ARC rating: 4.5
This book was such a rollercoaster to read and I really enjoyed it. I went into this book not really knowing what to expect so at the beginning I was confused about what was happening and where the book was going but I am so glad that I did that because it ended up making it a lot more enjoyable looking back. The book started off a little slow for me but once the plot started to pick up I didn’t want to put it down. At times I struggled to imagine this world and the characters and I wish we had a little bit more description of them but that is really my only complaint about this book. I feel like the whole story is something that I haven’t read before. While it has trials and kidnapping the way that everything plays out is new and fresh. The betrayal in this book was shocking and hurt and I loved it and can’t wait to see how the aftermath of it plays out. I can’t stop thinking about how the trials played out and the ending of the book and I can’t wait to read book 2.

The book follows Revna who is a princess with no magic in a family where everyone has powers and in a society where people who have powers have the ability to live comfortably. Every generation the children of the royal family fight to death in a trial until one is standing and they become the next leader of the country. Revna decides that she is going to compete in the trials and try to win for all of the people who don’t have any powers even though that means competing against her military-trained brothers who have magic. While starting to prepare for the trials and fulfill the duties that her father has forced on her she is kidnapped by the Hellbringer who is the general of her country's biggest enemy's army. We follow her journey of being kidnapped and what the general wants from as well as what her experience in the trials looks like.

Thank you so much to Netgalley and Berkley Publishing Group for sending me an ARC of this book.

Especially for this authors debut, I really loved this ride! There was so much that kept me guessing the whole way through. Her prose is really nice and engaging and I only took so long to read as I had too many work deadlines to just read all day. There is also a character with mind reading in this book that is handle in a way that felt incredibly fresh. I need the sequel as soon as possible!

First off, I absolutely love the cover! I love that book starts off strong and has a lot of different themes (trials, magic, forced-proximity, etc). It has lots of twists that leaves the audience wondering what happened and what is to come next.

Can we hear it for this gorgeous cover? I pick up pretty books and this one is absolutely amazing!

I am a sucker for a dystopian romantasy. And this book did NOT disappoint. It has all the elements that I love!
But, there was so much more! Just when I thought I knew what was going to happen.. I was turned around! There are so many wonderful twists in this book that it’ll have you on your toes and it’ll be impossible to put down!

I also LOVE the title. I NEED the physical copy for my shelf now please and thank you!

3.5⭐️ Thank you NetGalley and Berkley Publishing Group for this ARC.

TROPES:

He trains her
Secret identity
Religious and political themes
Trials
Strong and fiery FMC
Grumpy and mysterious MMC
Morally grey MMC
Forced proximity
Captor/ captive relationship
Feminine rage
One bed
🌶️.5


The beginning of the book started off really strong, with a unique plot I had high hopes for. Towards the end I felt it was getting a bit repetitive, but I enjoyed the ending, although I did see parts of it coming.

There was not as much emphasis on the trials as I anticipated, this was a plot point only at the very end and the rest of the book lead up to the trials.

I really liked the MMC in this, although I do wish we got to see more from his POV. The FMC Revna was clearly interested in the Hellbringer but I didn’t get that he cared for her much and when he did it felt a bit sudden.

I am curious to see where the next book goes after that cliffhanger ending. Overall this was an entertaining read.

Blood Beneath the Snow follows Revna who is the only member of her royal family without a magical ability. Her family does not accept her. But she has a found family in the outcasts in her kingdom. When two of her closest friends' lives are put in danger, she is determined to save them by any means necessary. The Bloodshed Trails is a competition where the last sibling in the royal family standing takes the throne. Revna turns down her arranged marriage in order to compete for the throne. But she then gets kidnapped by the Hellbringer, who is the general of her country's greatest enemy. At first, Revna wants nothing to do with him. But he then tells her he can help her. Will she be able to take over the throne?

I enjoyed this book. It had nonstop action and I was hooked from the very start of the book. I did feel like the romance aspect of this book was an afterthought. That kind of got overlooked for a lot of the book. I also felt like this book was a bit repetitive. I also felt like a few times the book forgot what the main focus was supposed to be. But other than that this was a great book. It was fast-paced and left me on the edge of my seat. It is also a good book for people who are newer to reading fantasy. I would suggest this one.

Thank you so much Alexandra Kennington and Berkley for the ARC of this book. This book comes out on March 11.

thank you to netgalley and berkley publishing for granting me access to a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

4 stars.

full review is on goodreads. link is below.

Revna, a royal outcast with no magical abilities, tries to undermine her bloodline and her kingdom's oppressive rules. Her determination to protect her chosen family and forge her path makes her a rebel. Revna decides to reject an arranged marriage and defy her parents' expectations as a pawn in their religious quest for power. She enters a trial against her brothers for a deadly competition to claim the throne. You can't help but root for her.

