What an amazing book! I read it in one sitting, staying up till near 3am on a work night as it was just too gripping, the action in the last few scenes was just too tense to pull away. I was in tears by the end, it was all so well written and heartfelt .

Natasha Pulley is one of my favourite authors, I don't even need to know what the book is about but knowing it's written by her means you're in for an immersive, mind bending experience. The characters in The Kingdoms all feel very real and fleshed out, even more so than in 'The Watchmaker of Filigree Street' which is one of my favourite of all time books.

I've already preordered a physical copy to reread. It was a little tricky at some points to remember which timeline we were in, which would be solved by flicking back to a chapter heading, but not so easy on a Kindle for someone who isn't used to ereaders. I cant wait to read it again to catch all the little details I missed first time round!

Huge thank yous to Bloomsbury Publishing and NetGalley for the e-arc of The Kingdoms by Natasha Pulley in exchange for my honest and unbiased review.

What would Britain be like if France had won the Napoleonic Wars? I totally admire any author who rewrites history! The joining of time lines across 2 dimensions, joining all those dots - a totally immense task that bring out the wibbly, wobbly timeline admirer in me.

Joe, a slave with a skill for engineering who suffers from paramnesia, a mysterious lighthouse, and time travel, all feed into an interesting, albeit convoluted story.

I did find the story somewhat overly complicated and slow at the midpoint, but overall fell for the key characters and invested in their ultimate outcome.

However, I would only recommend to those with a pre-existing admiration for Pulley’s work or those with a key interest in historic fantasy or time travel.

The Kingdoms is a fun and exciting history-based time travel adventure slash romance, taking place in Great Britain around the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. While it is much more heavy on the reflective, atmospheric and emotional side than the adventure one, though there is plenty of seafaring gore and is very gay. While I enjoyed The kingdoms on the whole, I did find it frustrating that once we got the first flashback and understood the MC's pervious life and what was going on around them it did feel quite slow at times and as though we were waiting for the penny to drop for the characters and realise all that was happening. Overall very enjoyable and I will be picking up some of the author's other books.

Thank you for this ARC in exchange for a fair and honest review.

I enjoyed the concept of the book, what would happen has Britain lost the Napoleonic war? It was detailed, and immersive but it got to a point where I struggled to follow what was happening.

I love Natasha Pulley's novels and I thought this one was a brilliant read. The time slip / time travel theme was so cleverly done, and the way she weaves history together with other possible outcomes and alternative lives is absolutely fascinating. The detail about the navy during the Napoleonic wars was so well researched and realistic, though with a steam punk vibe. She writes really sympathetic characters and I really wanted them to have a good ending, even if it was not the one I was expecting.

This was an interesting read read with lots of detail that captured me from the beginning but at over half way through I found my interest waning and I got completely bogged down with the plot. I can’t say I didn’t enjoy the book as I did but I think it was just too long and I felt the plot line got a bit lost at times and also it was in parts quite difficult to follow. Maybe my concentration was just not there I’m not quite sure but overall the book was beautifully written and full of details that you would want in a historical novel.
So a book that in many ways I can’t fault but for me something was missing and I did struggle it just wasn’t what I was expecting although in all fairness how can you ever know quite what to expect when you first pick up a book however it was different and I’m sure that others will enjoy perhaps more than I did.
My thanks to NetGalley and Bloomsbury Publishing for giving me the chance to read the ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

I was very excited to read Natasha Pulley’s latest book as I have loved her other books (The Bedlam Stacks & The Watchmaker of Filigree Street). I enjoyed the first half of the book but unfortunately as the story progressed I found the storyline difficult to follow. The premise of this book intrigued me as a historical fantasy that follows the story of Joe a diagnosed amnesiac man trying to find answers that sends him on a journey through the Napoleon War with the French. Despite the book being beautifully written I struggled to connect to the characters and to capture my attention.

Thanks NetGalley & Bloomsbury Publishing for providing me an ARC copy in exchange for an honest review.

