Shannon Ives’ Those Fatal Flowers is a captivating blend of history and mythology, set against the haunting backdrop of Roanoke. This mysterious novel kept me engaged from start to finish, offering a unique perspective on timeless struggles.

The story follows Thelia and her sisters, who have been banished to the island of Scopuli and cursed to live as sirens. Eventually, Thelia escapes to Roanoke, only to discover that the colony is a perilous place, especially for women. This novel’s themes resonate deeply, coming at a time when women’s rights are still contested. Thelia’s journey reflects both personal resilience and systemic oppression, making it a fitting narrative for today’s readers.

Ives masterfully weaves mythical elements into the historical setting, creating a story that feels both timeless and fresh. The siren mythology is beautifully explored, adding layers of intrigue and depth to Thelia’s character and her sisters’ plight. The setting of Roanoke is richly detailed, bringing the dangers and patriarchal dominance of the colony vividly to life.

However, the novel’s attempt to draw parallels between the suffering of white women under the colony’s patriarchal leaders and those same leaders’ enslavement and slaughter of Indigenous women feels underdeveloped. While Ives acknowledges these racial dynamics, there is a noticeable lack of depth or commentary on this aspect of history. This omission is unfortunate, as a more nuanced exploration could have enriched the story’s impact.

Despite this shortcoming, Those Fatal Flowers is a compelling read. Its strong female characters, mythical elements, and historical fiction foundation make it a standout novel. If you enjoy stories that combine mythology with powerful themes and unique settings, this book is well worth your time.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House - Ballantine for this ARC!

Those Fatal Flowers was everything I needed even if I didn’t know I needed it when I started. It is such a beautiful depiction of feminine rage. I love the sapphic storyline and the exploration of sexuality. I love how empowered I felt after reading it. Thelia js the best of best FMCs ever. You will enjoy Those Fatal Flowers if you enjoy sapphic romance, powerful FMC, and mythological retellings.

Rating: 3 Stars
Format: E-book (ARC - pub Jan 21, 2025)
Genre: Historical Fiction, Fantasy, Myths and Retellings
TWs: Murder, violence, gore, miscarriage (graphic, on page), sexual assault, sexual violence, rape, cannibalism

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review!

Those Fatal Flowers is a fascinating take on a mythical retelling, blending Greco-Roman inspiration with colonial historical fiction. It follows Thelia, who is one of three sirens, former handmaidens to Proserpina (Perseophone). After she is taken by Dis (Hades) to the underworld, the sirens are exiled to an island called Scopuli as punishment for failing to protect Proserpina from Dis’s attack. From there we follow the three cursed sisters’ struggle for survival and efforts to escape their exile.

One of this book’s strongest elements is the writing. I enjoyed the alternating timelines and felt like Ives did a good job of giving us just enough information to keep things moving without bogging down the pacing. I was definitely entertained throughout the entire book and I was invested in Thelia’s arc enough to want to know what she was up to and how she would grow. Thelia had some major character flaws at the beginning of this book and it was satisfying to see her grow and change some of her problematic beliefs. I liked many of the side characters, but I do wish we got more development of Thelia’s sisters. They didn’t feel as fleshed out as some of the other members of the cast.

And as a warning, this book is pretty brutal. I think some of the violence was effective and some of it took up a bit too much space. There are graphic descriptions of the killing, mutilating, and eating of the men that Thelia and her sisters lure to their island through their magic song. I appreciated the underlying rage that the women in this book felt and I understand the catharsis of some of the violence against very bad and corrupt characters, but it didn’t always land.

As others have mentioned, an element that didn’t really work for me was the discussions, or lack thereof, of colonization. We don’t see a single Native person on-page. There are references to Indigenous populations in Virginia, but I didn’t like how the atrocities committed against those Indigenous groups by the community Thelia found herself in were sort of swept under the rug by the narrative. Those atrocities are mentioned, and there are hints that the narrative is self-aware enough to paint them as bad because they are denounced on-page, but I don’t think that Ives explored that enough, especially when so much of the book discusses morality, violence, and innocence. If you’re going to do a colonial setting in historical fiction, you should flesh out all the implications of a character like Thelia stumbling into that colonial setting. The absence of Indigenous characters was very weird throughout.

