REVIEW: red, white & royal blue, by casey mcquiston

Red, White & Royal Blue, by Casey McQuiston

Published by St. Martin’s Griffin, on May 14th, 2019

Genres: New Adult, Romance, Contemporary

Goodreads

★★★★★

A big-hearted romantic comedy in which First Son Alex falls in love with Prince Henry of Wales after an incident of international proportions forces them to pretend to be best friends…

First Son Alex Claremont-Diaz is the closest thing to a prince this side of the Atlantic. With his intrepid sister and the Veep’s genius granddaughter, they’re the White House Trio, a beautiful millennial marketing strategy for his mother, President Ellen Claremont. International socialite duties do have downsides—namely, when photos of a confrontation with his longtime nemesis Prince Henry at a royal wedding leak to the tabloids and threaten American/British relations.

The plan for damage control: staging a fake friendship between the First Son and the Prince. Alex is busy enough handling his mother’s bloodthirsty opponents and his own political ambitions without an uptight royal slowing him down. But beneath Henry’s Prince Charming veneer, there’s a soft-hearted eccentric with a dry sense of humor and more than one ghost haunting him. 

As President Claremont kicks off her reelection bid, Alex finds himself hurtling into a secret relationship with Henry that could derail the campaign and upend two nations. And Henry throws everything into question for Alex, an impulsive, charming guy who thought he knew everything: What is worth the sacrifice? How do you do all the good you can do? And, most importantly, how will history remember you?

 

 

starting RED, WHITE & ROYAL BLUE was probably the best and worst decision i have ever made. the worst? because i read this during finals week. the best? because i absolutely adored this book. i can easily say it was one of my favorite reads of 2019 (not that i read a lot of books this year, but let’s not talk about that).

 

it really has everything i love in a contemporary: the romance, the ennemies-to-friends-to-lovers trope and the laugh-out-loud scenes. i found myself fully immersed in this story from the first page, building connections with the characters as they win, lose and fall in love. they all go through wonderfully built character developments, and we see them grow, learn and build beautiful friendships.

 

and between those friendships blooms a cute heart-warming romance, in which the chemistery was just on point. the exchanges between alex and henry, whether it was through emails or in real life, were very funny and heartfelt, which is why the book is very, very, very fun to read. (really, i had a delightful time reading it.) not only that, but the fun of it was wrapping the discussion of important and up-to-date issues, which is probably the thing i admired the most about this book.

 

“How dare Henry come into Alex’s house looking like the goddamn James Bond offspring that he is[…]”

 

but yeah, it was so fun that i couldn’t even put it down (oops). not only because of what i said before, but also because the writing was very easy to follow and simple to understand. i was never lost while reading it, and at a certain point, i didn’t even feel like i was reading anymore. the words felt more like images and scenes than actual words and paragraphs, especially towards the end.

 

 

overall, RED, WHITE & ROYAL BLUE was a light, cute, funny and just the perfect summer read. i really felt soooo happy after reading it and i wanted to hug the characters so much! (i can’t, sadly.)

 

 

have you read RED, WHITE & ROYAL BLUE? if yes, what were your thoughts? if not, are you planning on reading it? (READ IT.)