DNF at page 222
Stacia and Veru are twin princesses, neither of whom want to inherit the throne. They long for freedom and they train with the soldiers, hoping to someday get a military command that will allow them to travel the empire while their sister has to take the throne and make a good political marriage.

When their mother is on her deathbed, the twins send for any healer, priest, or doctor who can cure her, and an old wizard claims to have the power to heal. However, he unleashes a curse that transforms the twins into tigers, and now they must travel to the furthest mountains to find magic that will turn them back into humans again.

Nik is the faithful soldier who guides them into the mountains and finds food for the tigers, but he is hiding dark secrets of his own and a terrible past that he can never outrun.

I ended up DNFing this book for several reasons. I guess I was expecting this book to be just like the first series, Tiger's Curse, and it just wasn't, so I felt disappointed. There were so many flashbacks that the plot dragged very slowly. Flashbacks are not a good story structure. I did not care about the main characters, and I really hated Nik.

Most of the flashbacks have to do with Nik's dark past, and we learn about how he was abused as a child, and he killed his entire family. Parents, young siblings - murdered them all in their beds. It was just really really dark and gruesome, and after the sixth flashback of Nik being abused, I just couldn't take it anymore. I don't know if he is going to get a redemption later on in the series, but the dude is a murderer. That is some serious mental illness there, and I don't know how the author could possibly turn that around in a believable way. I hated his story so much.

The only part I liked was the musician hunter character who meets the tiger princesses, befriends them, and joins their quest. I guess he is like the Kelsey character in this new story, so I liked him. And I'm a musician, so I loved the descriptions of music!

The writing is good, but the plot structure suffered from all those flashbacks slowing it down. Usually, I love this author's writing, but I just couldn't stomach all the dark themes.

Disclaimer: I received a copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for a free and honest review.