To Kill a Kingdom

By: Alexandra Christo

Narrated by: Jacob York, Stephanie Willis

Length: 12 hrs

Publisher's summary

Princess Lira is siren royalty and the most lethal of them all. With the hearts of 17 princes in her collection, she is revered across the sea. Until a twist of fate forces her to kill one of her own. To punish her daughter, the Sea Queen transforms Lira into the one thing they loathe most - a human. Robbed of her song, Lira has until the winter solstice to deliver Prince Elian's heart to the Sea Queen and or remain a human forever.

The ocean is the only place Prince Elian calls home, even though he is heir to the most powerful kingdom in the world. Hunting sirens is more than an unsavory hobby - it's his calling. When he rescues a drowning woman in the ocean, she's more than what she appears. She promises to help him find the key to destroying all of sirenkind for good - but can he trust her? And just how many deals will Elian have to barter to eliminate mankind's greatest enemy?

©2018 Alexandra Christo (P)2018 Audible, Inc.

Critic reviews

"Dual narrators heighten the drama of this fantasy... Stephanie Willis delivers Lira's vicious, impassioned narration with theatrical relish, allowing the character's fierce tones to soften as she begins to understand how deeply she's been warped by her mother, the merciless Sea Queen. Jacob York gives rakish swagger to Elian's drive to protect both his kingdom and his beloved ship's crew." (AudioFile Magazine)

From Murderous Siren to Loving Conpanion

The reading in the is by Stephanie is phenomenal, her voice for her characters completely get the story across. What started out as dark, subversive tale of Mermaids and their darker counterparts, Sirens, turned into a pretty good book. Still it was greatly centered around an obvious romantic tale. Now see, romance is nice and the parts where the two enemies slowly find admiration and love in each other is touching; however, it was filled with great side characters, your co-actors, that made this magical tale somewhat contemporary. I don’t really have an aversion for romance, but could we get a YA fantasy book where- the love is lost, the hero or heroine doesn’t find love in the end. Where the world is saved, or evil is abolished and still they are single and on their own, force to battle the dark without that new found love? I mean, a good portion of the kids that I know reading these, well, they shouldn’t be dating anyways - so why have this as a main artery of the heart that is the tale of YA??

Kept my interest!

I liked this book a lot but I like the female narrator much better than the male narrator. As for the story itself, I was hooked!

Wonderful

It’s a wonderful rendering of the Little Mermaid Story. But the performances of both narrators is what is absolutely striking here. The emotion the infuse in the characters is just beautiful. Loved it.

Slow start but picks up...

The story starts off a bit slow, but the middle and end are the best. It’s a mix of the little mermaid and pirates of the Caribbean. The two narrators kind of threw me off. The female narrator starts off very slow and lingering on each word that kind of bothered me at the start but later she really became of the voice of Lira. The male narrator really bothered me when he came to the female characters. He made them sound old and ancient, when they were only 18 to 30/40 years old. It was a contradiction to the descriptions of the characters. Other than that I did enjoy the story.

aawwweessooommeee

amazing awesome book! I thought I would try it out and I couldn't be more happy

Diverse characters in a wickedly fun tale.

Very surprising re-imagining of The Little Mermaid. Our main characters have done terrible things which effects the way they interact with their magical world. There are myths that enrich the settings our MCs travel through. Diverse characters enliven the narrative.

The narrators are perfectly cast. Lira can be silken and alluring as well as sharp edged and dangerous. Elian reminds me a lot of Flynn Ryder with his sarcastic twist to his words. However, when the narrator for Elian would do female voices, it made me cringe. He made them sound like taut old women voices. The narrator for Lira was able to diversify her voice more successfully.

There are laugh out loud moments and heart-rending moments sprinkled between adventures on the high seas and higher mountains. Well developed characters within a dark and wickedly fun tale of mermaids, sirens, pirates, and princes. Enjoyable audible experience!

Interesting world but poorly developed characters

I read the ebook while listening to the audiobook. I will say that the male narrator imitating women characters makes me cringe, but the female narrator did a great job.
For the story, I really enjoyed Lira and Elian's character arc, but I wish the Sea Queen had an arc. She was the main villain in this story but she was flat. Her whole thing was that she was evil and for no reason. I also felt the story was too quick paced, but perhaps I'm too used to trilogies.

Good story

The female reader is amazing she has a great voice and good cadence. The guy sounded like he was trying to he the next clear eye guy. Over all it was a good listen though. The story was interesting and fanciful

This listen has it all

Pirates, sirens, prince's & princesses, magic and a quest. Great story and a great performance. Loved it.

Good narration poor plot

It had some good elements! But overall the characters weren’t compelling. “Sweet smell of licorice” used way too many times.