Narrated by Andi Arndt and Shane East
Audible’s Winner in Romance: The Best of 2016
Long, long ago, in a kingdom far, far away, lived a beautiful girl named Cinderella… No, wait, while this is a sort of Cinderella story – one of my favorite tropes! – it’s a contemporary, and Ella, I mean, Olivia is in Manhattan. But there is a prince! Prince Nicholas is next in line for the throne of the principality of Wessco and has just been ordered by his grandmother, the queen, to announce his betrothal. However, she gives him 5 months reprieve before doing so (and there is no fiancee in sight), during which time he escapes to Manhattan to locate his ne’er-do-well brother Henry, the Spare Heir, who is cutting it up royally. There Nicholas runs into Ella, I mean, Olivia, who is sweeping, I mean, runs the family coffee shop and bakery to keep her younger sister in school and her alcoholic father off the streets. (There are no step-siblings.)
Their first encounter isn’t exactly high class, however, as Nicholas is three sheets to the wind and on a whim offers Olivia money for sex. Yeah, that happened. But one thing leads to another, and soon he’s pursuing her in earnest. This tale has all the catnip-moments of this trope, like going in disguise to “regular” places, leaving his security team behind, and agreeing with everyone else how much he resembles that rakish playboy Prince Nicholas. But when the going gets rough, will the Prince be able to leave commoner Olivia behind to marry someone of his class?
Royally Screwed is an entertaining read that Audible has awarded Best Romance of 2016. Three of us here at AudioGals had this in our personal queues, and discussed it behind the scenes. Chase’s style of using witty banter, amusing situations, and steamy bedroom scenes, as well as some heartbreaking and emotional scenes, is in full force here. Because Wessco is somehow in the UK (it’s all explained in the book, really), using new-to-me Brit narrator Shane East was a terrific choice – BJ calls him a British Sebastian York, who is often the male narrator in Chase audiobooks with American-accented heroes. East has a short list of romance audiobooks at Audible, and a representative from AudioFile Magazine posted in GoodReads that this is “almost undoubtedly a pseudonym” (see message 17). My one, small quibble with his narration was the pauses at commas that sound like pauses at periods instead, which I noticed several times at the beginning. Pacing can truly affect a good narration – luckily, either he got into the rhythm of the book later or I just overlooked it as it went on. These days, Andi Arndt is often heard as the female voice in contemporary romance, especially dual-narrations/first person POV with Sebastian York, and she does a bangup job of the pragmatic New Yorker Olivia, as well as all the various other voices, although her British accent isn’t convincing, especially compared to her co-narrator East. Her acting, pacing and character differentiation make her narrations shine.
The Gals are giving Royally Screwed 3 thumbs up – Diana called it one of Chase’s best, and BJ found it a “delectable treat”. However, while BJ and Diana each rate it a 5-star listen for both narration and content, I’m a little harder to please, so I’m going with 4+. I did enjoy the whole Cinderella angle, and there was some awesome groveling with a big gesture to win Olivia’s heart, but the pacing and accent issues, plus the slightly fanciful plot, didn’t quite rise to 5 stars for me. If Royalty is your thing, there are two more books in the series, where Nicholas’ brother Henry finds his own princess in Royally Matched, while mum’s the word on the plot of the final book, Royally Endowed.
Melinda
Narration: B+
Book Content: B+
Steam Factor: Glad I had my earbuds in
Violence Rating: None
Genre: Contemporary Romance
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
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