved Bretton’s narration for this as well, and I felt like she really made me like Reid and Harlan a lot more than if I had read them, or if someone else voiced them. She gave this sort of edge to Reid but still make sure that she sounded like the woman she was – despite having to grow up as a boy. I think she gave personality to all of the characters that we got to meet in this novel, and I was really intrigued by the whole story in general.

I really, really hope that she stays the narrator for the entire series. This was my first time hearing Bretton as a narrator and I look forward to hearing her again in other fantasy novels.

Davis made a story where I wanted the main character to be able to fully be herself, and yet I could relate to her in that she had to hide part of who she was. I don’t find a lot of novels where our female MC has to grow up from birth living a complete lie about their sex and gender. The only people that knew that Reid was born a girl, and was still a girl by all physical requirements, were her sisters and father. Unfortunately, her mother died in childbirth, and she felt like she was the one that killed her mother, which is super heartbreaking because it definitely wasn’t her fault. In this world and time, if a family does not have a male heir, the family can lose whatever property and land they have, and their titles. Hence why Duke Ellington – Reid’s father – declared that his late wife gave birth to their son Lord Reid.

So for one, I enjoyed Reid’s journey into learning how she could use all facets of herself to be a Knight of the Realm, almost a group of elite soldiers that act as spies for the Kingdom. Since she pretty much knows the mannerisms of men, and grew up doing combat training, she can handle herself as man, but can also change her outward appearance to be a woman when the situation calls for it. While this may not seem like a novel idea in the present, it seems like in the kingdom of Marsden, this situation that Reid was thrust into gave her so much more agency over herself than she realized. It wasn’t until she had to be “Lady Reid Ellington” that she truly felt how oppressed being a woman could be.

But I won’t spoil the rest of this one for you, because things get so much more interesting when she goes on an actual mission as a Knight, and gets to travel to an enemy realm to save her people. It really was quite interesting, and the entire time I was listening to it, I was engaged in Reid’s journey and didn’t want it to end. I’m actually quite peeved that it ended in such a cliffhanger and I have no idea where or when I’ll get the second audiobook but I need it like yesterday.

Oh, and I also listened to 1.5x the speed, and it just made the story feel so much more intense! I think I need to listen to the rest of my audiobooks at this speed from now on. It also made the laughing in the novel sound super cool for some reason??? I can’t explain it. I just totally dig it.

I don’t think I’ve ever really had an author guest post before, and I was really excited to do this for the first time, ever! So not only do I have a new type of blog tour to join, but I also have a new aspect to my post too! Freaking awesome, am I right?

The heroine’s biggest challenge is discovering what it is she wants with her life. 

Reid has spent her entire life pretending to be a man, learning to manage her father’s estate, and fitting into society’s expectations of what a person of her position should be. Trough it all, she has never stopped to consider what she wants for herself. Does she want to be a woman and wear dresses like her sisters? Does she want to marry? What about kids? 

Reid thought being a man was limiting the things she wanted to do. However, when her life is uprooted and she is forced to be Lady Reid instead of Lord Reid, she discovers that being a woman isn’t as easy as she thought it would be. What she thought would be fun—like wearing a dress—she suddenly realizes isn’t so simple. The fabric and design of a fancy dress is restricting. Yet, women aren’t allowed to wear pants. In addition, she discovers that she can no longer speak her mind in public, walk around town unattended, spar or do sword work, or even ride her horse on her own. The freedoms she took for granted as a man are suddenly stripped from her. 

Forced to face the fact that while she is a woman, she prefers the freedoms men have. However, she can’t have both in her society. She knows she can’t live the rest of her life pretending to be a man. However, she isn’t sure she can stand the thought of being a woman every day either. 

On top of discovering herself, she also has to navigate the murky waters of love. She has been careful to shield herself from being attracted to men or falling in love. After all, it would have ruined her cover. However, now that she meets a few new people, she doesn’t know what to do when she finds herself attracted to one of them. Reid suddenly feels inadequate, out of her league, and not sure how to behave. She’s never done anything for herself or anything simply because she wants to. But it’s time for all of that to change. It’s time Reid decides who she is, what she wants, and to fight for those things.

Jennifer Anne Davis

Looks like there is also a giveaway for this tour as well, so be sure to enter if you’re interested in winning a $25 Gift Card for Amazon! I mean, you can use it for presents, or yourself? It’s Amazon! The possibilities are almost endless.

Realm of Knights Giveaway: $25 Amazon Gift Card https://widget.gleamjs.io/e.js

I can’t wait to hear what you thought of my review. I really enjoyed this book, and I checked Goodreads and the sequel comes out on December 10th! I didn’t see when the audiobook comes out though, but I’m seriously excited to listen to it when it does come out.

Until next time, fam!