Some advice? Don’t sleep with your dead brother’s girlfriend. Don’t move in with her. Don’t trust her.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher.

This book is …. bizarre. I like dark psychological thrillers, and this certainly falls into that category. It’s unlike anything I’ve come across.

Holly’s brother Dane moved in with his girlfriend after only knowing her a couple months. When he commits suicide after struggling with mental health issues, Holly is convinced there’s more to the story based on text messages, and she’s determined to discover what really happened.

She may have good intentions, but when Holly is in a position to uncover information about Dane’s death, it quickly becomes evident she doesn’t have a plan. Numerous opportunities are wasted, and she ambles about and spends more time fawning and obsessing over Maura, Dane’s fiance. I also didn’t get a good feel for Holly’s character other than her occupation, information about her family, and her living arrangements.

Savannah is arguably the most haunted city in America, and I’d hoped it would figure more prominently in the story. A couple areas are mentioned, but that’s as deep as it went. With Maura being a florist, it’s clear the author did extensive research on flowers and toxins. I was fascinated by it.

This novel ventures into some dark, disturbing places, so I’d advise checking trigger warnings before reading it. Although I wasn’t the biggest fan of the MC, I wouldn’t hesitate to read future novels by this author.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

This is billed as a Southern gothic thriller so I was incredibly intrigued... only to be quickly disappointed with a bizarre story that morphed into a ridiculous plot with frustrating characters who became exaggerated stereotypical caricatures. Basically, this became a hate read for me.

Holly's brother Dane is found cleaved open (literally) in his girlfriend's bathtub. Police say it was a suicide sparked by psychosis. Oooookay.

Holly begins her search for answers with Maura, Dane's girlfriend. Suddenly Holly's moved in to the extraordinary Savannah townhouse where her brother died and Maura is a creepy florist growing some weird plants in her greenhouse while seducing the sister of her dead boyfriend.

Seduction, secrets, and gaslighting of epic proportions plays out in implausible eye roll inducing ways.

Ugh.

Thanks to Bantam and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review. Such Pretty Flowers was released February 7, 2023.

A solid 4 star read for me. If it wasn't for the fact that the main character had ZERO personality, I probably would have enjoyed this so much more. The spooky atmosphere of the house and my love of flowers are what kept me invested. I really just wish Holly had had more of a personality and a reason for being aside from avenging the brother she ignored.

How fun was this one?!

Holly is living in Savannah and grieving the recent suicide of her younger brother. She is looking for answers, spurred by the last texts she received from him, and her distrust for his girlfriend. She becomes intertwined in a very interesting exploration and gets in too deep.

I started reading this right before I visited savannah for the first time, which really heightened this for me. This kept my attention the entire time and I enjoyed the two main characters. I could totally identify with Holly who is kind of a mess in her early(?) 20s, but is so realistic!

The ending was fun (although not very probable) but suspending my sense of reality kept me hooked! All and all would recommend.

I wanted to like this because a gothic horror novel sounds amazing but I couldn't get passed the character of Holly. I thought she was portrayed in a very flat way and even though the plot was engaging, it distracted me from enjoying it completely.

There's been an influx of 'flower horror' lately and it's odd but pretty cool. I like the idea of plants and flowers being either sentient or a tool for evil deeds. On that front, this book had a lot of that content and was my favorite part of reading the story.

The main character Holly is what I didn't like about the book. I can understand being wary or even afraid of a sibling after they've been diagnosed with a mental illness, especially one that can manifest violently. The way Holly almost shunned Zane got to me. He asked for help, told her things weren't right, and still she ignored him. It was only after his death that she bothered to look into things.

Then, Holly can't see what's happening with Maura because she's infatuated with her. This girl obviously has shady things happening, but Holly keeps forgetting because she just can't get over liking her deceased brother's partner. WTF.

I still enjoyed the horror aspect, though I wanted the plant's uses to go deeper and learn more about them.

I voluntarily read and reviewed this book. All opinions are my own. Thank you to Bantam and NetGalley for the copy

Such Pretty Flowers, is an adult thriller story following the perspective of Holly. It has been a couple months since Holly’s brother committed suicide, she is struggling with accepting facts surrounding his death, including his seemingly perfect girlfriend, but Holly does not by it, especially since the voice mail he left her the night of his death leaves her with a lot of questions, so she begins to dig a little deeper and decides to keep a close eye on his ex, Maura.
The introduction of this thriller was great, pulling you in with mysteries and horrifying circumstances of her brother's death. I wanted to know what the hell was going on and what could push someone to do that to themselves. I thought the use of sinister plants was a great twist and added an unsettling psychological aspect to the story. The writing was ok and easy to follow, after the introduction the story was pretty straightforward, there were no unexpected twists or throwing the reader with misdirection. I still enjoyed reading the story and the journey but knew the outcome. So, the main character Holly, I had a lot of problems with her decision-making skills, some of them I understood why she made them, plus she was having a hard time grasping and dealing with a lot in her life. Other decisions I just could not wrap my head around and they made no sense and left her horrible vulnerable. The cover is beautiful, so eye-catching, I loved the colors, and the dark shadows. It was a pretty good read but did not blow me away, it is still a solid read.
Trigger warning: Suicide, drug use, kidnapping
I received this advanced ebook, via Netgalley. This review is my own honest opinion.