I am delighted with this book. It’s got a haunted lighthouse, a rift in time, and an alternate history following the battle of trafalgar where England is now a colony of the french empire and the King is Napoleon IV in the year 1900. England isn’t exactly in the shape one would wish her to be in. The main train station in Londres is the Gare du Roi, there are steelworks blighting the skyline and St Paul’s is half in ruins, its dangerous to speak English or have written English on your person. Scotland is the last bastion of rebels, of course. Many English men and women are slaves working for French masters. Everything is very weird and wrong, and our main character knows it. But he doesn’t really know what’s wrong, or for that matter, who he is. At the beginning of the book, he has severe amnesia and can’t remember anything at all from before he got to the train station. There’s also a character named Missouri Kite, what a name. Queue a lot of weird time stuff and napoleonic era ships. One thing I did struggle with slightly was the frequent flipping to different moments in time. It was alright when it was 100 years back and forth, but when we were then also flipping from 1807 to 1805 as well and other things, it got a bit confusing. But, I’m not sure what the author could have done to counteract this as it’s fairly essential to the plot. There was a nice resolution to the book.

My thanks to #NetGalley and the publisher, Bloomsbury, for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

What would Britain have been like if it had lost the Napoleonic Wars? "The Kingdoms" considers the possibilities, in a dazzling mixture of historical fiction, time travel and steampunk. A great read!
Read the full review via the link below.

Natasha Pulley's fourth novel, The Kingdoms, retains her signature mix of fascinating nineteenth-century historical detail intertwined with an unsettling speculative mystery, although there's a darkness about this story that I'd say is absent from her other books, except perhaps The Bedlam Stacks. Joe Tournier can't remember anything about himself or his previous life when he arrives at the gare du Roi station in central London - or, as everybody else calls it, Londres - in 1898. It becomes rapidly clear to the reader that we are operating in an alternative version of history where the French won the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, but this doesn't explain Joe's personal mystery. The only clue he has to his true identity is a postcard of an isolated lighthouse in the Outer Hebrides, which he believes was sent to him by a mysterious woman from his past, Madeline. But when Joe decides to travel to the lighthouse to see if he can find out anything more, he is swept into something bigger than he could have possibly imagined.

As she did with clairvoyance in The Watchmaker of Filigree Street and The Lost Future of Pepperharrow, and with supernatural powers in The Bedlam Stacks, Pulley uses time travel in this novel to explore loss, love and memory. I wasn't as invested emotionally in the central romantic relationship in The Kingdoms, but I still loved its clever plot and the haunting fate of the characters that find themselves stranded between one timeline and other. The alternate history elements are also well-handled, although I was a little unsure about the narrative decision to show London as a slave-owning society in the late nineteenth century, seemingly regardless of race. While I imagine this stemmed from Napoleon's reintroduction of slavery to the French colonies in 1802, I felt that it ran the risk of playing into harmful present-day narratives about 'white slavery' and propping up the myth that Britain's decision to abolish the slave trade in 1807 is somehow more important than her continued oppression of enslaved people both before and after the Act. As this element didn't seem essential to the story, I felt it might have been better to remove it. However, that aside, this was another brilliant novel from Pulley, and I can't wait to see what she writes next.

I will post this review to my blog and to Goodreads closer to the publication date.

Back to the future in the Napoleonic Wars! Or back to the days of futures past??🤔 I don’t know I admire any author who decides to play with time, it’s complicated and my brain doesn’t work that way so I just let myself accept whatever they tell me. So yes it’s perfectly acceptable to me that there is a rip in the space time continuum that is either caused or marked by a lighthouse built on the wrong side of it. Sure why not?
Natasha Pulley is one of those authors who has grown on me like mould, with each book I have grown to love her - and the devastatingly heartbreaking men she writes - a little more. The Kingdoms is my favourite so far. Joe is charming and Kite is a psychopath and I love him. I shouldn’t! he’s a psychopath! But dammit I love him none the less. That is the power of the Pulley.
There is however a striking similarity in all her plots and I suspect the heartbreaking men are actually one heartbreaking man given a different name/face/time that I constantly fall for. But actually who cares! They are so good! They all are so beautiful. And they love each other 💗💘 and they gets babies the end.
I do have a gripe, she gives us potentially amazing women and never gives enough of them and then usually they die. What’s that about? She just throws them away. 🤷‍♀️ So yeah. I loved the Kingdoms.
But what happened to tortoise 4????