She is sent to the war front by her father before the trial, where the Hellbringer kidnaps her. As a soul-rending general of an enemy nation, he's a formidable and dangerous warrior, and their uneasy alliance is a growing concern as to why so many parties want her on the throne. She is trained for the trial by Hellbringer, and emotions and attraction rise. When she is returned for the trials, visceral challenges force her to confront her limits. She is set to prove her resolve, courage, and willingness to fight for what's right.

The author creates morally complex characters and a heroine who refuses to back down in a brutal world. The level of oppression and savagery of the ruling families deliver a thrilling story of survival. The relationship between Revna and Hellbringer is steamy. This book is a story of defiance and high-stakes action. It was engaging, emotional, and thrilling.

I received an ARC ebook for my honest review. Thank you, NetGalley and Berkley Publishing, Ace

Blood Beneath the Snow was unfortunately disappointing. I loved the idea of a wintery tournament where siblings fight to death to win a crown. What I got instead was 200 pages of training montages and a main character who constantly needed to remind everyone of how wretched but also how special she was at the same time. My main problems with the story were as follows:

Side characters
The story opens with a bunch of side characters the main character interacts with. And then the side characters basically cease to be in the narrative, even though the main character claims that everything she does, she does for them. No character really had any distinguishable personality, and they existed only to be motivation for the main character. I couldn’t tell them apart, and frankly, I don’t think the main character could either.

Pacing and Plot
The pacing was… not great. The story starts out strong with action and stakes. But then the main character gets kidnapped and proceeds to spend the next 200 pages “training” and complaining about being a prisoner. During this time, there is a war/revolution going on, but the reader never interacted with that conflict. Instead, we just had to take the author’s word that things were happening behind the scenes that would be relevant. There is the idea of conflict in the story, but no actually scaled conflict. I wanted politics and war and collateral damage. Instead, I got a girl sparring and being cold.

“Romance”
To make up for the utter lack of external plot, the author pretends that the main character falls in love with her captor. Except they never talk to each other. They also don’t have a lot in common. Or any physical spark. The romance felt forced and like a cover-up for the lack of conflict in other areas. I didn’t believe that the characters were in love, so I never became invested in their relationship. There wasn’t anything compelling about them as individuals, so there certainly wasn’t anything compelling about them as a couple.

Writing
Finally, the writing just felt really dry. There was a lot of telling rather than showing. The author would say that a character was a certain way rather than proving it. Additionally, side characters spent a lot of time telling the main character how amazing she was, but the main character never did anything particularly deserving of praise. The dialogue was stilted, yet there also wasn’t enough of it; the reader could go pages and pages without anyone speaking or interacting. As for descriptions, there were no sensory details. The author would simply say that it was cold rather than describing how that cold felt or the visual surroundings.

What I loved…
- starts off with a bang!
- trials
- elemental magic
- political intrigue
- forced-proximity
- masked villain
- heavier themes that mirror issues in our society

What I didn’t love…
- there is a quite a bit of repetition, reminiscent of what I’d expect to find in a YA novel, lots of reminding the reader about certain aspects that relate to later plot reveals.
- overall the pacing was a bit all over the place
- the romance was one-sided for a large portion and then BAM not so one sided, this felt insta-lust and a bit jarring

I think overall this was a fine book, I would absolutely consider checking out this authors future work.

one final issue - how did she remote detonate a bomb in a world without radio waves/electricity and no magic? No really I need someone to explain this one to me please.

Thank you NetGalley and Berkley (ACE) for sending this book (eARC) for review consideration. All opinions are my own.

I was lucky enough to win an eARC of BLOOD BENEATH THE SNOW by Alexandra Kennington through a Shelf Awareness giveaway. Thanks for the early look, and have a safe and happy holiday season!

This was darker than I anticipated but I really enjoyed it, the characters felt authentic and had a lot of depth to them, Revna was a fiesty FMC with grit and determination (we love) the world building and lore was intricate, i wouldn't say its fast paced but there wasn't a lul and things kept moving along nicely if that makes sense (didn't feel rushed) I'm a sucker for enemies to lovers and the chemistry in this was palpable, this will definitely appeal to fans of romantasy (booktok girlies will approve) I appreciated how heavy topics weren't shied away from either, overall a suspenseful pacy fantasy with a cherry on top of romance! (Although probably more than a cherry)

Welcome to Bhorglid— where snow covers all, the god touched rule and the royal heir is chosen by The Blood Trials. Revna, our hero, is thrust into the trials to prove her worth, but at what cost? Kidnapped by the notorious Hellbringer, she is forced to reckon with her agency and the role she must fulfill. As weeks together pass and truths spill, will our leads realize they have more in common than the masks they don?

