Smut me up, Scotty | Kingdom of the Feared by Kerri Maniscalco

 

The final book in the Kingdom of trilogy by Kerri Maniscalco, Kingdom of the Feared, sees the end for two of my favourite fictional characters, Wrath and Emilia. From the first line of the first book, to the last line of the last book, I was captivated by a tale of witches, demons, love, loss, and revenge. It's bittersweet to write this, as I feel as though I am finally turning away from a world I've been in love with since the first page. 

Kingdom of the Feared marks an end to Emilia's suffering and search for answers. She finally learns who she truly is, and her relationship with Wrath reaches its pinnacle. 

The characterisation of Emilia through this final instalment really stuck to the detailed and intricate character-arc the readers have followed during the past two books. In this segment of her journey, her liberation from within releases a whole new view of the character, and allows Emilia to become fully independent—she stands on her own two legs without the support of Wrath, or her side kicks Fauna and Anir. Emilia makes her own decisions, damn the consequences, and uses her own intuition, conscience, and magic for guidance through a rather confusing time. We had seen hints of these qualities prior to this book, of course, but Maniscalco ramps up the intensity in which we see them within Kingdom of the Feared. 

In terms of the plot, I really enjoyed it. Full of twists and turns, Kingdom of the Feared picks up right where we left the characters in Kingdom of the Cursed, and immediately we are plunged back into the depths of hell, except this time, with a whole lot more spice than I anticipated. While I did have fun embarking on the adventure alongside Wrath and Emilia, I did often find myself feeling slightly confused at the whole ordeal of Vittoria's storyline. 

Of course, I may just be extremely dumb and slow, (I do often liken myself to being the human equivalent of a broken 2005 Dell laptop which lags just a little bit too much for my liking), but at times I felt as though there was almost too much trying to be solved and spoken about within this book. The race to prove Vittoria's innocence left me bewildered in places, and I struggled to keep up with the pace of everything. Information was thrown about at a hundred miles an hour sometimes, and the overall end seemed quite lacklustre and rushed, if I'm honest. I struggled to pinpoint the exact moment we found out about Vittoria's innocence, and Emilia's own part in her twin's plan came across as pressured, thus leading the gravity of the situation to feel as though it had been thrown away.

Wrath and Emilia's romantic side story did melt my heart a tiny bit, but on the other hand, I did feel as though there was almost too much smut running alongside the main plot. Don't get me wrong, smut me up Scotty, and all that, (and if you don't like my mildly misplaced and mistyped puns & references, then I can only apologise), but sometimes it felt as though all Wrath and Emilia were doing was having sex. And if they weren't, they were trying to. While I don't have any major problems with this, the sex scenes almost felt jumbled and often placed haphazardly throughout the book. 

However, despite my minor qualms, I did still really enjoy this book and how everything seemed to dovetail very nicely at the end. 

I'm sad this is the end, but I'm glad we got the answers we had been searching for since the beginning. I can't wait to one day reread this series, but for now I shall have to be content with knowing Wrath and Emilia have the happy ending they needed and deserved.