This book was so interesting! The concept was very intriguing and I kept flipping the pages to find out what would happen next. Thank you for the early copy!

I gave this a three out of five stars. I enjoyed it but wasn’t my favorite. I don’t think I was in the right headspace to read. I think if I read it at a different time it would be a higher rating. I like the main characters and I wish I could read from her brothers pov of before the events in this book.

Such Pretty Flowers by K. L. Cerra had an exciting premise horror thriller focusing on botanical elements. In ways, that book lived up to this, but it also didn’t quite do it for me. Continue reading to get my fuller take on this new release.

Characters
Honestly, I did not like any of the characters in Such Pretty Flowers. Holly, the main character, made so many bad decisions that it was unbelievable to a certain point. And Maura just felt like such an obvious villain. Granted, her motives were not actually all that obvious until later revealed, but I was pretty over the sexy irresistible villain thing mid-way through. Other minor characters seemed to appear and disappear. These characters just slipped through my fingers and I could not tell whether or not they added to the overall book. I would have liked these characters to either be more fully situated in the narrative or removed/combined with others. Unfortunately, the characters were too one-dimensional to be interesting to me as a reader.

Plot, Pacing, Themes
I thought the overall plot was pretty compelling. I love plants, I love some gothic horror, what is not to love from the summary? When reading Such Pretty Flowers it was up and down with the pace, starting slowly. As a result, it was difficult for me to be immersed from the beginning. Putting pacing issues aside, Cerra has good bones for a creepy psychological thriller. Unfortunately, the follow-through was not there. If there was less focus on the ill-begotten romance between Holly and Maura, there would have been more time to fully delve into the southern gothic horror that seemed to be the draw for many readers. There were some, what I would describe as side-quests, that Holly used to investigate her brother’s death; these were not explored enough to be actually helpful for the plot and seemed tangential. Again, decrease the repetitive description of how Holly doesn’t trust Maura, but still gets sexually involved, and increase aspects of the novel that actually build up the plot.

Overall
I’m always here for a good gothic horror novel with Sapphic romance. Such Pretty Flowers does not hit that mark very well. The romance is obviously wrong as Holly doesn’t trust Maura since she thinks she was involved with her brother’s death. The execution of the plot did not lend itself well to being gothic horror or psychological thriller as much as it could have. Granted, I’m hoping that Cerra releases more as their career continues!

Southern gothic? High society? Deaths? Sounds like a perfect recipe for a great novel. Between the queer elements, the darkness, and weirdness of this book, it was an all around win for me.

Ⓑⓞⓞⓚ Ⓡⓔⓥⓘⓔⓦ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

𝕊𝕦𝕔𝕙 ℙ𝕣𝕖𝕥𝕥𝕪 𝔽𝕝𝕠𝕨𝕖𝕣𝕤
𝐊.𝐋. 𝐂𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐚
Psychological Thriller
336 pages

Sʜᴏᴿᴛ Sʏɴᴏᴘsɪs

After Holly’s brother commits suicide, she wonders what led him down that path. She plans on finding out by befriending his girlfriend. After moving in with her, she learns more than she bargained for.

Mʸ Tᴴᴼᵁᴳᴴᵀs

Psychological thrillers are my favorite genre, and this one is top-notch!
The story revolves around the strange relationship between Holly and Maura. Maura’s moods swing quickly and wildly making life difficult for Holly as she tries to learn more about Dane’s life before his suicide.

The characters make the story, but I can’t say I liked them. Their personalities fit the plot, but I had a hard time knowing Maura is only 22 years old. She is the younger of the two, yet seems like she has much more knowledge and personal property than possible, even for a child of rich parents.

Using plants as an integral part of the story brought something different. There is mention of several plants and what they represent. I found that interesting. The atmosphere was eerie, and somehow the plants brought much of that creepiness. Such Pretty Flowers is dark, with a bit of the paranormal thrown in. It is such a unique take on death, with Dane’s suicide being caused by something that no one would think of.

Such Pretty Flowers flows well, keeps you engaged, and is a unique read. If you like psychological thrillers, you can’t go wrong with this one.
Thank you to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for providing this ebook for me to read and review.

