If you are a fan of the Hunger Games, and you loved the BookTok-favorite Powerless trilogy, then Alex Aster’s young adult, fantasy novel, Lightlark, is possibly your ideal read. You are up for a magical world-building, a deadly game, a love triangle, and plot twists, dear bookworm! Pick your love interest: a brooding king or the dark anti-hero?
Have a recap of our Powerless summary and plot points, characters, and lose yourself in Kai Azer’s unforgettable quotes. Lastly, here is a list of titles to match the vibe of powerless heroines and then some.
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Without further ado, let’s dive into the Lightlark complete synopsis, but beware of spoilers.
Former rulers created the Lightlark island in an attempt to bring the six realms together; the Sunlings, Moonlings, Skylings, Starlings, Nightshade, and Wildlings. But when a great offense was committed, the realms were cursed, perishing slowly but painfully. Each curse is crueler than the other; the Sunlings cannot walk during daytime, and the sea becomes deadly for the Moonlings every other full moon. The Skylings are no longer able to fly, the Starlings do not live longer than their twenty-fifth year, while the Wildlings have to feed on human hearts, and doom the lovers to death. Lastly, the Nightshade cannot walk at night.
Some realms have left Lighlark and rebuilt newlands, while the mainland remains for the royals and the Sunling ruler, King Oro. However, every five hundred years, Lightlark resurfaces to host the Centennial, a deadly game during which the rulers should survive trials, pair up, and then kill one of them. As part of the prophecy, one realm shall perish along with its ruler to break the curses.
Isla Crown is about to join the Centennial for the first time. As the ruler of the Wildlings, it is her duty to compete and win to save her people. The award for the one who will lift the curses is ultimate power. And for Isla, who was born powerless, it would have been the only goal.
With nothing but her wits and deadly fighting skills, Isla enters the competition with three different plans in mind; seduce the king, make him love her and share his powers, find the answer to the prophecy and save her people, or look for an ancient relic, the bondbreaker, and lift the curse of her people. With the help of her best friend, the Starling ruler, Celeste, Isla plans to survive quietly until the relic is in their hands. However, Isla draws too much attention to herself… The King and ruler of Nightshade have their eyes on her.
Then, an unexpected deal is struck between her and the King. When he confesses that he is dying, and the island is going down with him, Isla agrees to help him look for Lightlark’s heart; a pure source of power that will save their world. As Isla’s and Celeste’s plans on finding the bondbreaker fail, Isla clings more to the King’s plan.
Plenty of enemies are on her, though. Cleo, the Moonling ruler, has expressed her hatred over Wildlings from their first meeting, and Azul has secret dealings with the King discussing the extermination of one of the realms in favor of the Skylings. On top of that, Isla is having steamy dreams about the Nightshade ruler, Grimshaw. This dangerous but alluring man plays with Isla’s mind by saving her from uncomfortable situations, and then disappearing for weeks.
Oro depends on Isla’s Wildling powers to find the heart, without knowing she is actually powerless. The trust between them is so fragile that developing a genuine friendship seems impossible. But you know how time in romantasy brings enemies closer… until the moment comes that they betray each other.
As soon as Oro learns of Isla’s powerlessness, he announces it to everyone, marking her as a target. Grim is paired with her and makes sure she stays clear of the other ruler’s blades. As this relationship burns slower than a snail on the move, Celeste’s life is in jeopardy as someone managed to poison her.
Finding the heart is Isla’s last chance to save her best friend. But as she manages to obtain it, an arrow cuts through her own heart. Barely surviving this, Isla comes against yet another great challenge. She has to choose whose ruler’s life to take to break the curses. Oro is willing to let her choose one to spare. Between the Starlings and the Nightshade, Isla is left at a crossroads. Maybe it is high time she finds the bondmaker and saves both Grim and Celeste.
However, the oracle Isla had met on her search for the heart of Lightlark, said Isla was surrounded by liars… By the end, no man on the island has not betrayed her at least once. Funny right?
The greatest twist hides in the very existence of the bondbreaker, which ends up being a bondmaker, enabling the owner to draw energy from another subject. As you can guess, in the last fifty pages, we learn that Isla is not truly powerless, but her magic is somehow cloaked, and the true villain of her story manages to use the bondmaker on her… In the meantime, she is bonded to both Oro and Grim, sharing their magic. All this magic… gone in a second.
We promise that you will not waste a second before grabbing Nightbane, the next book in the Lightlark series.
