From Blood & Ash // JLA, you finally got me

Author: Jennifer L. Armentrout
Published On: March 30, 2020
Publisher: Blue Box Press
Genre: Fiction, NA Fantasy, Romance
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Synopsis:

A Maiden…

Chosen from birth to usher in a new era, Poppy’s life has never been her own. The life of the Maiden is solitary. Never to be touched. Never to be looked upon. Never to be spoken to. Never to experience pleasure. Waiting for the day of her Ascension, she would rather be with the guards, fighting back the evil that took her family, than preparing to be found worthy by the gods. But the choice has never been hers.

A Duty…

The entire kingdom’s future rests on Poppy’s shoulders, something she’s not even quite sure she wants for herself. Because a Maiden has a heart. And a soul. And longing. And when Hawke, a golden-eyed guard honor bound to ensure her Ascension, enters her life, destiny and duty become tangled with desire and need. He incites her anger, makes her question everything she believes in, and tempts her with the forbidden.

A Kingdom…

Forsaken by the gods and feared by mortals, a fallen kingdom is rising once more, determined to take back what they believe is theirs through violence and vengeance. And as the shadow of those cursed draws closer, the line between what is forbidden and what is right becomes blurred. Poppy is not only on the verge of losing her heart and being found unworthy by the gods, but also her life when every blood-soaked thread that holds her world together begins to unravel.

Alright. Where did this come from? Who did this to me?

I picked this one up completely on a whim. I had seen it floating around Goodreads and my easily distracted brain was like “Oooohh pretty cover” and, lo and behold, ten minutes later I had a copy on the way.

I went into it almost completely blind – the synopsis is incredibly vague and gives you no real urge to pick it up, imo. I didn’t have super high expectations, as I tried to read Obsidian a few years ago and just…wasn’t into it? But this one really did surprise me.

There are so many moving parts and details to even begin to summarize, but to hopefully give a better idea of what this is about, this book follows Poppy, who lives in a world where the second born child is given over to the church in order to “Ascend”, which basically means to become immortal. Poppy, as The Maiden, is apparently the key to the next round of Ascensions, and thus is coddled and sheltered in the home of a Duke and Duchess of the kingdom.

This one is gonna be long, so buckle up, friends.

Things I liked:

• Poppy’s growth as a character: At the beginning of this story, I was really, really worried that I wouldn’t like her. She comes across as very demure and passive, and I was worried this would be another Twilight-esque story where the “lion saves the lamb” and all that. But as this story goes on we find out that Poppy is anything but powerless, and I loved seeing her come into her own and realize what she wants, which is a life much more exciting than that of the Maiden.

1. The dynamic between Poppy & those around her: Poppy’s backstory is a bit tragic and I genuinely felt for how little connection she had to, like, anyone. She has two close “friends” in her life and she questions their genuine intent because they technically were assigned to her and didn’t cross her path naturally. I think it took me reading to the very end of this story to actually realize how totally alone Poppy really is, and that not only made my heart reach out to her character but also gave me a lot of reason to root for her success!!

• The history and backstory of “The War of Two Kings”: This one takes awhile to fully come together, but once it does, whew is it interesting. Towards the end of the book, we learn a lot more about what’s called “The War of Two Kings” and how this fantasy world came to be, and I think it’s a really interesting premise and am excited to explore it in the second book!

• Cool magic stuff: Again, this doesn’t really happen until towards the end of the book (see: things I disliked for more on this), but some of the species in this book have certain forms of magic that I’m basically trash for??

• Hawke & Poppy’s relationship later in the book: The dynamic between them is constantly changing and evolving and WHEW did that ending shake me!! Their relationship does not only flip, but does a freaking triple backflip and I am SO excited to see where the next book takes them. Also, the angst? The arguing? The power struggle? Ugh, please never change. I think this book sets up for a very spicy interesting Book 2.

Things I disliked:

• The first 2/3 were SO slow. Like, glacier pace. I was so worried that I’d DNF because I just didn’t have any desire to read it. There was a lot of explanatory content and not much dialogue, and it all just seemed really pointless? It was a lot of Poppy explaining her situation instead of actually showing it to us, and this usually equates to a very boring narrative. Every 100 or so pages something really intense would happen, but after it had we’d just go back to a normal setting of Poppy living her maiden-ly (aka boring) life. If I had to give it a star rating, I’d definitely say 2 or 3, but it absolutely picks up.

• Some of the world-building fell flat: There were so many elements of this book that just…weren’t explained? Such as the geographical setup of the entire country/continent (?). From what I gathered, we have these “Rises” that surround the castles of Dukes and Duchesses, who do not live in the capital but instead in little towns throughout the country. Okay, fine. How are they laid out? How far are we located from the capital? How big are these towns, are we talkin 200 people or 20,000 people? I want more detail! Poppy being The Maiden is also just super vague, like we know that she’s important and I guess she herself doesn’t really know what that means, so it could be on purpose that we’re left in the dark. But we also have no idea how she got to be chosen as The Maiden other than surviving an attack (no backstory on this at all). Even after we do find out the truth about the Ascended, I still didn’t really know what it meant for Poppy to be The Maiden? I don’t know, just really vague and unexplained plot points that made it hard to follow along sometimes.

Rating:

So to sum it up, definitely pick this one up. I’ve heard it be pitched as “ACOTAR meets The Grisha Trilogy”, and while I think there’s some elements that for sure differ, I can understand why people are comparing the dynamic between Hawke and Poppy as a Feyre-Rhysand type of situation. Also, this book seems like one big prologue to what I hope is a really great continuation in the second book, but that’s a discussion for after Book 2!!

If you’re willing to power on through the first half of the book to get to the really juicy stuff at the back half, I 100% recommend. Needless to say, after that ending, I’ll be picking up the second book the second it lands on my doorstep next month.

Did you enjoy this book? Agree/disagree with any of my comments?

Thanks for reading, guys! xx