This was an interesting read. I've really enjoyed Natasha's previous books and while this has a similar vibe, it is quite distinct.
I liked the initial set up with the mystery of the main character's amnesia and the tie into the Eilean Mor lighthouse mystery. My main problem with the book was that the plot could get quite convoluted in places and a little confusing to follow.
I also didn't find the lead characters interesting enough to be that invested in the ending.
All in all, it was an enjoyable read but not one I think I would be running out to reccomend.

Wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey with Napoleonic Wars-era boaty ships (not space-y ships)
I think it's safe to say that Natasha Pulley is one of my favourite authors, a definite auto-buy. Pulley's writing is immediately immersive; precise and flowing, atmospheric and detailed, but without dipping into flowery.
The plot is difficult to explain without risking spoilers. In the late 1800s, a man arrives at a train station in London, or rather Londres (Napoleon won and absorbed most of Britain into his empire), but he suddenly has no idea who he is, the places are familiar but the names seem wrong. He's returned to his "family" his wife and their owner (slavery is alive and well) but receives a post card of a remote Scottish lighthouse that seems vaguely familiar and so, eventually, he manages to engineer a path that allows him to visit only to thrust into a war long lost...
There are multiple timelines at work, not only moving backward and forward to see what characters were up to and different times but also throwing in alternate timelines for added confusion. Personally, I didn't have much trouble following this, with the occasional check back to the date at the start of the chapters, this may not be for everyone but I think it's worth persevering with to find out how everything untangles.
The characters are interesting, complex and manage to be sympathetic, infuriating and both likeable and unlikeable, often within the same page. I liked that we could see the everyday life and personalities on a warship as well as the hard-nosed, cut-throat violence that would have been necessary and normal.
Do I have any criticisms? Without spoilers, I felt the section just before the ending was a bit rushed/convenient but equally, I always enjoy and find more layers in Pulley's work on subsequent readings so I don't consider that a fatal flaw.
A page-turning, historical speculative fiction with a twisty-turn-y mystery - I recommend rereading the first chapter straight after finishing to complete the loop.

I received this book from Bloomsbury via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Pulley on twitter has called this her best work yet and I wholeheartedly agree. What as astounding piece of historical fantasy this was! The book itself takes place during a war and the violence in it is stark at times and the character’s themselves are also a lot more twisted. I actually really enjoyed this change but it’s definitely worth mentioning that this is a lot darker than Watchmaker.

It’s honestly hard to talk about this novel without wandering into spoiler territory so apologies in advance if I sound a bit vague about certain details in this review. There are so many twists and turns in this book that you really need to experience them for yourself.

Like previous Pulley books this one is very intricately and delicately plotted. There are several flashbacks that provide pieces to the overall story, and you get glimpses of the truth here and there. I will admit that there is one aspect of the novel that seems glaringly obvious right from the very beginning. It was a bit frustrating having to spend almost the entire novel waiting for the truth to finally come out but the journey there was an intriguing one and I actually enjoyed watching the characters work it out for themselves. It seems clear-cut to the reader, who has been privy to some of the backstory scenes, but for Joe, our main, oblivious character, it’s very easy to see why he can’t come up with the same conclusion.

At its heart The Kingdoms is another love story with some very deeply flawed characters. We have Joe, who spends most of the novel confused and desperate to return home. Then we have Kite who it would be so easy to hate because of all the despicable things he does. And some of it is definitely awful. His past is fully explored and so we see how it has shaped him into the man he is during the events of the novel, but some of his actions were really hard to read. It should make it hard to root for them but there are flashes of vulnerability beneath his harsh exterior and I found myself warming to him unexpectedly. He’s definitely an anti-hero type of character, but much like Pulley’s character Mori, his motives for the things he does always come back to same thing.

