Friday 23 June 2023

The Prince & The Apocalypse by Kara McDowell (one slight spoiler in review)


Wren Wheeler has flown five thousand miles across the ocean to discover she’s the worst kind of traveler: the kind who just wants to go home. Her senior-year trip to London was supposed to be life-changing, but by the last day, Wren’s perfectly-planned itinerary is in tatters. There's only one item left to check off: breakfast at The World’s End restaurant. The one thing she can still get right.

The restaurant is closed for renovations—of course—but there's a boy there, too. A very cute boy with a posh British accent who looks remarkably like the errant Prince Theo, on the run from the palace and his controlling mother. When Wren helps him escape a pack of tourists, the Prince scribbles down his number and offers her one favor in return. She doesn’t plan to take him up on it—until she gets to the airport and sees cancelled flights and chaos. A comet is approaching Earth, and the world is ending in eight days. Suddenly, that favor could be her only chance to get home to her family before the end of the world.

Wren strikes a bargain with the runaway prince: if she’ll be his bodyguard from London to his family’s compound in Santorini, he can charter her a private jet home in time to say goodbye. Traveling through Europe by boat, train, and accidentally stolen automobile, Wren finds herself drawn to the dryly sarcastic, surprisingly vulnerable Theo. But the Prince has his own agenda, one that could derail both their plans. When life as they know it will be over in days, is it possible to find a happy ending?

It's a new mini trend ... 'apocalypse by comet'. It's one I quite like, because there's basically nothing that the common person can do about it; it's not a zombie apocalypse that they can fight off or a plague they can try and avoid, it's going to get them no matter what, probably.

However, the comet has very little to do with this story; it's the inciting incident, but it's certainly the calmest version of this apocalypse I've read. That's not a complaint! It's nice to read something other than 'everyone's looting and raping everyone else' which is what a lot of these turn into. The people our characters meet here seem more interested in partying (genteelly) than looting.

Spoiler below: THAT ENDING?!?! PLEASE tell me there's another book in the series coming! How can it stop there?

This would be a great Hallmark or maybe Disney Channel movie. It's got everything, the meet cute, the terrible problem, the opposites attract, a road trip, 'there's only one bed'...this was made to be filmed!

I really enjoyed this cute, fun apocalypse and, if there isn't any more in this series, I can at least look forward to reading more by Kara in the future.



The Prince & The Apocalypse publishes on the 11th July, 2023. I received a free copy and am giving an honest review.

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