THE HEIR by Kiera Cass

Princess Eadlyn has grown up hearing endless stories about how her mother and father met. Twenty years ago, America Singer entered the Selection and won the heart of Prince Maxon—and they lived happily ever after. Eadlyn has always found their fairy-tale story romantic, but she has no interest in trying to repeat it. If it were up to her, she'd put off marriage for as long as possible.

But a princess's life is never entirely her own, and Eadlyn can't escape her very own Selection—no matter how fervently she protests.

Eadlyn doesn't expect her story to end in romance. But as the competition begins, one entry may just capture Eadlyn's heart, showing her all the possibilities that lie in front of her . . . and proving that finding her own happily ever after isn't as impossible as she's always thought.

The very first thing that comes to my mind when somebody mentions The Heir is how bratty Eadlyn is. She’s entitled, self centered, and pretentious. Basically, the opposite of what I was expecting when I thought about what sweet Maxon and America’s baby would be like (their other children, however, were a lot closer to what I imagined). But Eadlyn was always complaining about how she has to be the queen in the future and not her brothers, and that she has it the worst. She also likes to constantly remind us that she is the most powerful person in the country. But I guess after you get over her character, there are some things to like about this book...

Something that I liked more about this book than the rest of The Selection series - it wasn’t incredibly predictable. There were parts in the first books where Cass would try to throw me off, but the whole time I knew what was going to happen. In this book, I didn’t have a clue for even a minute. I still don’t know. And while I like it more when it isn’t predictable, I think that it springs from a lack of romance (This book is mostly a build up for the next, I believe) there were hinting clues to a romance, but Eadlyn is dead set on not falling in love. I love an independant woman, but she needs to let people help her - she was always contradicting herself. She has too much on her shoulders and she can’t handle all the pressure on her own, but she doesn’t want to have help because ‘she can do it herself.’

I only give this book for 3.5 stars, but only because I wasn’t all that entertained by it. However I do recognize that this is mostly a build up for the second book, so I’m not discouraging anybody from reading it. I do have higher hopes for the next book in the series. I understand that it isn’t that fun going through books that are just a build up for a later installment, but I encourage all to read it for that sole purpose.