Violet, Ash and Raven have escaped the Jewel, but not without some trauma. She has to try to defeat the royalty, because if she doesn't everything will be for nothing. Her friend Raven is pregnant and that's a death sentence, Violet is willing to do anything to help but there will be costs.
It's a fine bridging novel, now to read the next in the series. Lots of learning in this, about the world, about themselves and about the costs. ( )

Edit: thought about it some more and I'm going with a solid 3 stars. I really think it should have been combined with the last book.

I'm torn between giving this 3.5 or 4 stars. While this one was fast-paced and Violet was less annoying in this one, I feel like not much actually happens to warrant a whole book. I did enjoy this one, but could it have been combined with the last one and made into one book? I think so. I feel like publishers are trying to drag out series way too much now. This could have been a duology, and they could have combined this with the last one. I don't care if it's over 500 or 600 pages, if it's good I'll still read it. Most of the interesting stuff doesn't even occur till the second half of the book anyway. That cliffhanger ending though, had to give another star just for that. ( )

There are two possibilities as to why my rating for this book is low: 1.) My love for dystopians diminished thanks to the consistent tropes found within them, and 2.) Although this tale could have been epic had the world building been better developed, this book sometimes felt somewhat claustrophobic.

The White Rose by Amy Ewing is the second novel in The Lone City trilogy, which also features The Jewel. Now, I never read the first book, due to it being compared to the Matched trilogy (yeah, not a good comparison in my opinion), but I followed the plot of this book well enough anyway. In fact, I really didn't need to read The Jewel to know what was going on in The White Rose. So, kudos to the author for that. I have to admit, regardless of my apprehension to this book's tropes, I really enjoyed Amy Ewing as an author. She pulled me into the story with ease, and kept me there from the first page to the last. Sadly though (and this is nobody's fault but my own), I do feel I'm over the whole dystopian genre. In other words, maybe this trilogy came out a couple of years too late?

All that aside, The White Rose is an interesting tale, perfect for a YA audience who loves a good book about rising up to fight the ultimate evil (in this case, a dystopian government where the upper-classes oppress everyone else). It's got its charm, I'll admit, I just don't think I was the right audience for it at the time of my reading.

Review originally posted at:
( )

Book one was adorable, book two is a little slow and I feel like it could have had a few more important moments... It was mostly just them running and being scared and not the story being forwarded as much. Still, pretty cute! AND THAT ENDING! ( )

This book was just getting into the action and bam! cuts off. I have to go request the next one now. Thanks for that. Seriously though, it was amazing. I absolutely adored the world building as I did with The Jewel.

We join Violet Just after the end of the first book. This is something I really love in writing, the story picking up precisely where it left off. When books start down the road and then revisit through memory, or worse don't tell you what happened it drives me absolutely batty. Batty, I tell you. ( )