Mixing elements of Arthurian legend and Sleeping Beauty, historical romance author Deborah Hale’s first fantasy novel centers around her heroine’s belief that she is the Destined Queen foretold by legend. According to the old stories, Umbria’s great king sleeps – only to be awakened by the Destined Queen in Umbria’s time of greatest need. The legend is interesting, but, unfortunately, the pacing here sometimes left me feeling as though I was the one left sleeping for hundreds of years.

As this novel opens, Maura learns from the wizard Langbard that she is the Destined Queen of the legends and the time has come for her to seek the Waiting King and free Umbria from the oppression of the Han. Shortly thereafter, Maura saves the life of an outlaw named Rath and Langbard decides that the clever young man would be the perfect person to guide Maura on her journey in search of her King.

Maura is somewhat reluctant to trust an outlaw, but circumstances leave her with little choice. As the two travel together and learn to rely upon one another’s skills – Maura in healing and white magic, Rath in fighting and survival – they form an uneasy alliance that gradually turns into something warmer. However, Maura is very conscious of the fact that she is promised to the Waiting King, so she fears allowing herself to grow too attached to Rath.

Maura and Rath are both likable – if somewhat flat – characters, but this flatness diminishes as the book progresses. Maura is a healer, and she is so amazingly good and selfless that her uncomplicated near perfection makes her emotionally distant to the reader. Rath, on the other hand, is more well-developed. He is a strong survivor but he also has his darker moments.

The legend crafted by Hale is an interesting one and she does a good job of getting inside the heads of her characters (particularly the Umbrians) to show readers their worldview. The rules of Maura and Rath’s world and the religion of the Umbrians were some of the more fascinating elements of this story.

However, as much as I like longer, detailed novels, I must admit that this one dragged on and on. For one reason, the author spends a lot of time setting the stage and explaining (rather than showing through characters’ actions) the world her players inhabit throughout the first part of the book, making the plot action drag a bit. In addition, the writing in much of the first half of the book read as a flat narrative with less-than-engaging dialogue and few emotional details to bring the reader into the lives of the characters. The author’s stylistic choice created a sense of distance; I rarely felt as if I were alongside the characters, watching what they lived, and as a result found it difficult to become personally invested in their story.

The book improves in the second half. Its characters seem to draw a little nearer to the reader, and the litany of details about their world sprinkled throughout earlier parts of the book began to coalesce and make more sense. As the action picked up and grew more intense, the narrative became more streamlined.

While this book had its flaws, the initial premise is an interesting one and there are some intriguing ideas in this story. The world of the Umbrians and the Hans shows promise of being an interesting place. However, the flatness of the narrative here keeps the reader at a distance and almost made me feel like I was reading Fantasy Lite rather than entering another world. This is Hale’s first fantasy novel, though, and with some practice, her writing shows some promise of good things to come.