Overall, I thought this book was entertaining and easy to read even with its flaws and thematic missteps. I think enjoyers of myths and retellings will find a lot to like here.

This is an overall solid book, it’s full of female rage and I loved that part of it. The writing is easy to follow and immersive, I felt I understood the main character well and felt for her predicament. The pacing was a bit slow as it took me a long time, over halfway thru the book to become invested in the story. I think if you enjoy female rage and Greek mythology then this is good. It doesn’t have much that is new to that genre but the addition of the Roanoke community mixed with ancient gods made it interesting.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House-Ballantine for granting me access in exchange for an honest review.

Those Fatal Flowers is a feminist rage epic that embodies Greco Roman mythology and the Roanoke City tragedy.

Disclaimer: I did receive this as an audiobook arc from Penguin Random House audiobook influencer club as well as an e-book from NetGalley. I mostly read this on audiobook. This is my honest and voluntary review.

**I would highly suggest paying attention to the content warnings page at the beginning of this book. It is also narrated in the audiobook for those who need it. The triggers are heavy and they are graphic in some areas.

I really enjoyed the narration of this audiobook. The narrator's voice was extremely soothing in the areas it needed to be and kicked it up a notch when it was a more brutal and gory scene. I would be interested in reading more books by this narrator.

This book is a hard one to read for me. There are aspects of this book that really hit home for me and that I really enjoyed, but there are also aspects of this book that I felt were a little extreme and improperly utilized.

The feminine rage was overall very empowering and done well in most areas as pertaining to adult relationships. There are definitely men in this book that you really wish would just meet there untimely end in a very gory and horrible way. I feel like the internalized misogyny within females of the book was also handled really well. But the part of the book that I did not vibe with was misogyny and sexism being thrust upon male children within the book. At one point, our main female character expresses her dislike for small male children because she's concerned they'll grow up to be misogynist. Up to the point where she won't even interact in a reasonable way with them. And I thought that was a little odd because, they are children, and even this child in particular is being raised by a single mother, which does not indicate he will in any way grew up to be a misogynist.

I found the premise in the story to be super interesting and this is why I have a hard time really figuring what to rate this book. While I had some issues with some of the content that really turned me off in a lot of ways there were also a lot of parts of this book I feel I will remember for a very long time. I did have a little bit of a hard time with the main female character, I floundered between really liking and respecting her to kind of rolling my eyes at some points because she's just extremely dramatic and takes things a little too far for my taste at times.

Overall, I feel like I can give this book a 3.75 because even though there was some parts that I did not overly enjoy in the book, it'll still stick with me for a while because the story and the utilization of feminine rage I think is a very lasting emotion in the book. I would be interested in giving some more work by this author a chance.

I've really been into the Greek myth retellings that have been coming out for the last couple of years. This stands out among the many that have been published lately because of the multiple timelines twist. I really enjoyed the character build-up of Thelia. It's good to have imperfect main characters. I would definitely read another book by this author!

There are a couple of TW: gore, rape, abduction, assault

Thanks to Net Galley, the publisher, and Shannon Ives for this Advanced Reader Copy. This book publishes January 21, 2025.

I isn’t really enjoy the book because I was excited to read about the Greek/roman side and the Roanoke. It it didn’t really seem like the author did a good job with it. I love Greek stories since I was young when I first read Percy Jackson. I enjoy most of the Greek fiction books that I’ve read but it just wasn’t for me.

i liked the promise this one provided, but at times this turned out... less so. i DID NOT like how there was no indigenous main character, or in fact any indigenous voice in this, almost trying to divorce the colony of roanoke from colonialism. that was..., not so great. 2 stars. thanks to Random House and netgalley for the arc.

