In this YA fantasy novel perfect for fans of Divine Rivals, a girl who has always served others decides to take power for herself.
Her magic feeds on lies.
His magic could destroy her.
Mira Kyler runs the court of Virdei from the shadows. Ever since she helped her half-brother Luc cheat his way into the role of Virdei's leader, she's used her lie-powered magic to collect secrets from members of court, then used them as blackmail to keep her brother in power.
But when newcomer Kaidren Vale shows up and challenges Luc's leadership, he threatens the stability Mira has worked so hard for. Kaidren also has magic-magic that can detect the precise nature of someone else's power with a single touch. If Kaidren so much as brushes against her, everyone will discover that Mira is the one who's been manipulating the court for years.
As Kaidren and Luc compete in three deadly challenges called The Trials, Mira realizes that no matter who wins, she'll be stuck serving a mediocre man who doesn't deserve to be in charge. She's done hiding in the shadows. She wants power of her own.
To get it, she'll have to betray both her own brother and Kaidren-but the fiercer the competition gets, the more Mira realizes that the one boy who could destroy everything is the one boy she might not be able to resist.
Her magic feeds on lies.
His magic could destroy her.
Mira Kyler runs the court of Virdei from the shadows. Ever since she helped her half-brother Luc cheat his way into the role of Virdei's leader, she's used her lie-powered magic to collect secrets from members of court, then used them as blackmail to keep her brother in power.
But when newcomer Kaidren Vale shows up and challenges Luc's leadership, he threatens the stability Mira has worked so hard for. Kaidren also has magic-magic that can detect the precise nature of someone else's power with a single touch. If Kaidren so much as brushes against her, everyone will discover that Mira is the one who's been manipulating the court for years.
As Kaidren and Luc compete in three deadly challenges called The Trials, Mira realizes that no matter who wins, she'll be stuck serving a mediocre man who doesn't deserve to be in charge. She's done hiding in the shadows. She wants power of her own.
To get it, she'll have to betray both her own brother and Kaidren-but the fiercer the competition gets, the more Mira realizes that the one boy who could destroy everything is the one boy she might not be able to resist.
Title: To Steal A Throne
Author: Gabi Burton
Publisher: Bloomsbury USA Children's Books
Expected Publication Date: April 7, 2026
Review:
Thank you to Bloomsbury USA Children's Books and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this title to read and give my honest review. The opinions expressed here are my own.
I was excited when my wish came through for this book. Most intriguing to me was the potential of the magic system. How lies would feed magic. I was excited to watch the world build and see how the magic system was set up. Unfortunately, this one just missed that mark for me.
At first, I really liked Mira. She was strong and confident in herself. She was strong for her step brother, Luc, who is obviously a total wimp and cannot make decisions for himself or even stand up for what he might believe in. Their relationship was frustrating for me. One minute she loves him and is helping him and he's grateful, the next he's ignoring her or not backing her up and she is hating him. The swings were so drastic I couldn't truly understand the relationship at all. It made me start to dislike Mira and I become totally frustrate with her. She was willing to continue having a relationship with him despite him ignoring her or even standing down when she was always standing up for him. I also didn't understand her position the "kingdom". She's a bastard child but she is able to stick close to the person with the highest title in the country? How? Why? What was their relationship growing up? She tells us over and over how much her father hates her but she's allowed to be close to his son. It just made zero sense to me. You do see her teeth come out when it comes to the enemy, Kaidren. There's a push and pull there. Burton tried to work this as chemistry but I didn't feel it at all. Overall, I didn't connect with any of the characters in this book. They were not well developed and appeared so flat to as not really have any genuine personalities to speak of.
The magic system for me was totally confusing. I truly could not understand it apart from lies fueling it. But, even then, there were times when Mira needed jars of magic to help her? I didn't understand how it was set up, or used, or why. Burton did attempt to explain is somewhat at the beginning but I still didn't understand it. Maybe that was a me thing but I don't think it was.
The world building is totally lacking. I didn't see it well explained as to why there were these positions. Why her step-brother could hold his position so long. What the vote meant for him to maintain that position. Why there was a tournament, which dragged and dragged. Let's be honest, I could not explain the intricacies or politics of this world if I tried. I also had a hard time visualizing the scenes. The descriptions were very flat for me to the point it felt Burton was telling me what I was seeing rather than showing me. The action scenes were dull and devoid of anything that would make my heart race or be in fear for the characters.
The pacing was all over the place. Some scenes went by super fast, while others just dragged. I found nothing happening in the middle of the book at all. I had a hard time understanding where the book was going or what the point of it all was going to be in the end.
Burton worked in a kind of Bridgerton twist to her story by adding The Shadow Queen, who distributes papers with stories of the "ton" for lack of a better world. While I liked the idea, it just wasn't a fresh idea. Too similar to Lady Whistledown for me. I'm not sure how Burton could have even made this unique because it just was not.
Mostly, I was just bored while reading this. I found myself skimming over sections just so I could get to the next chapter in the hopes something exciting would happen. The plot of this book gets totally lost in the scenes that don't move the story forward in any way. The description tells us the FMC is going to steal the throne (which is not really a throne, by the way), but I didn't get the sense of she was truly worried about this. I didn't see her fighting to gain that place for herself or her sabotaging others to even try and take it. Add to this the abundance of subplots that didn't add to the main plot of the story line and the entire story felt all over the place with no cohesion at all. The biggest issue with this book is it tries to do too many things while not fleshing out any of them and leaving the reader to wonder how any of these things are related. Unfortunately, I won't be continuing on with this series in the future.
Author:
Gabi grew up reading and writing in St. Louis, Missouri. She graduated from Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine in 2021. Now, she works as a paralegal and author on the East Coast. When she’s not working or writing, she’s probably watching Netflix, scrolling through Tiktok, or finding beautiful places to walk—preferably near a body of water.
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