I absolutely adored their relationship, all the turns it took and the many shapes it changed into. It was beautiful and achingly wrong at the same time. It’s definitely one of the most turbulent relationships I’ve ever read. Pulley has a wonderful way of showing you just how strongly the characters feel for one another, even when it’s never explicitly stated. This one doesn’t have the beautiful love declaration that Pepperharrow featured at the end but my gosh the character’s actions more than make up for it.

The last few chapters are more fast-paced than the rest of the novel, and they feature some of the most emotionally wrenching and heartfelt scenes of the entire novel. I stayed up all night to finish it and was in tears by the ending. If a book can move you that much it definitely and rightly deserves a 5 star rating.

For me this was another win by Natasha Pulley and has definitely solidified my trust and faith in her as a writer. Up to this point I have loved everything she has ever written and I cannot wait to read whatever she releases next!

Natasha Pulley’s ‘The Kingdoms’ has definitely joined my favourite fantasy books. It’s so atmospheric, engaging and heartbreaking, and I loved every bit of it.

In some ways, ‘The Kingdoms’ is a retelling of several big conflicts and battles, but predominantly is a story of remembering, forgetting and also grieving. We meet Joe in the 19th century England occupied by the French, when he arrives at the station in London, with no recollection of who exactly he is. But he has flashes of life that doesn’t seem possible. I enjoyed the split narrative between the 19th and 18th century and getting to know both Joe and Kite in two timelines, their lives entangled, Joe’s life changing, not just once. In ‘The Kingdoms’, the future is a fragile thing.

‘The Kingdoms’ is, despite being set against the backdrop of war (in parts), it’s a quite slow read, especially initially. But it’s atmospheric and absolutely engaging from the start. Natasha Pulley’s vivid and rich descriptions are definitely something I enjoyed. I also liked how some of the characters, and especially Kite, are not necessarily good and honest people at all times, their actions often reprehensible. And yet, they are interesting, raw and real. I really enjoyed the diverse cast of Natasha Pulley’s novel, and it’s definitely an author I’ll be reading more from in the future.

While some aspects from the plot, the reader can figure out much earlier than the protagonist himself, we are still waiting for the answer on how those events come to pass, and the journey is both emotional and, in later chapters, fast-paced.

I’m certain I will be getting a physical copy as soon as it’s out, and that re-read will happen in the future!

The review will be posted on Goodreads, Amazon and blog closer to the publication date.

Intricate. Involved. Confusing. Sad and happy almost at the same time.
A maze story impossible to know where it will end up
Will definitely read other books by this author who I have not read before.

Saying that this book is made for fans of David Mitchell and The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is a great pitch for me. I love both! And the first 100 pages of this book made me think "yes, this is the type of story I really like". Those are wonderful and the landscape once the story moves up to Scotland is fascinating.

However, once the main character moves to the north and starts going back in time, the plot gets messy. There are different timelines going on, but all very similar even when separated by a century or so. From a prose perspective it is well written but the story itself didnt catch me. Its a shame cos it was promising...

The Kingdoms is a timeslip alternative historical fiction, if that is even a genre! And, for those who hate timeslip, it isn't modern and the past but the past and even further back. Whatever genre, it is fascinating.

Joe finds himself at La Gare du Roi, one of the mainline train stations in Londres but has no recollection of getting there. He thinks there might have been someone else on the train with him, but he can't be sure. All he does know is that nothing makes sense. Eventually, he is collected by his master, M. Saint-Marie, a shabby chic Frenchman who's finest days are behind him, but is genuinely fond of Joe, his slave, and married him off to Alice, another slave who was supposed to marry his brother, Toby, but Toby died in Scotland seeking to put down the English and Scots rebelling against French rule in the UK.

Then a postcard is delivered to him, dated some ninety or so years in the past, but depicting a lighthouse that was only built six months before, and signed 'M' who he thinks might be Madeline, but has no idea why. Drawn to seek employment at machinist who manages the UK's lighthouses for their Parisian masters, Joe travels to Scotland, to Eilean Mor, to repair the lighthouse and discover what happened to the keepers. And to unravel an impossible mystery.