A brilliant women-centric retelling of the story of Proserpina, goddess of spring and daughter of Ceres goddess of the , who gets stolen off by the lord of the underworld after eating pomegranate seeds. Before Proserpina gets stolen away, Thelia and her two older sisters serve as Proserpina’s handmaidens, and Thelia has a budding teen romance with her. After the kidnapping, Ceres in her rage banishes the sisters as Sirens to a remote island and changes them into half women and half flying animal bodies but allows them to retain their hypnotic singing voices that lure men and ships to crash upon their shore. In their monstrous forms, the women sacrifice men to Ceres in hopes of forgiveness, to no avail. The fates of the Sirens ultimately will fall into the hands of Proserpina.

Meanwhile, blended into this is an imaginative intersection the creation of a new myth centered on the lost American colony of Roanoke. Thanks to Proserpina’s help and the request that the sisters sacrifice the lives of many men in her honor, Thelia manages to escape the island in her human body and sets sail to lure men back to the sister’s island. She arrives carrying jewels and gold from the ships that have crashed on the island and offers more for a husband and men up for taking more of the spoils. In a colony dominated by mostly cruel men, Thelia discovers a new love in Cora, who bears an uncanny resemblance to Proserpina.

Ultimately, the story centers on female empowerment, and the complex strength (and in Ceres case destruction) of women’s relationships with each other. It also joins the group of amazing books that have emerged the past couple of years that retell myths from a keen imagined women’s perspective in sharp contrast the storytelling over the centuries based on men’s accounts.
The language borders on the poetic, so incandescent that you find yourself slowly down your reading to simply absorb its luminosity.

Thanks to Random House, Ballantine & Dell, and NetGalley for an advanced reader’s copy.

This was a weird mash-up of settings, but I enjoyed the book. Those Fatal Flowers combines the myth of the sirens (with their backstory of being friends with Persephone and failing to save her from abduction by Hades) with the abandoned Roanoke colony from American history. Honestly, I would have preferred the story if the colony had remained unnamed, as it was kind of weird to know too many specifics about the lands mentioned in the book. It also seemed like another random Americanization of Roman history. Having said that, though, I was invested. This book was dual timeline and I preferred reading about the Sirens surviving on their harsh island during their exile, but both were interesting and I wanted to see where everything ended up. Overall, I would recommend it to others who already like this genre.

I found the premise of this book to be super interesting, however, it did take me a majority of the book to "get into it" so to speak. And while I definitely appreciate the feminine rage present in this book, I can't really get past how the author chose to totally exclude colonialism and Native Americans from a book that takes place in the Roanoke Colony. This was touched on in the author's note at the end, but I found it to be a weak excuse.

I really enjoyed this. I have also had a soft spot in my heart for the story of Persephone, but I was unsure how to feel about this one initially because of how much it differs from the original tale. That being said if you add any sapphic element to anything, I am naturally reeled in. I think the beginning of this does drag a little bit however, especially the scenes in the before as I found the chapters in Roanoke to be more compelling as there was much more meat to that part of the story. About halfway in, it does begin to really pick up and I couldn’t put it down. It was really unique to blend the story of the Abduction of Prosperina and the mystery of Roanoke and while this book is particularly harsh to men, I don’t mind because so am I. Otherwise, I think this is a fun take on a Roman myth that stands out from all the others that we are being inundated with as of late. I recommend!

Thank you to Random House - Ballantine & NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!

The grief and rage of violence endured, witnessed, and enacted is a cornerstone of greco-roman mythology. Ives captures the nature of those tales wonderfully in this novel. The sorrow of a curse endured and eventually embraced in some forms was the driving interest of this book. While the continued mythology of the "lost colony" Roanoke did not really hit for me, that particular setting seemed more out of structure use than anything. As gendered experiences of society and homosocial expectations have shifted, early colonization was an easier in point for the novel than others. Ives and her story are more interested in stark gendered experiences, especially as they pertain to violence and survival than anything else. This is what drives community and character. Comprehension of monstrosity depends upon understanding survival this novel and what that is versus what is choice for enjoyment.

