A review by prawntaar
From Blood and Ash by Jennifer L. Armentrout

adventurous dark tense medium-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? It's complicated
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.75

I walked away really mixed feelings about this book.  The scenes/elements that I really liked, I REALLY liked.  There were a couple of scenes that were just written really well and I liked how the dialog was written (with a couple of exceptions).  At the same time, this book was also really cliché in a really lame way.  It had a great first and second act.  The third/final act left so much to be desired.  I'm genuinely conflicted about reading the rest of the series.

Poppy is a cool character.  It's easy to fall into the trope that a strong female character is simply one who doesn't follow the rules and then just go insubordinate=strong-willed.  Poppy has motive and her own reason why she does X or Y and I really appreciated that about her.  

It really felt like this author's publisher insisted that the ending be re-written.  I feel like there is such a difference in tone in that final 150pgs.  We take such an odd and drastic left turn with the Hawke character near the end that I can't believe that is where this author intended to go with this story.  I also largely feel like we're left with a Hawke character that is irredeemable in the worst way.  That could have been intentional and I suppose reading subsequent books might better explain that decision to me, but I just feel like I'm left with this cruel, suddenly crazy, and unforgivable character that I'm just uninterested in reading any more about.  It almost ruined the book for me.

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Blood, Death, Gore, Grief, Murder, Physical abuse, Sexual violence, and Violence

Moderate: Cursing, Misogyny, Sexual assault, and Sexual content

I would have liked there to have been a little bit more consent with regard to the sexual relations between characters. This book walks a fine line, where it's the first person POV so as a reader, I know what Poppy is and is not okay with, but other characters don't have that same information. When it comes to full on sex, there is explicit consent. It's all the other sexual touches that seem to not have to follow that rule.

Hawke just acts throughout a lot of the novel that he gets to touch Poppy however he pleases. There is at least one sexual encounter between Poppy and Hawke where he's telling her "you know you want it" and she doesn't really respond to him yay or nay. He doesn't really ask, either. Just continues to tell her that "this is what she wants." and then puts his hands down her pants. As a reader, Poppy is telling me that this is something she's into, and that's cool. But that information isn't really shared with Hawke and he doesn't really seem to care what she does or doesn't want.