This review contains spoilers for the book “The Bridge Kingdom.”
“The Bridge Kingdom” by Danielle L. Jensen is the first book from “The Bridge Kingdom” series, which currently consists of five books. The sixth and last entry in the series is estimated to come out in 2026. The books are a series of interconnected duologies. This basically means that all of the books happen in the same world with overlapping characters, but only two of the books follow the same main characters. For example, “The Bridge Kingdom” and “The Traitor Queen” follow the same main characters, but book three has different main characters.
The first two books in the series follow Lara and Aren. Lara is the princess of the kingdom of Maridrina, and she is sent to marry Aren, the king of Ithicana, as a means to create peace between the two countries.
However, Lara is more than just a princess. She was raised in the desert with 12 of her half-sisters, where they were trained in isolation to become spies in order to tear down Ithicana. That way, all the wealth Ithicana holds would go to their starving kingdom. However, only one of the girls would be able to put their skills to use, and Lara made sure it was her.
While Lara is in Ithicana, things become complicated when the truth begins to unfold along with her feelings for husband. This leaves Lara to make a difficult decision.
Meanwhile, Aren just wants peace and safety for his kingdom, and he will do whatever it takes to keep his citizens and kingdom safe.
This book is extremely underrated for how good it is. It is very well written with tropes that will keep you coming back for more.
To start off, Lara and Aren are true enemies to lovers, which is something you don’t often see. In most cases when a book is marketed to have an enemies to lovers trope, it is more of just rivals to lovers. This is good in its own right, but it’s not the same.
For example, many called the book “Divine Rivals” an enemies to lovers story, but the main reason the characters didn’t get along was because they were trying to land the same job. Once the job was no longer in the picture, they got along for the most part. However, that is not the case with “The Bridge Kingdom.”
The relationship between Aren and Lara goes from utter hatred towards each other to caring about one another despite not wanting to. The way their dynamic evolves throughout the book is so interesting.
Another fantastic part about the book is all the plot twists. The first one happens within the first few chapters. Lara kills her sisters so that the king must send her to marry Aren. Then it is revealed she merely gave them a sedative in order to fake their deaths. This is because the king wasn’t going to let more than one girl leave the desert compound alive.
This created an intriguing beginning to this story, which kept getting more and more interesting as the story progressed. The plot twists later on in the book are even better than the first one.
Overall, if you are looking for an enemies to lovers fantasy book that will keep you coming back for more, “The Bridge Kingdom” is worth the read.
