Key Details
- Voice: Tim Paige holds the single narrator credit, carrying a book the reviews describe as rotating through several points of view.
- Big ideas: Enemies unifying, a reluctant heir taking power, fated mates, betrayal from inside an alliance.
- Atmosphere: Escalating, high-stakes, ending on a drop.
- Worth it?: A strong third volume for readers already inside Kingdom of Lies, and close to impassable for anyone else.
A typo in one of the five reviews on this page is the best joke anywhere near this audiobook. CE, awarding five stars, writes that the characters jump off the Paige and rip out your hart. The reader credited on the listing is Tim Paige. Nothing links those two facts except a slip of the fingers and a coincidence, and yet that sentence is the only place in the entire column where the narrator's name lands anywhere near the act of listening. Thirteen hours and fifty minutes, one voice, and a book every reviewer describes as running on several perspectives at once.
What We Made of It
Stacia Stark's third Kingdom of Lies novel opens in the middle of a disaster and makes no concession whatsoever to anyone arriving new. The description is written entirely in first person, by a narrator it never names, who is surrounded by enemies, further from a crown than ever, and closer to death. Lorian is elsewhere and furious. Regner's spiders are closing in. A betrayal nobody anticipated has already happened before the first sentence. The reviewers supply the name the copy withholds, which is Prisca, and without them a buyer would not have it. Alliances are being forged and broken, in the description's own phrasing, a sentence that means everything to a returning reader and nothing whatever to anyone else.
Tim Paige is credited alone for the full thirteen hours and fifty minutes, and the review column makes that a more interesting fact than the listing intends. BeaWilson describes a story unfolding through multiple points of view and offering a rich tapestry of perspectives. elsam13 calls the multiple POVs a main highlight and mentions a new couple to root for. Nicole Lewis writes about relationships deepening beyond the two main leads. All of that arrives through a single credited reader, with no second name anywhere on the Dreamscape Media listing.
Prisca is the center of this book by every account except the publisher's. Nina traces a reluctant leader turning into a fierce queen and stepping fully into what the review calls the Hybrid Heir. elsam13 singles out a power described as genuinely unusual for the genre. The synopsis, meanwhile, hands a listener nothing but pronouns and stakes: whatever it takes, stop at nothing, he should be afraid of me. Copy written from inside a character is a legitimate choice, and it serves returning readers and absolutely nobody else. No spice level is indicated anywhere either, which on a romance listing tagged Fantasy is an omission a buyer will notice.
Betrayal, shifting alliances, and an enemy assembling god-like power are what the description promises, and the reviews confirm the scale has gone up. The King of Eprotha, as elsam13 names him, is running a scheme that spans centuries, and the four kingdoms hold humans, fae, and hybrids with the whole population in the balance. Nicole Lewis reports stakes higher than ever and an enemy permanently on the horizon. That is a third volume doing precisely what a third volume should: widening the board before the endgame.
Thirteen hours and fifty minutes is a comfortable middle length for this genre, long enough to hold several threads and short enough to finish inside a week of ordinary listening. The romance is not the only engine, which matters for pacing. CE describes threads being pulled in every direction and side characters stepping further into the spotlight, while Nicole Lewis credits the growing connections across the wider cast with much of the richness. A book with more to do than its central couple carries a long runtime better than one without.
Weak Spots in A Crown This Cold and Heavy
Regner is the problem the series has been building toward, and the description handles him carefully enough to avoid spoiling volume two while telling a newcomer almost nothing. That trade is reasonable for returning listeners and a genuine barrier for everyone else. No summary of the earlier books appears here. No character list. No signal that this is a third volume at all beyond a series field reading Kingdom of Lies and a number, which a browsing buyer can easily fail to notice before paying. By way of further orientation the page supplies a January 2024 release date and nothing more.
Eighteen ratings produced the 4.5 on display, and the written column splits three fives and two fours, with both four-star entries reading as enthusiastic rather than guarded. elsam13's four stars come attached to a declaration of love for the series and a claim that it improves with every book. Nina's four stars sit under a title celebrating a powerful heir and a devoted prince. A column where even the reserve is this affectionate is not a warning to a buyer; it is a readership rating its own series.
Cliffhangers are the thing to plan around. Nina's review title names an unforgettable one. elsam13 writes WHAT AN ENDING in capital letters. Nicole Lewis closes by reporting a move straight into the final book. Three separate readers flag the same structural fact, which is that this volume does not resolve and the sequence carries on past it. Anyone who dislikes being left mid-story should have the next installment ready before starting, because by all three accounts the ending arrives without ceremony.
Best Suited For
Romantasy listeners who want the fantasy half to carry real weight are the target audience: the reviews spend more words on the four kingdoms, the hybrid politics, and a villain's centuries-long scheme than on the couple at the center. The mate framing is present, Lorian is described as bloodthirsty and devoted inside the same sentence, and the emotional payoff arrives through the wider cast as much as through the leads. Anyone who wants the world as much as the romance is well served. Nina's phrasing, a phoenix rising from the ashes, gives the register away: this is a series that means its metaphors literally.
Series newcomers are the group this page fails hardest. The copy assumes two volumes of knowledge, names nobody by way of introduction, and explains nothing, and thirteen hours is a long distance to travel while working out who Madinia is and why the spiders matter. Anyone allergic to cliffhangers should weigh the three separate warnings sitting in the column. Starting here would mean guessing at a betrayal that has already happened, a crown already lost, and a fury already in motion somewhere off the page.
Before You Listen
Do I need the first two Kingdom of Lies books before this audiobook?
Yes, in practice. The description starts mid-crisis, names Lorian and Regner without introducing either, and never says who the first-person narrator is. The reviewers supply that name, Prisca, along with the alliances and the villain's long scheme. Nothing on the page recaps what came before, so the entry cost is two full volumes.
Does one narrator handle the multiple points of view in this audiobook?
The narrator field names Tim Paige and nobody else across thirteen hours and fifty minutes, while three separate reviewers describe a story told through several perspectives, including a new couple introduced in this installment. No second voice, dual-cast note, or additional production credit shows up anywhere, so one reader covers the whole rotation.
Does the story end on a cliffhanger?
Three reviewers say so independently of one another. One review title calls the ending unforgettable, another puts it in capital letters, and a third reports going straight on to the final volume afterward. Nothing resolves here in any lasting sense, so anyone who hates waiting should line up the next book first.
