A thoroughly unique and gripping take on an original take on mythology, gods and humans. I really enjoyed reading this story and all of the twists and turns it took me on (even if I was so late to joining the party). Kinda sad that this book appears to be the first book in a series that isn't continuing anymore but these things happen 🤷🏻

Thank you to NetGalley, the publisher, and the author for giving me a free eARC of this book to read in exchange for my review!

This so sounded like something I would enjoy reading, but, nope- not for me. Sorry. I am sure it will have it's fan.

I do not think this book is for me. It's not bad, but the story doesn't speak to me and doesn't pull me in. It may not be the genre for me at this time.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for giving me a free advanced copy of this book to read and review.

I very much appreciate being gifted this copy of Goddess of Limbo by Lea Falls, and the opportunity to read & review it. Thanks to the publisher.

The story first hooked me because of the promising blurb and the concept; however, I couldn't dive into the book because the writing could have been more precise. The number of characters, the POVs, and the Setting changes left no room to connect with their individual stories, which made me DNF the book at ca. 30%.

Regardless, I would like to thank both NetGalley and Zauberfalls Publishing for the opportunity to read this book.

Unfortunately, I didn't really get on well with this book. I found the way the story jumped between characters difficult to follow. I was lost to what was happening and it made the story difficult to follow. I am still lost to what happened in the final chapters really! Also, Robert and Reggie are very similar names and I kept getting mixed up between them. The overall storyline was interesting and had potential, so hopefully the author can improve with future books

(ENGLISH REVIEW BELOW)

Ce roman, qui avait tout pour me plaire, m’a laissé mitigée.
¤
C’est un roman dans lequel l’autrice nous plonge dans un univers bien construit. J’ai beaucoup aimé la place que la magie et les dieux ont dans cette histoire. Après avoir lu le résumé du roman, j’étais intriguée et je dois dire qu’au niveau de l’intrigue, l’autrice est allée au-delà de mes espérances.
Dans ce roman, nous suivons plusieurs personnages, donc plusieurs points de vue : celui d’Ally, de Se’azana, Richard et Vana. L’autrice mentionne aussi Balthos et Alames. J’ai été entraînée par cette alternance de points de vue. J’ai trouvé ma lecture dynamique et j’ai été emportée jusqu’à la fin. L’autrice a instauré une ambiance électrique et j’étais curieuse de connaître la fin de ce premier tome.
Pourtant, même si en somme, il y a eu plusieurs éléments qui m’ont fait apprécier ma lecture, j’ai malheureusement été parfois dérangée. L’alternance de points de vue, si dynamique soit-elle, était parfois trop rapide pour moi. Au début du roman, j’étais confuse et il m’a fallu du temps pour m’adapter au rythme du récit. Également, j’ai eu du mal avec le style d’écriture. Il est assez simple et facile à lire, mais j’ai manqué de concentration à cause de certaines longueurs.
En soit, ce sont des détails mineurs qui ont entaché mon appréciation du roman, mais malgré ça, la fin donne envie de connaître la suite des événements !

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ENGLISH REVIEW

This book, which had everything to please me, left me mixed.
¤
Free will is a relic of the past. Souls have a prewritten path to heaven. If they miss it, they are doomed to roam the lost realm of limbo as splinters of their former selves or worse—as demons.
Their only hope is the reaper Alames, whose own soul shattered when her celestial lover, Balthos, usurped their creators to make them gods. In her absence, he builds a pantheon of monsters and tricks the mortals, whom he blames for his grief, into worshiping him. But when a new generation defies Balthos’s law, Alames’s splinters appear among them.
Brilliant physicist Ally longs for progress and innovation, but the Council controlling her nation strips the “Mad Princess” of power. Pregnant and uncertain, the unrivaled Captain Se’azana abandons her career for the false promises of love. The starving serf Richard makes a deal with a Fae demon to save his son. And teenage rebel Vana trades her guitar for a blade when faced with ruthless nobility.
When worlds tear and hearts break, will they defy the gods’ narrative to create a brighter future or will they obey the lies preached and doom their souls forever?
¤
It’s a book in which the author plunges us into a well-constructed universe. I really liked the place that magic and the gods have in this story. After reading the synopsis, I was intrigued and I must say that in terms of the plot, the author went beyond my expectations.
In this book, we follow several characters, therefore several points of view: that of Ally, Se'azana, Richard and Vana. The author also mentions Balthos and Alames. I was carried away by this alternation of points of view. I found my reading dynamic and I was carried away until the end. The author created an electric atmosphere and I was curious to know the end of this first book.
However, even if in short, there were several elements that made me appreciate my reading, I was unfortunately sometimes disturbed. The alternation of viewpoints, dynamic as it was, was sometimes too fast for me. At the beginning of the book, I was confused and it took me a while to adapt to the rhythm of the story. Also, I struggled with the writing style. It’s quite simple and easy to read, but I lacked concentration due to some lengths.
Either way, these are minor details that tainted my appreciation of the book, but despite that, the end makes you want to know what will happen in the sequel!