Our strong and seductive female lead is strong-willed, feisty, and, of course, deadly. She may not have magic, but she knows how to wield a blade, and then some. She is beautiful, clever, and ready to sacrifice everything to save her people. Raised by two warrior guardians, she suffers from her parents’ decision to fall in love and doom themselves. Before the Centennial, her life was all brutal training and spending time locked up in the Wildling realm. Secretly, though, she travels to other realms with a relic her mother has left behind; a Starstick. The more she sees of the world, the more her heart longs for freedom.
The Sunling ruler, and King of Lightlark, carries the world on his shoulders. Literally. If he perishes, so does the island of Lightlark, taking hundreds of lives that reside there with it. He is the strongest ruler, brooding and distrustful, especially of beautiful women like Isla. As a King wielding incredible power, falling in love with someone and sharing his power is forbidden. Oro is very goal-oriented, and he actually cares for his kingdom, so he will stop at nothing to save the world.
Grim has dark powers, drawn from nightmares, and is considered a monster by everyone. It is a common ground he finds with Isla, actually. A heart-eater and a shadow daddy. A match made in heaven if you ask us… Anyway, Grim’s plans for this Centennial are thoroughly shady, as his people had been in war with the Sunlings for years for the Lighlark lands, and it is even said that they had cast the curses originally. Grim is a great warrior and has the scars to prove it. He is a flirt and a fierce protector. We certainly see more of him in Nightbane and Skyshade.
Since birth, Isla has been trained to fight and win the Centennial, while seducing the King to share his power. As the Wildling ruler, her beauty is a weapon as much as her blades. Being powerless, the burden of leadership falls harder on her shoulders as she blames herself for her people’s suffering. The true power she holds is within herself; the confident, fearless, and desperate young heart that will go to great lengths to save her loved ones, even cheating death.
As we have already mentioned, betrayal for people on the island of Lightlark is the butter to their bread. Trust is a dangerous weapon, and once it’s lost, it's gone forever. However, in desperate times, unexpected alliances are formed for the greater good, even if hearts are bound to be broken in the process.
All Isla is allowed to think of is her obligation to her people. But all she actually thinks about is freedom, travelling through the realms, falling in love, meeting new people… The moment she is off the Wildling realm, her heart craves a life without the responsibility of a ruler—and a powerless one at that.
For Isla and Oro, love is forbidden. Isla would doom her lover to death as part of the Wildling curse, while Oro has the great responsibility of his power, and falling in love meant sharing this power, which could destroy the world in the wrong hands. However, for love, Isla is ready to sacrifice everything. For Celeste, she will risk her life and take an arrow through her heart. For Grim, she gambles the King’s trust, and eventually the luck of her entire realm.
You may choose not to trust your social media, or even the TikTok book reviews on Lightlark, but if you are reading this now, then we may have convinced you to give it a chance. Log in to your Amazon or Goodreads account and add the series to your TBR. After the announcement of a new book coming in the series, you can only imagine how hyped up we are!
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The first installment of the Lightlark saga does not have explicit scenes or graphic sexual language, but some sensual exploration between Isla and Grim, gives the characters some more depth as their relationship evolves. Things get a little more heated in Nightbane, but the series stays close to the young-adult boundaries.
There are some mere mentions of LGBTQ relationships in Lightlark, but they are not further explored. For example, Azul, the Skyling ruler, used to have a husband he loved very much, and Cleo is mentioned as bisexual, having both male and female lovers over time.
Isla breaks the curses after she completes the prophecy and kills Aurora, the one who cast the curses in the first place. Oro’s and Grim’s powers bond with Isla’s as they declare their true love for her. Oro saves Isla, and chooses to live with her in Lightlark, after a shocking truth about her past with Grim is revealed.
Nikki Sheryee insists that she’s “up to no good” whenever she’s in the company of books. Armed with a degree in English Language and Literature, she wields the power of words like a mischievous wizard. Her lifelong dream? To be the editor who sprinkles magic dust on manuscripts! To Nikki, a book is more alive than a caffeinated squirrel on roller skates. Readers nurture it, cuddle it, scold it, and occasionally challenge it to a duel! But in the end, a book does its own thing, pulling at our heartstrings and revealing our inner human-ness. Nikki’s favorite pastime? Well, it’s none other than the noble art of daydreaming! And she wears her daydreamer’s badge with pride, sharing this delightful delusion with the crème de la crème of her friends.
