Twelve-year-old Rowdy Buckner, who has dark eyes and hair and “the same brown skin passed down from ancestors who called this kingdom home long before it was a kingdom at all,” is sick of his pampered lifestyle as the future monarch of the Kingdom of Texas in the Allied Lands, a magical version of the U.S. He dreams of someday being an adventurer and gaining access to the alchemic tonics that provide gender-affirming and other physical changes so he can live as the man he’s long known himself to be. Rowdy’s parents unconditionally support his identity but say his behavior is too irresponsible and impulsive—he whines, screams at a housekeeper for smiling, and abandons friends who are in danger—to access the “powerful magick” of the tonics just yet. Rowdy decides to prove them wrong by competing in Realmsweep, a high-stakes team scavenger hunt. The hunt, which culminates in an anti-monarchy protest after the murder of a dark-skinned boy named d’Artagnan by city guards, offers big-hearted if unsubtle moral lessons that are somewhat undermined by Rowdy’s own incipient “earned” kingship at the denouement. The writing is often repetitive and expository; the magic and worldbuilding, like the moralizing, feel overstuffed but ultimately work in service of the worthy message that kids needn’t be likeable to deserve love, community, and gender-affirming care.