Interesting premise but I’m having a really hard time getting into this because of the writing style. For example, the descriptions are just plain weird, including: “asparagus-shaped shadows cast by my bedposts”, “eyes vacant as empty nighttime homes”, and the use of “little red sun” to describe a text notification.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This was a lush and wonderful queer novel. I loved this book and was in awe of it.

Let me start by saying I wanted to love this book, the premise hooked me from the second line.

The visual storytelling is stunning with imagery to rival some of the best that I've read, with a dark, creepy, downright horrifying story it has moments that are heartstopping and breathtaking.

Our characters are complex and feel like people, the pain I felt for Holly when Dane died was palpable and raw, and Holly's confliction for how she felt about Maura just made her that much more complex.

All of that being said as much as I enjoyed parts of this book some things just seemed rushed at the end and for me that took away from the overall reading experience.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group-Ballantine, Bantam for providing a copy of this ebook, I have voluntarily read and reviewed it and all thoughts and opinions are my own.

My rating: 3 of 5 stars--

As a main character, I found Holly very relatable. When her brother, Dane, dies, she's a twenty-something college grad who without direction--she moves back to her hometown, works a pretty low-skill library job with thoughts of grad school if she could afford it, and her best friend is planning on getting married and buying a house with her fiance, leaving Holly behind.

After her bother's rather gruesome suicide, Holly becomes fixated on her deceased brother's girlfriend, Maura. She finds herself moving into Maura's suspiciously fancy townhouse (how does a florist afford this..) where her brother died. Ostensibly, Maura is there to find out what ~really~ happened to her brother and if Maura was involved in his death. Holly continues to tell herself as things get weirder. And weirder. And weirder. And as her fixation on Maura grows into obsession, lust, and fear.

There was a ton to enjoy about Such Pretty Flowers--the atmospheric use of historic and ghost-storied Savannah. The mystery surrounding Maura's relationship with Holly's brother, business, inner circle, etc. Holly and Maura's relationship. The escalating creepiness as the mystery unfolded.

That said, there were so many little pieces and clues that I wanted some more resolution. One in particular was a desire for more backstory on how Maura and Dane's art school friend, Laura, had connected the couple, and whether there was malice or intentionality there. I also struggled with some of Maura and Holly's behaviors and motivations. By the end of the story, Maura exhibits a strong philosophical stance about suffering and sacrifice for beauty. And I feel like that should have been present in some way throughout the story. In a way that made her eventual actions feel a bit out of place for me.

My only other pet peeve was about the larger message of the book, which felt somewhat like an allegory aimed to show readers that intense emotions like grief, shame, fear. etc. are part of being human and a small price to pay for being alive. To me, this felt a bit dismissive of mental illness and the complex causes of suicidal ideation. For people struggling, you can't just decide to be happy and value your life.

2 stars for the first 75% of the book.
4 stars for the remainder of the book.

The first 75% of the book is so not what I was thinking I was getting myself into. This segment had some of the good elements of mystery and horror, but it was mostly Holly grieving over her brother Dane’s suicide. Then it got really bizarre when Holly moved in with Dane’s fiancé and then they started to sleeping together. I just couldn’t connect with the book since it felt like it was all over the place.

The last segment was really good. It became an entertaining freaky horrific nightmare. I couldn’t put the book down at this point. I really wish the whole book was like this part.

Thanks NetGalley and publisher for the digital copy in exchange for my honest review!

This one is creepy and has more violence than I typically care to read in a mystery, but still had engaging characters and a unique storyline!

Holly received strange messages from her brother Dane prior to his death, which police have called a suicide due to psychosis. She goes to Savannah and meets his girlfriend Maura, a florist involved in the city's high society. In following her and trying to learn more about Dane's death, Holly is drawn to Maura and the dark allure the woman has. As she gets closer to Maura, Holly risks finding out exactly what happened to Dane the hard way.

Holly and her parents are grieving after Dane's violent apparent suicide following an intense but short bout of psychosis. She initially finds Maura off and a bit creepy, but still moves in with her quickly when her roommate's fiance wants to get a separate condo for the two of them. The two quickly glom onto each other, and it's only partially due to Holly wanting to know more about Dane's final moments. Because Holly doesn't always delve into her own motives for doing anything, we feel her confusion keenly. The repetition of flowers and its images throughout the text adds a dreamy quality to the story, pulling you in just as Maura draws Holly's attention.

The creepy vibe and floral aesthetic if this book is ultimately chilling once we find out what's going on. The final third of the book had me racing through it to find out what happened next. The flowers, tea, and ghostly, haunted atmosphere helped sell the body horror elements that became more prominent at the very end. I don't know what I feel about Maura, but she's compelling and complicated, and I couldn't look away from this book.