This is a long, complicated story that takes you through the lives of several characters in order to relate the story. It flits in and out of time, back and forth through backstory and and the action, piecing together the story and revealing little at a time until we finally, along with Joe, find out what is going on. There are hints along the way, one massive one that made me stop and re-read towards the end that made sense only as a train journey neared its end.

One will never quite look at time travel the same again, never quite trust what you see, and one's knowledge of the Napoleonic Wars will take on a new light.

A fantastic novel, a growing genre of alternative history treated in a unique, fascinating way. A perfect novel for fans of Hornblower, or with an interest in the ships of the era and sailing. More literature than commercial fiction, you won't regret reading this,

I think what my issue for this novel the ARC is I received from Netgalley was not the easiest to read. It was full of Os and 1s, and formatting was a bit off for at least the first half of the copy. This gave it a clunky style to read that made it harder to read and enjoy I was more than halfway through it before I noticed that the formatting issues where gone so I was glad I stuck with it.

This novel is very unusual. It includes time travel, amnesia, an alternate history that becomes an alternate history, butterfly effect, what happens when you change history, a love story, and a trip to Edinburgh.
Joe suffers from amnesia and comes through on a train from Glasgow with no idea how he got there. A gentleman helps him, but Joe finds himself in an asylum with amnesia caused by epilepsy. But he can’t remember any of this.

This is an alternate history Napoleon has won the Battle of Waterloo, but Joe knows this, and knows how to speak French. So, what has changed in Joe’s life? why is he so confused and so sure that the something is missing in his life? And why have shops changed and why does he not recognise his wife or slave owner?
A postcard arrives for Joe from a lighthouse in Eilean Mor in Scotland, which according to the Postman has been in the Post Office for a hundred years and is written in English that is banned Dearest Joe. Come Home Joe if you remember. But this makes no sense the Lighthouse has only been there a few months, so how was the postcard in the post office for nearly a hundred years?

Joe travels to the lighthouse to try to piece together the mystery of his memory and embarks on a time travelling adventure.

I nearly cried at the end when it all came together and was surprised that I was so invested in Joe as I felt that I had really struggled with this novel. Its complex, there are a lot of characters, a lot of decisions that I disagreed with and alternate timelines. And there is Captain Missouri Flint and a tiger.
Keep with this novel it will get under your skin and you will find yourself rooting for Joe and hoping he solves the mystery of his memory, before it’s too late. I reread the last chapter twice.

Four Stars – maybe if I ever re-read the novel in paper from without the formatting issues I will up this rating.

Oh my God, this book was amazing.

Where to even start? So much happened and all the best ways I can think of to explain this book are full of spoilers. (this is a spoiler free review)

Time travel (sometimes accidental, sometimes deliberate). The butterfly effect. French-occupied England (Napoleon won). Memories of a world that doesn't exist. Pirates. Queer romance. Naval battles. Forgotten identity.

Joe Tournier’s first memory is his current one: he is stepping off a train in Londres (London), and that is all he knows. He asks a man where the train came from: Glasgow. And that, alongside the name Madeline, is all he knows. He thought he recognised Londres (London), but everything is slightly off - the shops he expects to see around the corner are different, and whilst he knows everything is in French now, he is still expecting English:

"Joe wondered why the hell the train company was giving London station names in French, and then wondered helplessly why he’d wondered. All the London station names were French, everyone knew that".

And then a postcard addressed to him arrives, which has been kept at the post office since 1807: "Dearest Joe, Come home, if you remember. -M". And it has a lighthouse on it that was only built a few months ago.

This book kept me guessing until the end. Nearly every time I thought I had worked something out, something else happened that made me question everything again! I was invested within pages, and Natasha Pulley’s writing made the world come to life so vividly that coming back to the real world felt strange. There were a bit more death/battles than I thought, though given one time period was in the midst of the Napoleonic Wars, that one is really on me.

There were several timelines to follow, some of which changed based on changes in the other, but i never once felt confused, which is a tribute to the writing. This was a novel that could have been hard to follow because of its complexity, but it was so engaging that I had no issues in understanding what was going on. This didn’t mean it wasn’t complex, just that it was brilliantly written.