This book had a lot of pieces or elements that had the potential to weave into a FANTASTIC dark romantasy read. It is dual pov (which I often really enjoy), we've got morally grey characters (say less!), and strong hunger games vibes. Grab your copy on 06.26.2024 and let me know what you think!

My first minor issue came when the first 4% of the book was a glossary of sorts for terms and characters for the book. On eBook I knew this was going to be hard to "flip" back and forth and there's no strong desire to read that many pages and memorize when you aren't yet even into the story. I feel like world building needs to be eased into and entice the reader to want to learn more. So it took me a minute to start to get into the actual storyline.

I began to like the MFC, Calista, I liked that she had a dark power and wanted to protect those close to her. I enjoyed her meeting, Azkiel, the god of death. They both seemed to be starved of touch and connection and feeling like they have a place.

As the book continued on, I felt like the story didn't quite piece together. I wanted to just get gripped when suddenly a story line connected or made sense. I kept going because I felt like there was hope this was going to all come together and just nail it (like SJM the last 200 pages of her books).

**potential spoilers**
There's a bit of a love triangle here with childhood friend Drake and Azkiel and though I knew she was going to end up falling for the morally grey guy, I got annoyed that Drake turned out to be the "Tamlin" or "Dane" of the book.

I also like some spice in a book, but for some reason the spice in this one just didn't feel right. We are supposed to believe he hasn't ever been able to touch someone but he sure knew what to do (I know this ties into the memory plot line but still). Just didn't feel like a slow burn lead up to this romance - kinda quick and dirty.

The ending - was ABRUPT. Not a great cliffhanger where you are like "GIMME BOOK 2!!!!" but literally "The End... for now..." I feel like it could've been edited better.

All that said - I think that I would pick up a physical copy of this book and see if I enjoyed it more when I can flip back to glossary. I'm curious if book 2 could work it's magic and really finish this story, weaving together the pieces in all the right spots.
Overall: 3.5 out of 5 (goodreads - we need half stars!)
Spice: 2 out of 5

Shout out to Netgalley and Victory Editing NetGalley Co-op for providing this ARC - these honest opinions are my own!

3.5 Stars
If you like dark fantasy themes, this book is worth checking out! The story follows Calista, a witch who has Death’s powers – which is a secret she has to keep due to the powers being against the laws of nature. We also have Azkiel’s (the god of Death) point of view throughout the book as he tries to stop a prophecy involving Calista. The two form an unexpected alliance and must work together (while trying to figure out how she has his power to begin with). There is a lot of world building throughout this book, as it is the first book in a series (the book ends on a major cliffhanger). There were elements that dragged a bit, but it wasn’t too bad and may have been intentional to set the stage for future books. There was a bit of a ‘Hunger Games’ feel to the Harvest tournament, but I like how the author creatively leverages magic in a way that makes the tournament different. I look forward to reading the next book to see what happens. Thank you Victory Editing and NetGalley for the eARC.

This book has a great start and finish, but the middle drags a bit and could have been shorter. It kicks off with some cool death magic and the God of Death, but loses steam once they get to the island. It kind of reminded me of "The Hunger Games" but without the same thrill. Things get interesting again around 85% in, with some good chemistry and secrets coming out. It's like Greek mythology meets "The Hunger Games." The main characters are awesome, and the dual POV works well. The cliffhanger isn't too shocking, but it’s still a fun ride. I’d recommend it, especially if you like Kerri Maniscalco's books or were let down by "Lightlark." My main gripes are that it feels a bit too long and repetitive, and the romance speeds up too quickly once it starts. But overall, it's a magical, action-packed read with great characters and hidden secrets.

Thank you to NetGalley for the free ARC of this book. This in no way affects my opinions.
Review date: 6/20/24, Release date: 6/27/24

If this had been the author's first book, I would have rated it higher because the plot sounded absolutely amazing. The premise was that 12 people are chosen to go out and basically murder each other until there is one standing who gets to become one of the leader's of the society. Whenever you murder someone, you get their power. And if they killed others, you get whatever power they inherited too. Cali starts off strong with a secret power from the God of Death- the power of decay. Any living thing she touches (mostly when she wills it) turns to ash.

