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A review by lilyrooke
From Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout
2.0
This is such a difficult book to review. What even are my thoughts on it? I can't say that I liked it, but 2* feels a little unfair in some ways, so I'll try to explain.
[Spoilers follow.]
I thought the story became much more interesting when they left for the capital. Hawke's gang appealed to me a lot as characters and I hope we get to see more of them. Naturally, Poppy's role as the Maiden limited what she could realistically do/take part in for the earlier part of the novel, but for me that meant there was a bit too much disconnect between the plot events of the Craven attacks compared to Poppy's active involvement in them. Maybe it might have been different if we had had some POV chapters from Hawke, Vikter or even Kieran? But I felt as though I was too separate from the main events of the plot for a lot of the book.
Maybe a part of the problem for me is feeling as though FBAA couldn't decide if it wanted to be pure Romance, or Fantasy with a romance in it. The balance felt off at times for me (again, roughly until they left for the capital), and that's a big part of what makes it hard for me to rate the book. The pure romance elements I thought were pretty solid, and those were definitely my favourite scenes ;)
With that said, the author later dives into tropes that I just hate with a passion, and which I won't apologise for seeing as shady AF. I can see some maybe being subverted? Hopefully? in the sequel, but for me there's no coming back from having sex with someone else while not being honest about your identity, because you know she wouldn't want to have sex with you if you were being honest with her. I mean. There's a word for that. It kind of hurts more as well because of how thematically significant Poppy's role as the Maiden is. I also don't like this trend of giving male characters abusive pasts without showing it having any real impact on them beyond a shock value sad backstory.
There's a lot I found intriguing about FBAA. The Craven, the whole 'truth' about the Ascended and the Atlantians, and what they're doing. I like how hints were dropped earlier in the novel that really arrived at a 'Oh wow!' moment with that reveal. Since the character I'm most interested in, who appealed to me most, who seemed most worth following (Malik), doesn't actually appear on the page (I really hope he does in the sequel) I'm definitely going to read the next book to meet him.
It was definitely an interesting concept and I'm glad I read it!
[Spoilers follow.]
I thought the story became much more interesting when they left for the capital. Hawke's gang appealed to me a lot as characters and I hope we get to see more of them. Naturally, Poppy's role as the Maiden limited what she could realistically do/take part in for the earlier part of the novel, but for me that meant there was a bit too much disconnect between the plot events of the Craven attacks compared to Poppy's active involvement in them. Maybe it might have been different if we had had some POV chapters from Hawke, Vikter or even Kieran? But I felt as though I was too separate from the main events of the plot for a lot of the book.
Maybe a part of the problem for me is feeling as though FBAA couldn't decide if it wanted to be pure Romance, or Fantasy with a romance in it. The balance felt off at times for me (again, roughly until they left for the capital), and that's a big part of what makes it hard for me to rate the book. The pure romance elements I thought were pretty solid, and those were definitely my favourite scenes ;)
With that said, the author later dives into tropes that I just hate with a passion, and which I won't apologise for seeing as shady AF. I can see some maybe being subverted? Hopefully? in the sequel, but for me there's no coming back from having sex with someone else while not being honest about your identity, because you know she wouldn't want to have sex with you if you were being honest with her. I mean. There's a word for that. It kind of hurts more as well because of how thematically significant Poppy's role as the Maiden is. I also don't like this trend of giving male characters abusive pasts without showing it having any real impact on them beyond a shock value sad backstory.
There's a lot I found intriguing about FBAA. The Craven, the whole 'truth' about the Ascended and the Atlantians, and what they're doing. I like how hints were dropped earlier in the novel that really arrived at a 'Oh wow!' moment with that reveal. Since the character I'm most interested in, who appealed to me most, who seemed most worth following (Malik), doesn't actually appear on the page (I really hope he does in the sequel) I'm definitely going to read the next book to meet him.
It was definitely an interesting concept and I'm glad I read it!