Royals by Rachel Hawkins

Summary from Goodreads:

Meet Daisy Winters. She’s an offbeat sixteen-year-old Floridian with mermaid-red hair; a part time job at a bootleg Walmart, and a perfect older sister who’s nearly engaged to the Crown Prince of Scotland. Daisy has no desire to live in the spotlight, but relentless tabloid attention forces her to join Ellie at the relative seclusion of the castle across the pond.

While the dashing young Miles has been appointed to teach Daisy the ropes of being regal, the prince’s roguish younger brother kicks up scandal wherever he goes, and tries his best to take Daisy along for the ride. The crown–and the intriguing Miles–might be trying to make Daisy into a lady . . . but Daisy may just rewrite the royal rulebook to suit herself.

Review:

I don’t know why I’m surprised by how much I enjoyed this one. I kind of love all of Rachel Hawkins’ books. I guess maybe I’m that one weirdo that’s not into the whole royal thing. Like I did not get up early and watch the wedding. I did watch “The Crown” on Netflix, but it was a total learning experience for me because I did not have the context and knowhow that people obsessed with this stuff do. I did really love The Princess Diaries books when I was younger, and I guess this book falls more into that category. It’s silly, fluffy, and full of bantering-type entertainment. What’s not to love?

This book reminded me a lot of the movie, “What a Girl Wants,” with Amanda Bynes. But instead of it being about an ignorant. MIA father, it’s about a girl whose sister is having a royal wedding. It has all the comedic timing of the Bynes movie, and all the romcom moments too. I loved Daisy. Though, it took me a surprisingly long time to understand that Dais, was short for Daisy….I was literally like what’s a dais?

I loved her best friend. I loved all the drama with the “royal wreckers.” I loved the love interest and shipped them from the beginning. I loved the family of the sisters. Every time the dad spoke, I could kind of hear John Goodman from Coyote Ugly playing the good dad card. Sorry for all the 90’s references in this review. To be fair, I’m writing this in the morning without my caffeine yet….so bear with me.

The only character that felt super under-developed to me was the sister. There was a ton of sibling rivalry/angst, but I never really felt anything for the sister and I kind of wanted to understand her more. They had this important sisterly moment together and I was kind of confused. I didn’t get their connection because this whole book followed Daisy’s loathing of her…

I also kind of wish it was longer. I kind of wanted to be there at the wedding. I felt a little gypped only getting the pre-wedding things. And this is coming from a girl not obsessed with royal weddings. I can imagine those reading this book who are obsessed with weddings feeling much worse about it. Maybe there will be a sequel?

All in all, this was a fun, quick, fluffy read. I read it very quickly. I loved the setting, the characters (minus the under-developed sister), and the idea of it. It gave me some serious 90’s nostalgia, and definitely left me with a big smile. I hope there is at least one more book to follow because I want to see the wedding. I give this an 8/10.