Rogue Powers

The story is set up in a time when royalty ruled over common men and ‘special powers’ was connected to royal blood only. If a commoner was found to possess some special power, they were arrested and promptly executed. In such a situation, the only thing that a commoner with power could do was to avoid discovery. Anson was such a commoner. When he was drafted to join the kingdom’s army, his mother is naturally scared for her son’s life. Once there, Anson’s power is immediately discovered by Lydia. The defiant princess finds herself drawn towards Anson even she is betrothed to another. And soon enough there’s love in the air. Since Lydia has no intention of marrying Prince Tenen, she and Anson plan to make their escape and leaving the kingdom behind. But the royal family will not let that happen so easily. So what happens? Do they get their happily ever after? Read the book to find out!
Phil Stern has done a real good job with this book. The book is a good mix of fantasy, romance and action. I liked his style of writing which is really inviting. He has set a rich setting with a lot of background history so that as a reader, I felt that I knew the characters and their lives. Another thing that I really liked was the strong characterization – the author has taken care to ‘develop’ not only the protagonists, but also the other characters. The protagonists were easy to like.
However, I found the plot to be a little weak as I could practically predict what was going to happen and thus lacked the surprise factor for me. It would make a good movie though.