Unfortunately, we didn't even get to the part where people get chosen until about 48% through the book. Some reviews said that it had a lot of world building, but I really didn't see much. We know nothing about the rest of the world other than this city. I found the first half to be tediously slow and I set the book down at least a dozen times. It finally picked up after all the chosen head out to the island to compete, but it still felt slow all throughout the book to me.

In the ARC I received, I have 35 grammatical errors and other typos highlighted which really made the story stop and go for me. I'm really hoping that these errors got fixed before it went to print (since it releases in one week). The author used the same phrase (clench my thighs) repeatedly when talking about the FMC Cali being aroused and it was enough for me to start counting (I read either 4 0r 5).

Azkiel, the MMC, had about as much personality as a piece of cardboard. He's a shadow daddy, so anyone who is really into that is going to love the spicy scene here. The rest of him was severely lacking, other than anger that Cali has his power when she shouldn't. It ends on a cliffhanger, so maybe he'll get fleshed out more now that we got a little back story on him near the end?

I found the romance between Cali and Az to be very similar to the Kingdom of the Wicked trilogy by Kerri Maniscalco, which isn't a bad thing because I loved that series.

Overall, I don't really know how to feel about this. It wasn't at a pace that I like my books and I had a lot of complaints. But the story was very intricate and I loved that they claimed others' powers and that whole magic system. Cali is vengeance and fury and ready to make heads roll.

Some tropes include:
-Shadow daddy
-He can touch ONLY her
-Strong sister relationship
-Dual POV
-Enemies to lovers
-Deadly competition
-Lost memory

I really enjoyed the magic system and world building in this one. The beginning was bit confusing but once I kept reading everything made sense.

Thank you NetGalley for this ARC.

The premise of this story was good, I was very excited to read this one. However I found the beginning to be a bit confusing for me, it jumped around a bit so it was hard for me to get into and overall wasn’t for me.

I enjoyed the story and the concept of this book. The world it is set in was definitely right up my alley. I only wished that the romance stuck with the slow burn all the way through the end of the book or that the romance between Calista and Azkiel was developed a little quicker throughout the book(I would have preferred slowed down). The romance at the end just felt rushed. I loved the cliff hanger at the end and cannot wait to see what happens next.

Also just a side note I do hope there was one more go at the editing before going to printing because there were some areas of grammatical issues and weird phrasings through out.

Thank you for the opportunity but unfortunately this is a DNF for me.

I was a little overwhelmed by the intro with all the information. Imo it may have been better for it to be in the back, at least for a book one. I could have gotten past that but I DNF somewhere between 50-60%. If felt repetitive and like nothing had really happened. I also had no clear idea who the love interest was going to be.

It also may not hurt to have some closer editing done. I found a few cases where pronouns switched around when describing the same person.

Such a beautifully written fantasy book! This was captivating and I was drawn in by the cover alone, to find that the blurb was giving high fantasy vibes meet Hunger Games and I couldn’t wait to pick it up.

The author does a great job with her world building, with intricate storytelling and amazing characters. I would have loved a map to be included, as is always the case with a fantasy book, but I devoured this in a couple of days and will definitely be picking up book two.

A spectacular book drenched in both myth and magic, a Night of Death and Flowers is a must read for all romantic fantasy fans.

Told from a dual narrative between Calista and Azkiel, this book does take quite a while to get going, but the first half sets the scene and builds tension for when the action peaks later on in the novel.

I felt a bit overwhelmed by the glossary at the beginning depicting characters, worlds and pronunciations and feared that I'd have trouble reading if I couldn't commit all of the information to memory. However, this wasn't the case as the world building throughout the novel still included enough information relating to people/places etc. Though I am grateful for the glossary as I most definitely would never have known how to pronounce Nyxara without it!

The ending had me gripped to read more, and I can't wait for the next installment.

