TL;DR origin story of Catherine the Great
(finished 9/21/15)
Honestly, I didn't do any research into this until after I finished the book, so I am in no position to talk about historical accuracy. I didn't even realize it was fact-based historical fiction until I read the foreword (preface? idk) by the author mentioning taking some liberties. Everything I found on Wikipedia seemed to check in correctly, but I'm not all that big on Russian history, so I could be way off on that statement.
I got Queen of Someday as a free ebook through Bookbub. I think getting it as an ebook influenced my overall feeling of it in that I was comparing it more to the other ebooks I've read so far than the books I get from the library. (I've come to realize I am really not an objective reviewer. I apologize.)
Anyway, I liked Queen of Someday enough to finish it without dragging my feet at all. It was actually pretty compelling to read. The plot and characters aren't exactly the best, but hey, it kept me occupied and I at least felt a little compassion for Sophie and Rina.
The characters functioned within the book, but they weren't all that dimensional. They were pretty predictable and standard romance characters. I feel like Peter and the empress weren't exactly characterized consistently, but I think that's also because of the facades they used, so I'm still kind of torn on how I feel about their sudden demeanor changes.
I had a little sympathy for Sophie, but honestly, the one I sympathized the most for was Rina. I don't think she really deserved any of what she got (although it definitely could have been worse, so at least it wasn't that.) I empathized with Sophie because she felt human enough, but she made stupid decisions despite knowing they were stupid, so I didn't feel all that bad when her stupidity caught up with her.
And honestly, as awful as this is to admit, I'm really happy her stupidity caught up with her. She didn't get an undeserved happy ending and yet she still managed to survive (so far in the series).
In regards to the romance, I have absolutely no idea what was going on with that. I feel like I've gotta give it props in regards to being fairly unique, but c'mon, three love interests is a little excessive. And none of them really had any basis to them. Sure, she's supposed to marry Peter, so I can understand affection for him, but the other two romances were essentially insta-love. I didn't support any of the romances in the book. And they were unnecessarily sappy, too.
Sophie's romantic complications can maybe be explained by the fact her childhood seemed especially sheltered and I doubt she's had any chances for romance before (and the fact that she was 15 for most of the book), but if you're not that optimistic, then I can't help shed any light on this. I do think that being able to throw in three love interests into a book and still compel me to read to the end says something positive about the book, but I think that ties in slightly to the "watching a train wreck" phenomenon. (Not saying that the book is a train wreck. Sophie's romantic tendencies, maybe, but not the book itself.)
Also in regards to Sophie being 15 / 16, I don't know if this is just me or what, but she seemed kind of unnecessarily thirsty. Maybe it's just because of the time period. Maybe I'm just ridiculously ace and don't understand romance. Who knows.
I don't have any plans to go out of my way to buy the subsequent books, but if I can get my hands on them, then I'm definitely going to continue reading. I'm honestly really interested in what happens now that I've played Wiki Adventures with Catherine the Great. There's a lot of good story potential in that.
As of 10/13 Goodreads is telling me that the Kindle version is free, so I think this is one of the series where they make the first book really easy to get your hands on. I can't promise that it's going to be free forever, but my philosophy is to not turn down a free ebook that looks interesting (proven by my, like, 50 unread ebooks on my iPod).
TL;DR historical fiction about Catherine the Great that was fairly interesting and easy to read. And free. You should read it.
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