This a very challenging book for me to review. I have been trying to finish this book for a long time ad finally completed it. There was a lot of heavy stuff going on. I really wanted to like this book but there was a lot of info dumping and too may character POVs.
I appreciate this book for having all the LGBTQ+ representation and a very unique magic system.
This book also contains a lot of trigger and content warnings that the author has listed on her website.


Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for a copy of this in exchange for an honest review.

Absolute unique story with enchanting details and, full character driven. Overall t is very refreshing

DNF @ 69 %
2.75 stars.
This was a little all over the place for me, it was so many characters, and very many that i just did not care for, wich made it harder to follow. It was interesting, but as i said " a little too all over the place" for my taste.

This story wasn’t strong enough to hold my attention, which I’m disappointed about. I was interested reading the description but it was hard to read this book

I really wanted to like this book, but it was a struggle for me. This book had a long list of characters, and it had a lot going on. Unfortunately, the amount going on and the number of characters made it harder for me to get invested in anything happening in the story. When the character I was following kept changing, it was hard to care what happened to any of them. I did like the writing itself, the author has a lot of talent, however I think she tried something "out there" and it just didn't land with me.

DNF at 15%
I really wanted to love this book, but it was just so long and confusing. I had to evaluate if I was curious enough and attached enough to the characters to care about what happens to them, and unfortunately the answer was no. I did like the writing style (for some character POVs more than others) and I would be willing to try reading this again at a later date, but right now I was not enjoying it enough to continue.

My thanks to the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book to review. For me, this was a slow and middling read. It had some really interesting concepts and characters, but overall it fell a little flat for me.

Goddess of Limbo is a creative and enchanting epic fantasy story with the delightful magic of the gods. This character-driven novel tells the story of how a group of unexpected heroes fight against gods and demons to save their souls. This premise seems to dream big and I was really pleased to see how interesting the characters are, how creative the world is, and how much everyone seems to grow throughout the book. Though it is a lengthy novel, it is perfect for those looking for a refreshing and different epic fantasy. If you are sick of the standard loosely veiled medieval England tome that is often epic fantasy Goddess of Limbo is a perfectly refreshing read!

“Free will is a relic of the past. Souls have a prewritten path to heaven. If they miss it, they are doomed to roam the lost realm of limbo as splinters of their former selves or worse—as demons.”

I pulled out my college speed reading on this one. It is fine but it is definitely a nearly 700 page novel that is just setting the groundwork for future books. There is some excellent world building and a plethora of characters to follow but I don’t know if the book needed to be as long as it is. There is a lot of filler and things that didn’t seem necessary as it didn’t move the plot forward. And I was totally lost on the timeline of the book. This is a fine fantasy novel and I hope that future books see things tightened up a bit.

Also, one of the great things with this novel is that there are trigger/content warnings in the book, on the author website, on netgalley and goodreads and more places I’m sure, so the reader can be aware of what they’re getting into. I think that due to seeing these I expected much darker/disturbing content but having those warnings were a welcome surprise.

eARC provided by NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

Much to my sadness, I didn´t get to finish this book before the time was up. I was really enjoying it but life got in the way and I wasn´t able to get back to it. I still wish to read it, as the writing was really fascinating and the plot had so many potential for me to love it. Wishing all the best to the author and publishing team!

This book seems like it was conceived as an exercise to include every possible type of sexual identity and relationship, including polyamory, pedophilia, domestic battery, incest, parental abuse, and abuse of authority. One of the characters seems to be neuro atypical. There is also a lot of homophobia, racism, bigotry, classism, sexism, a creepy priest, and evil perpetrated by gods or magical beings. There are a lot of characters to keep track of over more than a decade, but they are pretty well developed and for the most part likeable. I'm not sure why Ally is described as brilliant, and Subira's marriage is pretty baffling. I wouldn't say this is much like either The Stormlight Archive or The Priory of the Orange Tree, except in the most general sense. There is quite a lot of pregnancy. The first 90% of the story is about the relationships between the characters, their largely traumatic backstories, and the general political situation. There are humans, elves, orcs, part fae humans, and some magical beings or gods. In the final 10%, the gods suddenly take a very active role, and the action shifts back and forth into limbo, which is a sort of hell. At the very end there's a "to be continued" with some conclusions but mostly loose ends. This was well written enough that I didn't give up in frustration or disgust, and I enjoyed much of it, but it sort of meanders all over the place with little point other than that families and relationships are often horrible, but occasionally decent people are kind to each other.