Funny, but biting, stirring, and well-woven— Alexandra Kennington’s debut is perfect for fans of Danielle Jensen and Sylvia Mercedes. If you’re looking to add a new sizzling Viking romantasy to your shelf then pick this one up!

Read if you’re into:
✨prisoner/captive enemies to lovers
✨royal siblings who fight for the crown
✨god touched vs forsaken
✨chosen one vibes
✨evil priests

I really enjoyed this debut and am excited for more from Alexandra Kennington!

Thanks to NetGalley and Berkley Publishing Group for a digital ARC of "Blood Beneath the Snow" by Alexandra Kennington, in exchange for a sincere review.

This story had potential, but struggled to deliver a fully rewarding "romantasy" experience.

The start centers on Revna, a princess with no powers in a world where those blessed by the gods with elemental magic are elite-tier citizens, and those without are "Godsforsaken" and bottom-class trash. The disparity between them is markedly stark and grievously bleak.

As an imperial with opportunities other Godsforsaken don't get, by sheer accident of birth, Revna acts as an allied rebel against this caste system, to her royal parents' profound dismay. As she has four brothers and zero arcane power, they can't really be bothered to be anything but deeply embarrassed by her, and so seek to pair her off in a marriage of convenience, just to be rid of her and her trouble making.

Ever the revolutionary, Revna of course isn't content to simply be used as a pawn, and decides she's going to forge her own fate: instead of being forced into marriage, she boldly insists on entering the Bloodshed Trials - a brutal combat contest where the throne goes to the last surviving royal sibling.

Things take a surprising turn, however, when Revna is captured by The Hellbringer, a fearsome enemy general whose sinister capabilities are mysterious, but rumored to be effortlessly deadly. We discover that The Hellbringer is tasked by an enemy queen with training Revna for the Trials, in order to be a ruthless contender and increase her odds of surviving and thriving during the competition.

Without giving away too much of the rest: I feel like the romance plot was one of the book's weaker elements. It was very one-sided through much of the story. Revna was aware of Hellbringer as enticingly masculine and yummy, but he took a very, very long time showing he had any distracting attraction toward her, as well. He was a brooding, stoic teacher -- which is a trope that can be swoon-worthy -- but here we missed out on the reluctant vulnerability toward her that would have made him memorable.

Without any cracks in his armor, without witnessing him fighting his desire for her, without that fiery push and pull between them, Hellbringer's role was merely that of a dangerous mentor she had a crush on....until jarringly, he suddenly wasn't. Because of this absence, the romance felt forced by the author; not something that naturally developed.

In hand with that, the book also centered its focus heavily on the training and prison sequences. It could have worked great, but without the aforementioned spicy friction to hold our interest, they dragged. The occasional alternative plot tidbits that did appear therein weren't satisfying. To my mind, this could be fixed by either expanding upon the romance, or shortening the captivity scenes to focus way more on Bloodshed Trials, and what happens after.

The enemy Queen's motives for supporting Revna also remain frustratingly vague, and her absence from the story felt like yet another missed opportunity to flesh out the trials and their dangerous nature, and to show us more of the bureaucratic power dynamics Revna unwittingly ends wrapped up in.

The author writes well, and Blood Beneath The Snow is not a bad read, when all is said and done. There are some points of political intrigue that keep you reading, and some unexpected surprises and twists, but it didn't feel like a romance book at all.

If you're in the mood for fantasy plot with conspiracy, complications, and competition trials, this might scratch the itch - but it's not a book I'll be enthusiastically recommending as a must-read romantasy.

4.25 star read for me!! 👑✨🩸

Okay, Blood Beneath the Snow is an absolute wild ride. If you love twists that leave you staring at the page wondering what just happened—this book is for you. There are enough betrayals in here to make even the most hardened backstabber blink in disbelief. Honestly, the plot is like a game of chess played by psychopaths, and every move has the potential to end in "Wait, what?!" moments.

Let's talk tropes, because this book nails some classic ones that just work: Forced proximity? Check✅. Only one bed? Oh, you bet. And then there's the masked villain ... because what's a battle for the throne without some dark, mysterious figure lurking in the shadows? (Plus, it’s always fun to guess who the villain really is, right?)

The heroine, Revna, is everything I wanted in a princess 👸 competing in a deadly fight for the throne—tough, smart, and determined, even without the magical abilities her brothers wield. But if I’m being real, I would’ve loved a little more detail on her physical description. I found myself struggling to picture her, which made it hard to really see her in action sometimes. Still, her character development is top-notch, and her struggle for survival and power makes for some seriously gripping reading.