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

I enjoyed this one. The competition of who would become the next elder was interesting and fun. I really loved the lore of the gods and the themes of darkness and light within a person. Anything having to do with a sister bond is a big plus for me as well.

I did find the book to be a bit repetitive and I wanted some more of the gods - hopefully this will happen in the next book!

This is not effect my star rating but there was a LOT of typos, duplicate words, and things that didn’t make sense grammatically. I’m hoping that it gets edited more before publication, it was really distracting.

I’ll be reading the sequel for sure. Thank you to the author, publisher; and Netgalley.

3.5 stars

I liked the magic system in this, with a whole island protected by the dead. The beginning is really cool too with the festival with good descriptions as the sisters sneak around.

I really liked Azkiel, the God of Death, as a character, but I actually found the chapters from his PoV a bit hard to get into at times and hard to connect with. It's almost as if the author didn't have a clear fix on his voice. I felt that I saw him more clearly through Cali's eyes.

Calista is a great character. I love the morally grey ones.

Pacing was pretty good throughout, although there were a few areas where it was a bit slower.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for giving me an ARC copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

3.5 stars!

This was a very quick read and easy to get into!

I liked the world and the magic system, I thought it was unique and cool!

I loved Calista and Death together! I loved how their power was connected and he didn’t shy away from her darkness. I enjoyed that she did have that darkness in her and she wasn’t a complete damsel in distress. I love morally grey characters, that have goodness in them but aren’t afraid to get their hands dirty!

I expected more villainy from Death though. He did have his moments when he did evil things, but he didn’t seem that heartless for a lot of it. I was expecting to see more. To mortals he seemed evil, but he really wasn’t. He did some cruel things, but in the grand scheme of things it wasn’t all that bad.

I wish they had more scenes together though. By the end they were together a lot! But I wish we could have seen that build more. Yes he helped her out, and their magic drew them to each other, but we didn’t see them really falling in love again. Just one minute she hated him, the next she lusted over him. Which you can lust over someone and not be in love, but they did have that connection. For most of the book he wasn’t around her, and I would have loved to see them together. At the end I was eating all their interactions up!

I love a trope where magic connects them and lets them have a strong bond that draws them to each other.

I hate the best guy friend trope in books like these, especially when they’ve always had a thing for each other but you know it won’t happen because of the new main love interest. Obviously she was not going to end up with Drake in the end, so why try and put them together? It’s just pointless. I’d rather there be no romantic feelings for the best friend because the best friend is always boring and uninteresting, and just plain annoying. I did get smug when Drake knew they were together and got angry about it, but he still was a waste of space in my opinion. I’d much rather read about Calista and Ari’s sister bond and leave it at that. She didn’t need to protect two people. That was one thing that bothered me. He just seemed like a plot device and not someone to actually care about.

I loved Thorn, even though he wasn’t in it very much and he is a crow. I was so scared something was going to happen to him, that would have been so sad.

I think there was a lot of plot points that didn’t need to be there. I think the Harvest aspect of the book could have been cut out completely. It served a purpose to get the characters where they needed to go, but it took up so much space in the book yet was barely focused on and didn’t have any payoff or importance at the end of it. They only had a couple of fights to make it seem like the “Hunger Games” and everything else was about freeing the gods. I also think the beginning dragged, but that goes back to we didn’t need the set up of the Harvest because I didn’t think it needed to be in there. I would much rather have read a bunch of scenes with Calista and Death in place of all the talk about how Calista’s family was against her and how it was unfair that people were forced into the Harvest. Especially because again, that was of so little importance by the end of the book.

And the ending! I love a good cliffhanger and could see one coming knowing there was a second book, but it ended way too abruptly! It felt like she didn’t know how to end it so she just ended it in the middle of a scene. I didn’t need much more at the end of it, but something to close it off better.

Despite all of that, I really do think it’s worth reading, especially if you like all of the tropes listed! I definitely want to read the second book, especially because I have a feeling that we will see Azkiel and Calista interact way more, as well as, I’m hoping we will see Calista descent to a more evil and destructive path, since I love a good corruption arc.

