Also because one of them his human and the other is Kai there’s a bit of fish out of water as Ildiko goes to live with her Kai husband and his people. Radiance is, at its core, maybe more on the romance side of things as the main plot centers around the new couple getting to know one another after an arranged political marriage. Honestly, it’s one of the best blends of the two genres that I’ve come across. If you’re looking for a place to start with Grace Draven, I usually recommend this one as a good entry into her work because it has some really great things going for it. Radiance is one of my all time favorite fantasy romance novels.

Since I recently re-read it (yay mood reading) I thought I’d go ahead and officially review it. As such I’ve never written a full review for it. I first read Radiance a few years ago (three?) right before I started blogging. Two people brought together by the trappings of duty and politics will discover they are destined for each other, even as the powers of a hostile kingdom scheme to tear them apart. Bound to her new husband, Ildiko will leave behind all she’s known to embrace a man shrouded in darkness but with a soul forged by light.

Resigned to her fate, she is horrified to learn that her intended groom isn’t just a foreign aristocrat but the younger prince of a people neither familiar nor human. Ildiko, niece of the Gauri king, has always known her only worth to the royal family lay in a strategic marriage. Always a dutiful son, Brishen agrees to the marriage and discovers his bride is as ugly as he expected and more beautiful than he could have imagined. A trade and political alliance between the human kingdom of Gaur and the Kai kingdom of Bast-Haradis requires that he marry a Gauri woman to seal the treaty. Brishen Khaskem, prince of the Kai, has lived content as the nonessential spare heir to a throne secured many times over.

Radiance draven