A bit long-winded and very slow-burn, but I really like the story. Good world-building, compelling characters. ( )

A Taste of Gold and Iron by Alexandra Rowland left me pleasantly surprised. I was not expecting to enjoy it as much as I did because there isn’t much to it. The plot is simple. A prince, who has zero self-esteem, decides to step up and investigate a mysterious plot. That’s it. That’s the story. There is magic and romance, but it is a basic plot. I enjoyed A Taste of Gold and Iron because of the setting. It is so lush and exotic, and I couldn’t get enough of it. The romance is a bonus. ( )

Kadou is the prince of a nation modeled after the Ottoman Empire, in a timeline set in the late 16th century. His sister, the sultan, has just given birth to Kadou’s niece, to his immense relief. However, turmoil is brewing and Kadou finds himself at the center of it, and as a result falls out of favor with the sultan, a little bit.

“A man could be good, but a prince? A prince could only be good enough. He could, if he tried his utmost, meet expectations. But they were far, far too high for anyone to be able to exceed them.”
The Empire is a fictional one, and even a little bit fantastical, but the magical elements are slight enough that this reads more like historical romance than fantasy. The society is matriarchal and the people of the land are pretty diverse. Gender and sexuality aren’t qualities that determine a person’s value, and mostly goes unaddressed. (For example, there are three genders and this is never explained, rather you figure it out from the third gender pronouns. There is one reference to the third gender in a discussion about who people are attracted to, and a brief comment about how a character’s broken ribs weren’t so bad off because they were being held together by their binder.)

The story is told from two points of view, Kadou the prince's, and that of Evemer, his sworn protector. The story is heavily character driven and very slow build, and focuses a lot on Kadou’s crippling anxiety, the pressures he feels he’s under, and the insidious self doubt and self flagellation he’s plagued by. Evemer, in turn, is very rule oriented, strict, and loyal. He takes his duties very seriously, and is at first as resentful of his new charge as he feels he can allow himself to be.

“Anger was a relief, in a way. It was easier than fear. He was so tired of fear, but he was helpless to resist it or fight it off. It was like heading into battle at sea against a fleet of ghost ships.”
There is a very fun cast of side characters that brings levity to the sometimes pretty serious goings on, and I particularly liked Melek, Tadek and Commander Eozena. I even laughed out loud, several times. The sultan is a bit of frustrating character in how she balances her roles as the ruler of the Empire as well as that of sister to Kadou.

The plot is there to further the (eventual) romance between Kadou and Evemer, and while interesting enough, the plot is not the point of the story. The romance itself is very slowly and meticulously built, taking into consideration the very heavy power imbalance between the characters as well as Kadou's role in society and the restrictions it creates on how much of his life and decisions are actually his own.

I read this book pretty slowly and annotated it along the way, and I feel like I got more out of it than I would have if I’d just read it through without stopping to chew a little on the various decisions of the different characters. All in all, I really ended up enjoying this, even if I’m not usually a huge fan of historical romance, particularly when the language is at times rather formal. ( )

Kadou is a prince with an undiagnosed, untreated anxiety disorder (and a magical talent, like a number of others in his country, for assessing the purity of metal). Evemer is his new bodyguard, assigned after an interaction with his sister the sultan’s lover went terribly wrong. He initially misunderstands Kadou’s anxiety as cowardice, but soon learns better. They fight crime! And fall in love. AO3 tags include: hurt/comfort, there was only one bed, mutual pining, and forced to marry (through circumstances that make it imperative that they not consummate their attraction). ( )

I really hoped I would enjoy this more…
It always annoys me when fantasy worlds still have misogyny, homophobia or racism or all three, so I loved that this universe did not have any.
Unfortunately the rest fell a bit flat. I can’t think of anything wrong with this book, but I didn’t love it either ( )