I will be posting this review on Goodreads on 6/19/2024 and on Amazon on the release date!

I received this as an ARC & I must say it’s so beautifully written.
However before diving into this book I do recommend looking into the triggers that are inside the book as there are quite a few & your mental health is important 🫶

The author gives you a glossary in the beginning of the book describing each and every important detail in the book giving you pronunciation on the names and detailed descriptions on the world that you are put into allowing you to imagine & understand the story more.

This book had me hooked & made me fall in love with the characters! I have yet to finish the book but I have gotten quite a bit into it but I do recommend giving it a read once released

This book held a great deal of potential and I was very excited to read it. The storyline was everything I craved, witches and gods, action and romance. The author skilfully set up the world, giving each coven distinct characteristics and detailed backgrounds.
The main characters provided some complexity and intrigue, without being empty.

However, I really struggled with the writing in the copy I was provided. Unfortunately this has affected my rating heavily, as the issues were present throughout the majority of the book, with sentences that didn’t make sense, pronouns being switched randomly and punctuation that wasn’t appropriate. I really hope that this gets another round of edits before publication, the story has the potential to be great but the writing really let me down.

I really enjoyed this book! A slow burn spicy romance mixed with an exciting world of gods and magic. I enjoyed the author's writing style and she really brought the characters to life. I found myself not wanting to put the book down and I can't wait to read the next one now!

Thank you Netgalley for this ARC to read and review.

Tiktok review to be posted on publication.day.

Wow, so good! There were many things I didn’t see coming, which doesn’t happen often for me and I thoroughly appreciated that. One spicy scene. Definitely enemies to lovers trope. You’ll get Hunger Games vibes from this because people are forced to kill each other every 10 years. But it’s also more old school with gods instead of futuristic with high tech. Really good read!

I would like to note that I received this ARC with the mindset that I would provide an honest review.

Betrayal
Gods/Goddess
Villain Gets the Girl
He Falls First
Forbidden Magic
💀 Tournament
Witches and Monsters

Premise:
Calista is a witch that has the God of Death’s powers and has to hide her power because of it. However, she has reached the age of the Harvest and this puts her at risk because others could discover her powers. At the same time, Azkiel (God of Death) wow returns to his human form to prevent a prophecy from occurring.
This books puts you on an adventure and it leaves you wanting more. I am excited to see what happens next in the next book.

Okay, let me start by saying one of the best things about this book was the banter, both with the internal thoughts and the conversations between the characters; the banter leaves you laughing and loving the characters more.

I will say that the story dragged in some areas and there were some grammatical errors but nothing that messed with the readability of this book. The world building was long and drawn out in some areas and some plot points were repeated several times throughout the story.
Overall, this was a good first read and I will be reading this again when it releases later this month.

Release Date: June 26th

⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️
🌶️ 🌶️

Wow what a first book in a series!!! I love the connection between the gods and the witches, its unique with some archaic traditions and secrecy relating to the history of the connection.

My heart breaks for the end of this book, the betrayals and deceptions though slightly predictable are still crushing. Also I love when death especially as a god is depicted in books, the character is always broody, slightly cruel and seductive - a character you can desire and loathe all at once. Calista is a great character with her noble moral compass and a loyalty to her friends and family that shapes the story in devastating ways.

I really liked this story, whole cocnept is good, idea is great, but.. there are too many gramatical errors, which I hope they will edit correctly, and too many repeatings of things know from the start.
I liked Calista's determination and darkness, but too many times she was overconfident and a bit annoying. Drake is typical good guy who wants to save Calista even when she doesn't need it, resulting in him making a mess. Ari, I don't know, she's portrayed as a soft and weak, but her actions says otherwise.
Azkiel, painted as a villain, while all he wanted was to save his love, man starved of affection.
And while Cali's and Azkiels connection was good, the thing that bothered me during their sexy time, was description of his skilled fingers etc.. How can man who can't touch anyone, who last touched anyone 150 years ago and not for long,can be that skilled? The spice was good, but those details.. cmon..
That been said, I want to know what happens next, after all that at the end..