Title: The Queen's Game

Author: Carla de Guzman

Genre/Themes: Contemporary royal romance

Release Date: 1 August 2017

Author's links: Website / Twitter / Instagram / Goodreads

My rating: 4 Stars

Blurb 

There are only two reasons why Nina would come back home to Cincamarre--one, if Auntie Delia promises to stop butting into her business, two, if her father died and she was made to ascend the throne to be queen. 

Unfortunately for her, it was the second thing that brought her home. 

As a princess who's sunk a yacht and been caught kissing popstars, it's easy for her aunt, the regent, to think she's ill prepared for the throne. But Nina doesn't think that having to fake date Felipe, the handsome, squeaky clean Prince of Concordia was the best solution for that. 

Nina's ready to learn the ropes of her new role and make it hers, and reconnecting with Felipe only makes her want to be a better queen. But is the monarchy ready for Queen Nina?

This is a duology of fictional royal romances but can work as standalones. I loved the first book and had some issues with the second one.

The Queen's Game is just wonderful - a spoiled heiress who has become a world famous celebrity is on her path to take the throne without losing herself. Childhood friends to lovers, great hero - supporting and caring and encouraging, giving the heroine the freedom and the back-up/sense of security she needs. Things start with a fake relationships which quickly becomes real. He is a prince himself but was never intimated by her position, I loved how much he respected her and how proud he was of her achievement. 

The plot involved some court intrigue and backstabbling and was full of details of the everyday life/economy of the imaginary kingdom all of which made the story very relatable and real.

Cora Justa Dumagat has had enough. 

She is tired of watching the corrupt, fat cats of the council override the monarchy and risk the people’s lives in exchange for a payday. Despite advice from her Queen, Cora has decided to take matters into her own hands and hit the Joaquins where it hurts—to steal their precious Juan Luna painting right from under their noses in Barcelona. 

The job shouldn’t be too difficult. If only Luis Ang, her ex-boyfriend, wasn't hired to be her bodyguard. 

Luis knows that Cora is up to something, and will stop at nothing to make sure she’s safe, even at the cost of Cora’s plans. 

As Luis and Cora become more and more deeply entangled into each other, the more dangerous the situation becomes. Will Cora have her revenge? Or will stealing Luna be the last thing she ever does?

Stealing Luna is a second chance romance between an art thief the her best friend/crush from college who is hired as her bodyguard. There is a lot I enjoyed in this story - evocative writng, strong sense of place - the imaginably kingdom of Cincamarre and then Barcelona, Spain. The glimpses we get into the whole con of stealing a famous painting (a real one!) and replacing it with the perfect forged one, it was fascinating to see it on the page. There is a lovely secondary f/f romance which I greatly enjoyed. 

I liked how the story progressed, him making amends for rejecting her years ago, her trying to trust him again. The romance was swoon worthy but I had an issue with some of the behaviour of the heroine that I just couldn't accept. I feel she violated his privacy and betrayed his trust and they never properly addressed this. I felt her apology was too weak and she didn't try hard enough to make amends for her behaviour. I don't want to sound as hating on a difficult heroine, I liked a lot about her and could see she acted the way she did (she was prickly and angry but she needed to protect herself and she had her reasons to he guarded). Still, I feel the hero deserved more honesty from her. 

Overall, it's a lovely story and I loved a lot about it and despite my issues with it, I still recommend the whole series as a fun, mostly light-hearted contemporary royal romance.