So, in short: If you’re in the mood for a book full of backstabbing, a lot of "oh my god, I didn't see that coming!" moments, and some excellent forced proximity (with a lot of tension 😫), Blood Beneath the Snow should be on your list ✍️✍️✍️.


Link: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/6967079713


This book will be featured in some of my upcoming TikTok videos about betrayals, badass FMCs and great tropes!

3/5

As someone who has read more fantasy books than is probably reasonable in a not so long life so far, I think I'm very good at sensing plot beats, romance beats, twists, and numerous other things that make a fantasy book *good.* I think that for a debut novel, this is a solid book, but I found it had too many issues for me to be able to rate it any higher than 3 stars.

1) I think that this book does not work as a romantic fantasy. If you want the romance in your book to be taken seriously, it should follow certain beats that lets readers know it's important. I felt that this book was not wanting the romance to be as important as the plot, but the execution of the romance didn't seem to align with these plot beats. As our two main characters, Revna and the Hellbringer, don't have a conversation until about 35% through the book, I assumed that we would have a slow-burn romance that likely would be a sub-plot. This I believe is a fair assumption to make when we don't have any romance inklings for over a quarter of the novel.
So I was confused when the romance did take such a centre stage in the novel towards the middle. I was incapable of believing that the interactions we saw between Revna and the Hellbringer made it possible for them to fall in love. They had no chemistry. Revna was just horny for the majority of this book. I did not think that the pacing of the romance made any sense at all, and the love confession made me laugh because it was so out of place. I also found the smut scene to be unneeded... this should have been a multi-book slowburn.

2) The plot was beyond weird. I was under the impression that the Bloodshed Trials would be the main plot of the book. They were not. Instead, Revna just spends the majority of this book in a prison training with the Hellbringer because his Queen told him to, but we never meet the Queen or learn enough about her for the reasoning behind this to be fully fleshed out. I just felt that there was a lot of wandering around that amounted to nothing. I wanted more of the gods and more explanations behind the magic system and the politics of the world. I just felt that the parts of the book I wanted to be further explained in detail were left behind to develop a romance I didn't care for.

3) I hated the fact we had literally no side characters. It's just Revna and the Hellbringer (and to be honest, just Revna alone) for most of the book. Reina's friends and brothers just don't get enough consistent page time across the book. They appear in the first and last quarter so the relationships just felt like we were being told how they were like instead of seeing them interact over the course of 400 pages.

4) The world-building was sort of odd. I mean, it is a fun world and has fun magic, but I wished we'd seen more of it. I'm not sure about much other than Revna hates the priests.

5) the Hellbringer had no personality. He was stoic for most of the book and I couldn't see any development at all happening with his character. I also wonder how he will be justified in his actions at the end of this book? Unless what Revna saw him do was not in fact what actually happened, I don't know how he'll be redeemed. But either way, it's clear he held back a LOT of information from Revna anyway so I'm still not close to liking him.

6) Revna was okay. I can see people liking her but I found her insta-lust to the Hellbringer to be annoying and she didn't have many personality traits outside of hating her family, loving her friends, hating religion, and wishing she was stronger, and finding the Hellbringer hot.

All in all, this is a solid fantasy debut, but I think it has a LOT of room for improvement in further books in the series.

This book was a bit darker than I had anticipated when I requested an ARC, but I'm not saying that as a bad thing. It made the book more interesting. The characters were well written and I enjoyed seeing Revna persevere through it all. I loved how the plot unfolded, it didn't drag or slow anywhere so it was almost too easy to get lost in this story. I was hooked.

Plot: a rebellious princess named Revna goes up against the odds to stop a war and unite the kingdom. The kingdom is divided by those with magic and those without, with value only being placed on those with magic. Revna has no magic which is disgraceful for someone in the royal family. So how can one disgraced, non-magical young woman change anything?

I had high hopes for this fantasy but this one just didn't grab me. I found Revna to be more angry and petulant than rightly rebellious for at least the first half of the book. Anger spills from these pages more than the titular blood.

The intrigues hinted at throughout the story were more confusing than anything, raising more questions than answers. As the book ends on a pretty massive cliffhanger, hopefully answers will be brought to light in the following book(s).

The romantic storyline was one part silly and one part overly intense in places (I more or less just skimmed over the more graphic sections).

All in all, this fantasy didn't feel like there was enough world-building for me to become invested in anything that was happening.

Anyone who loves romantasy and a high stakes contest will be devouring Blood Beneath the Snow. The next fantasy book to take the world by storm for sure.

After reading Bloodguard by Cecy Robson I have been looking for an action-packed high stakes royal fantasy romance book and I found this book is similar and it makes me happy.