Books Under the Blanket (with a flashlight)

I have been playing The Sims for 26 years (The Power Trip of Playing God). Along with books and Survivor (which I have been watching for 26 years 🤷🏻‍♀️), The Sims ranks as one of my primary obsessions. I have played every iteration of the game, which is currently on The Sims 4, released in 2014. When I first started playing, you had to purchase the CDs to install. I didn’t buy all of the expansion packs for the previous versions of The Sims, but I certainly had quite the collection.

Since The Sims 4…let’s just say that—when I recently bought a new laptop and had to reinstall everything—I had to download the base game plus 124 items. 😮 I own every piece of this game, and I’m not complaining. 🤭

“Royalty & Legacy,” the most recent expansion pack and rumored to be the last, released in February 2026. As a fan of the stand-alone game The Sims Medieval, I was excited for this new pack for the base game. And I immediately decided I needed a family to live in the new royal neighborhood of Ondarion.

“The regal Kingdom of Ondarion takes its name from the emerald sea that unites its three great shores. It is upon these same coastlines that three distinct cultures, connected by one sea, live together and exchange traditions. Together they have forged a grand legacy of Nobility and aristocratic Dynasties, which has lasted for countless generations. To this day the Nobles of Ondarion duel each other through political plays and battles of succession, in the race to the ultimate goal: the Kingdom’s Royal Crown.”

While the family didn’t start out royal, they did earn an enormous amount of wealth in their original neighborhood. One is a fairy at the top of the Park Ranger career. The other is a spellcaster and star athlete who also owns a gym. The fact that I had one of them buy a money tree and then harvest it over and over until they had about a dozen money trees probably helped. 😁 I built them a regal house in the Kingdom of Ondarion…because why not?…and moved them in among the royals.

In order for your characters to level up in The Sims, they have to practice their skills. Spellcasters have to practice magic. Fairies have to do fairy tasks. But practicing those skills also comes at a cost, and the fairies do a lot of fairy tasks just over the course of each day. Almost immediately, my fairy character started being plagued by scandals, which she can either deny or apologize for, and her mood changes based on how the other residents respond to her denial or apology. You can also have a character buy secrets about another character and use that information against them. 🤫

So does my obsession with The Sims ever cross over into my obsession with books? Oddly enough, no, because I actually don’t read fantasy or romantasy. Does this strike me as a bit ironic considering my obsession with The Sims and everything I described here? Maybe a little. I never said that my obsessions make sense.

But occasionally, I will come across a book that reminds me of something in The Sims. In the book reviewed below, a commoner marries a Crown Prince, and she talks about scandals.

“…The source of my embarrassment is part of the reason King Franklin hates me. My common, soiled past. It’s not as if I can help where I was born or what my parents did. And it’s not like the royals are without scandals themselves…they’re just royal scandals, which makes them more acceptable.”

Now excuse me while I go play some more of The Sims before starting my next book. I have some secrets to buy and scandals to deny. 😉

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Book Review

⭐⭐⭐⭐
4 Stars for Queen of Hearts by Kathryn R. Biel

244 pages
Publisher: Kathryn R. Biel
Publication Date: January 23, 2018
Purchased directly from the author.

Publisher’s Description

And then they lived happily ever after…right?

Not necessarily in my case. I thought marrying Crown Prince Stephan was the happy ending to my fairy tale. Little did I know that after the ‘I do’s,’ there’d still be dragons to slay.

Namely, my curmudgeon of a father-in-law, otherwise known as the King of Montabago. He’s so old-fashioned and cranky, and no matter what I do, he doesn’t seem to accept me into the Royal Family.

I think marrying a prince was a mistake.

Montabago is on the brink of change, as am I. If I’m going to get my storybook ending, we’re all going to need a New Beginning.

************

Main Characters:

• Maryn Medrovovich – 31 years old, previously a commoner made a Duchess so she could marry Stephan after they met while she worked at university, newly married and finding it difficult to adjust to the restrictions of royal life
• Stephan Salzach – Crown Prince of Montabago, met Maryn while he studied at university, does not stand up to his father the King
• George Panagogus – lived across the street from Maryn, her first love, his mother took off with Maryn’s father when they were 16, Maryn told him she wanted nothing to do with him after that and they haven’t spoken since
• King Franklin – the monarch of Montabago, currently campaigning for an upcoming election where it will be decided whether the monarchy will stay in power or become a figurehead, not fond of Maryn or Stephan’s decision to marry her, widowed a number of years ago when the Queen died from cancer

The third and final book in Kathryn R. Biel’s New Beginnings series, Queen of Hearts delves into the story of Maryn Medrovovich, a lower middle class commoner who marries a prince. Cinderella, anyone?

Readers meet Maryn briefly in Made for Me, the first book in the series, where she finds herself thrust into the spotlight by a reality television show where designers compete to design her wardrobe and, ultimately, her wedding gown. She is quiet and proper, and the point of the show is really to update her look to be appropriate for a royal…and maybe to garner some good will with the public. We get a little bit of her developing friendship with the designer Michele in that book, but this book really shows her personality, which is not quiet and proper at all. 😉

Four months after her wedding, when she has been cooped up in the castle and not allowed to make public appearances without her husband, Maryn wonders if she made the right decision pursuing her fairy tale prince. Don’t get me wrong, she loves her husband. But she doesn’t love how much he puts his father’s opinions over Maryn’s, and there is definitely no love lost between Maryn and the king. When a scandal hits six weeks before the election and Maryn realizes that her father-in-law is only focused on her providing an heir, she makes a rash decision that could change everything.

I spent quite a bit of this book wondering whether Maryn would choose her husband Stephan or her first love George. In most cases, you know which way a romance is going to take you. So I’m actually not going to tell you whether this was a case of her choosing the castle or a second chance with her first love. You will just have to read the book to find out.

True to Biel’s style, this is a fun, quick read with great characters you want to love. This particular story also has wonderful references to The Princess Bride’s Inigo Montoya and Buttercup as well as “Princess School” a la The Princess Diaries—two of my favorite movies. Maryn definitely gives off Amelia Mignonette Thermopolis Renaldi vibes (Anne Hathaway’s character in The Princess Diaries), and that’s one of the reasons I love her character. I mean, who doesn’t love a transformation story?

Stephan turns to me. “It’s all right, darling. Daniel has been appointed as a public relations specialist.”
“By whom? How is he qualified?”
….
“Not only has it been my job for the past several years, but I have an in with the king’s most trusted advisor.”
“Baron von Windbag? He listens to something else besides his own pontification?”
Stephan’s face turns bright red at my remark. Daniel offers up an amused smile. “Well, I would hope so, considering the—what did you call him?—windbag—is my father.”

From the absolute opulence to the massive desk. I don’t even know what it’s made of. Mahogany probably? Or maybe something mined from a Tibetan quarry and flown on the backs of endangered condors under the second full moon of the third month, or something ridiculous like that. Behind it, in an enormous leather wingback chair, sits my beloved father-in-law. He dismisses Thing One and Thing Two with a curt nod.
Poop.
This is not going to be good.

I really enjoyed this entire series. Each book is a stand-alone, but obviously, you should read them all. 💖

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