Those Fatal Flowers by Shannon Ives, I was very into Thelia’s story and was captivated by her love for Percepina, but when she landed in Roanoke and they not only had houses, servants, a meeting hall, and a tavern, I was totally thrown off the story. not to mention there’s no interaction with the Algonquin tribe nothing. So as a historical read this really failed big time as a love story I was was into the story, but not as much as I would’ve been had she got the historical details at least close to correct I could see stretching the truth, but they have a whole town and a tavern, as if they had ways to get alcohol to their little colony. IDK, there was just too much missing. I mean, reading the story. It looks like instead of going missing the people of Roanoke prospered and even had commerce and did it with no interaction from the tribes. I mean, why pick Roanoke and not even make the environment close to resembling that there wasn’t even mention of John English the man who brought them there no mention of Virginia the first baby born there nothing nothing that made you think oh they must be in Roanoke I just didn’t like this book. I’m sorry maybe I know too much about the reality of the stories involved and it ruined it for me either way this was not my type of story. i’m not someone who believes just because the story is set in colonial days. They should have negative interactions with the colonizers and others, but don’t say the book is based off Roanoke and have them one, not interact with Indians and two, live in the town as if they did well there. #NetGalley, #ShannonIves, #ThoseFatalFlowers,

I ended up DNFing at 13%. I wasn't vibing with the writing style and felt kind of confused because even during the "now" chapters there were flashbacks and it made the timeline kind of wonky. I wasn't really sure of the plot at that point, but re-reading the synopsis I don't think this will be for me.

"Those Fatal Flowers" by Shannon Ives is a unique mix of mythology and historical fiction, combining the Greco-Roman story of Proserpina (Persephone) and the mystery of the lost colony in Roanoke. Filled with feminine rage and a touch of romance, this is the perfect read for fans of "Cerce" by Madeline Miller and "Ariadne" by Jennifer Saint. It would also be a great selection for a book club because there are a lot of interesting and important topics to unpack and discuss.

This is a good debut novel and I enjoyed parts of it immensely. There is some beautiful writing that paints a vivid picture of the world Ms. Ives imagined for her characters. However, it is dense in many places and moves more slowly than I would like. I, like many other early readers of this book, found it troubling that the author chose to largely exclude what the colonists did to Native Americans. She included so many other heavy topics in detail, why minimize the tragedies caused by colonization that should be so central to any story involving such colonization? Why include this setting at all if you are not going to include it fully?

Overall, this was a good, but not great, novel. I enjoyed it enough to be open to reading other offerings from this author but not enough that I would read it again.

Nothing gets me going like Greek mythology retellings, and tied into one of the biggest mysteries in the U.S., Roanoake, had me requesting this faster than you can say American Horror Story. I loved the back and forth between past and present, and how the myth of sirens was presented. The sapphic romance was the perfect accompaniment to a story like this, and if you like historical fiction with a bit of magic thrown in, this is for you.

Greek mythology meets American Roanoke colony mystery in this epic female rage adventure. Three sisters are cursed to live out their centuries long life as sirens on an island of Scopuli for after the daughter of queen is taken to the underworld. For the three sisters to survive, they must sing to lore sailors to the island and they sacrifice the sailors to the queen. But one day, the curse is partially lifted allowing a sister, Thelia, to leave the island as a human in a boat and it finds it way to Roanoke. With jewels in tow, the men of the Roanoke colony want to discover Scopuli and its riches.

This is beautifully written with mythology woven into present day where the themes, regardless of era, are the same. Men are powerful and women are beneath them. The women in the story, despite their differences and upbringings, join together in hatred of men. While yes, the book briefly mentions the natives of Roanoke, the story isn't about that. So to read this for what it is, it's a great book.

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for the ARC. Opinions are my own.

