Six Wild Crowns

• Author: Holly Race
• Genre: Fantasy
• Publication Date: June 10, 2025 
• Publisher: Orbit
• Series: Queens of Elben #1

Thank you to Orbit and Oliver Wehner for sending me a copy of this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

The king has been appointed by god to marry six queens. Those six queens are all that stand between the kingdom of Elben and ruin. Or so we have been told.

Each queen vies for attention. Clever, ambitious Boleyn is determined to be Henry’s favourite. And if she must incite a war to win Henry over? So be it.

Seymour acts as spy and assassin in a court teeming with dragons, backstabbing courtiers and strange magic. But when she and Boleyn become the unlikeliest of things – allies – the balance of power begins to shift. Together they will discover an ancient, rotting magic at Elben’s heart. A magic that their king will do anything to protect.

A captivating epic fantasy filled with dragons, court politics and sapphic yearning, perfect for fans of The Priory of the Orange Tree and House of the Dragon.

This book sounded like such a good read. Historical fiction centered around the wives of Henry VIII with fantasy thrown in, plus sapphic yearning and dragons? It sounded as though it was written for me. However, it felt like the author’s idea didn’t quite work as well in practice as it did in theory.

To start with, I’ll admit that I don’t know a whole lot about Henry VIII other than the fact that he changed the entire church structure so that he could divorce women. So I went into this read with an open mind and a hope that I might learn something new. But this one was a tough read, and while there were some good things, there were more things that I didn’t love.

When reading a fantasy novel, one of the first things I typically notice is the world building. For books with a basis in historical fiction, the world building is usually already done, but I really struggled with it in this book. Instead of setting the story in a real place where the basic events occurred (16th century England, for example), the story takes place in the kingdom of Elben, and the world building fell short. After reading the entire book, I still couldn’t tell you a single thing about the kingdom itself—the writing doesn’t describe it at all, and it honestly felt like it was just leaning on the idea of England.

The issue with this book is that it literally had nothing to do with the actual historical events aside from the names. When it comes to the names, I noticed early on in the story that the women are only referred to as their last names—Aragon, Cleves, Boleyn, etc. It was intentional because the only women who were able to claim a name of their own were those who were widowed. I understand that it spoke to the patriarchal family and social structures of the times to the extent that women were not quite but close to property, with little rights of their own. However, it also made it hard for me to connect with the characters, none of whom truly felt three-dimensional to me until close to the end of the book. I watched all of The Handmaid’s Tale and the women who were named as property of the commanders (Offred, Ofjoseph) still referred to themselves as their real name when talking with other handmaids or thinking of themselves, while these women still only refer to themselves with the name of their father/husband/other responsible male. 

Using simply the names and a rough idea (Henry and his multiple wives), the author then proceeds to strip away nearly every single aspect of the original story and overlay it with a fantasy plot involving magic between the king and the multiple wives he must have. There were plot holes throughout, and I found it tedious that the author chose to  have the queens be at odds with each other and constantly be at odds for his attention, rather than taking their jealousy and frustration out on the man responsible for pitting them against each other. The ‘catty woman’ trope is one that got played out for me a long time ago, for the most part. It was clear from early on that having the queens work together would be needed, if only they could get out of their own way and work out a schedule with Henry that was acceptable to all of them. 

Court politics do come into play throughout the story, but the author chose to remove the religious aspects behind the whole situation with the Henry VIII and his multiple sequential wives, yet doesn’t replace them with anything other than a vague need for the king to have multiple wives at the same time, and it isn’t explained until much later on in the book. In fact, it wasn’t until halfway through the book that I even felt like I had any idea of what was happening. By then, I realized that it wasn’t the kind of story I had been expecting from the summary, and I was disappointed. 

You might be wondering how we could possibly go wrong with dragons. Well, the first time that readers encounter a dragon it is being sacrificed, and I was shocked. And the author’s world changes dragons from fearsome dangerous beasts to tame ‘lap dragons’ and ‘hunting dragons.’ I was appalled at the way dragons seemed to be treated much like toy dog breeds have been by royal families—cute, but don’t serve much of a purpose. 

I read this as an audiobook narrated by Olivia Dowd, and she did okay with a story I was not loving. There are a lot of info dumps throughout the book, and I found myself having to reread certain chapters to understand what was happening. Additionally, it took me an embarrassingly long time to realize that Dowd wasn’t saying ‘Berlin,’ it was just the pronunciation of Boleyn with a strong British accent. Even after realizing that, I couldn’t hear it as anything other than ‘Berlin.’

Overall, it’s clear that this book wasn’t a great fit for me, but I did find myself getting more invested towards the end of the book. While the story did actually catch my attention, it wasn’t until the end. Unfortunately, it didn’t quite make up for all the other issues that I had—the lack of world building, the flat characters, trying to shoehorn what could be a good story into an attempt at historical fiction that is heavy on the fiction, light on the history. Additionally, the names in some cases reminded me of something that came from a poorly designed D&D name generator — Mathmas, Alpaca, Thawodest, the Sea of Hreónessa, and my personal favorite, Cnorgleo. There is a map in the beginning of the book, but didn’t any of the people who gave input love the author enough to tell her to find names that are pronounceable and actually roll off the tongue. There was a lot of potential in the story, and the author does write beautifully, but I hope she finds her footing with her next book. Also, the issues that I had with the book might be the very thing about the story that you enjoy. So take my review with a grain of salt, and give this one an open-minded read if you’re so inclined. The cliffhanger ending was fantastic, but the series isn’t one that will be a good fit for me, so I’m going to have to leave it unfinished. 

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