How to Catch a Queen

Alyssa Cole opens her Runaway Royals series with How to Catch a Queen, a contemporary romance that takes the arranged-marriage trope into a fictional African kingdom. Shanti has been preparing her whole life to be a queen. The new king Sanyu has not been preparing to be a husband. The marriage contract gives them a probationary period to make it work.

Cole’s heroines are usually politically sharp, and Shanti is no exception. She has actual ideas about how to govern, and watching the king slowly realize his wife is the smartest person in the palace is one of the book’s pleasures.

The romance heat is moderate. The political intrigue gets real space.

For readers who liked her Reluctant Royals series with A Princess in Theory, this is in the same expanded universe. New readers can start here without trouble. Cole has a smart, generous voice that the genre doesn’t always reward.