3.5 stars
StoryGraph Easy Read Challenge: A book with flowers, plants or leaves on the cover
Buzzword Title Challenge 25: Animals (Birds are animals, right?)
Nowhere Book Bingo 2025: A YA book
CBR17 Bingo: TBR (I bought this back in 2009, it’s been on my TBR for 16 years)
Anidora-Kiladra, the Crown Princess of Kildenree is taught the language of animals by her aunt while she is still a girl, but she has to hide this from people around her. Unfortunately, she’s unconventional enough that as she gets older, her younger brother proves to be a more suitable royal heir and her mother the Queen announces that she’s being sent to the neighbouring kingdom of Bayern to be married off to their Crown Prince. Ani, having been brought up believing she would be Queen of Kildenree at some point, doesn’t really have any other choice but to obey her mother.
She is sent with a large retinue, including her beautiful and dangerously ambitious attendant Selia. About halfway through the journey, Selia has charmed enough of the guards to enact a coup, and Ani is shocked and devastated to see many loyal soldiers slaughtered around her. She manages to escape into the woods and finds refuge on a secluded farm in Bayern, where her wounds are treated and she’s nursed back to health. She discovers that Selia has assumed her identity and is pretending to be the real princess. Once Ani is healthy enough, she makes her way to the capital and gets a job as a goose herder in the king’s stables. She hopes to be able to make enough money to eventually make it home to her mother, to warn her of the dastardly deeds of Celia and the rogue guards.
Thanks to her secret skills, Ani is able to charm the geese enough that they will listen to her. She works hard and makes several friends among the other labourers, tending the king’s livestock. She befriends the handsome and charming Geric and is, in general, quite happy to have avoided having to marry the prince, whom she’s seen from a distance. He appears to be about thirteen, much younger than her. But then Ani discovers that Celia isn’t just content to lie herself into a royal marriage; she is also trying to get the king of Bayern to declare war on Kildenree. Ani has to enlist the help of her friends to get to the king before the wedding is finalised.
Full review here