DNF at 51%. I may finish reading this book at some point, since the sections that happen in the past with the three sisters on their island I find interesting, but nothing else about the plot has kept me engaged enough to want to continue. Plenty of other people have mentioned the glaring lack of native Americans present during the scenes that take place in Roanoke - and yet there are plenty of mentions of massacres of native peoples as well as those taken to be enslaved - so I won’t go too in-depth with that here. In all honesty, that issue is not why I decided to stop reading this book. I just could not get over how poorly I felt the plot of the two locations in this book were stitched together.

The scenes on the island felt natural, and I did enjoy the ability to see the passing of time based on the names and outfits of the sailors - as compared to the siren sisters who are stuck in one place and from the time they were banished. However, once the main sister washes ashore on Roanoke, I felt like the plot fell apart entirely. You would have me believe that these people simply believed that a woman, by herself in a boat surrounded by treasure, washed ashore and their response was to simply believe that she is actually a princess looking for a husband? Huh? This part felt so poorly formulated I was in disbelief when her plan had come to light, because it seemed absolutely wild that anyone would ever believe this story - and especially not a bunch of godly people living in the harshness of the New World. Everything that happened during the “Now” parts felt unrealistic and like it only existed to make the story move forward.

I also found the story to be oddly told - with only bits and pieces being shown to us as we read, and yet already kicking off the plot with the much later actions. The entire reason Thelia is at Roanoke is because, apparently, she was told by Proserpina that she could reverse their curse if “she had more blood” but. That’s it. I don’t know how she was the one chosen to go to Roanoke, how they decided on the plan to shove her in a boat with treasure, how or when they were changed back into humans, nothing. And I would like to clarify that yes, I know I haven’t finished this book, but I feel like those are very reasonable plot questions that should have been answered earlier and when they were occurring. Especially about the boat with the treasure, or why Thelia was chosen, or why she chose the ridiculous reasoning for her presence that she did. Once again, I stopped reading because I felt like half of the plot was so poorly held together it stretched the imagination past believability.

I also felt like the “romance” that was presented in this book was uncomfortable. The entire reason our main character is attracted to the woman that she is is because she, apparently, looks exactly like her former love of Proserpina - and for no other reason. Every description of the woman forces us to be reminded that she is only interested in her because of someone else, and never by her own merits. In my opinion, as the “romance” progressed and we see the beginnings of the love interest being attracted to the main character, I was rooting for her to NOT be because she deserved better than to just come as a runner-up to someone Thelia has been in love with for millenia.

This book also goes to great lengths to show us how every man in this world is cruel and evil, and how our main character cannot talk to a single one without thinking about how he should be killed. Practically every woman in this book is shown to be trapped and unhappy with her lot in life, and every man is shown to be completely happy doing the trapping. I’m not saying that plenty of women weren’t oppressed during this time, but - even for the scenes outside of Roanoke - we cannot get one single mention of a man without the negative commentary about his actions or personality, even if he hasn’t actually done anything by that point. Instead, we (within the mind of the main character) are simply waiting for him to prove our disdain, every single time. It got extremely tiring and repetitive after a while.

I think this book could have captured my attention better if it had done a better job of using its location properly (it seems odd to specifically mention how you, as the author, didn’t feel like it was your place to write native American characters and then use Roanoke as a location), or improve the plot and characterization. The idea of Greek sirens being the reason for the disappearance of the colony at Roanoke I think could have been interesting, but the way this was written was not and required a lot of suspension of disbelief that kept taking me out of the story. I also felt like the storytelling format fell flat, where decisions would be made and we (as the reader) had no understanding or reasoning behind them - which, when so many of those same decisions were rather absurd - having an ounce of reasoning would have, potentially, helped keep me in the story.

Also. Why the Roman names for everyone? Odd choice.

Thank you to Netgalley and Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine for providing this e-ARC.

I usually don't gravitate towards historical fiction, but this one peaked my interest. it took me much longer than I care to admit to start reading it. the plot was decent, and the characters we were interesting. it just took me a while to get through.