I loved this- such a rich and gothic world with a real sense of history that’s carefully laid out by the setting in a way that doesn’t feel forced, and the focus on ordinary, everyday characters (especially the Dust caste) was really refreshing. The mystery felt a little muddled at times, but overall I loved it and can’t wait for more books set in this world.

I went into this book completely blind, but it took me exactly one page to realise that this book would just click for me on every single level. These days, it’s rare for me to get so sucked into a story that I completely forget the time, but Dream of Death City accomplished exactly that and completely entranced me from the very first page.

Welcome to the Red Kingdom, a brutal and dark fantasy world where your caste decides your fate in life. The brutal Red Reform Laws ensure that the wealthy Sun-Nobles keep thriving off the poor, while the lowly Dust-Caste slaves suffer and remain oppressed. Anyone even thinking of stepping out of line will be swiftly and brutally punished by the Purge House’s Red Warriors, but that doesn’t stop Dust-Caste slave Thora from daring to dream of a better life for herself.
When a young Sun-Noble daughter disappears from her tower in Death City, Thora seizes upon the chance to improve her lot in life and convinces Investigation House to put her on the case as assistant-investigator. Along with the recently demoted Low-Investigator Diem Lakein, she is sent off to the wild, icy Thousand Island Frontier. Neither are prepared for what they find in the strange Death City, though, and they must do everything in their power to survive the dangerous web of conspiracies.

I am absolutely floored by the depth and breadth of the world building. As someone who struggles to visualise while reading, it’s rare for me to have a fully immersive reading experience. So imagine my wonder and excitement when I opened this book and discovered P.J. Nwosu’s incredible ability to transport me into her world. From the peculiar speech patterns in the dialogue, to the vivid and evocative descriptions of the uncanny settings, to the fascinating death worshipping culture with its elusive magic and finally to the all-encompassing oppression of the strict rules upholding this hierarchical society. The world building just bleeds through into every aspect of the story and creates a unique flair that will completely entrance you. What an incredible experience.

But that’s not where these author’s talents end, because the character work was also simply outstanding. Diem and Thora are incredibly compelling characters to follow, because they both dare to dream of a better life in a world where dreaming could result in death.
This is not the story of heroes or rulers, but the story of average citizens trying to survive in a harsh and restrictive world. Both of them have mysterious and dark pasts, which are slowly revealed throughout the story. And even though they have both done less than savoury things in order to survive, you can’t help but fall in love with them.
Thora’s journey was especially gripping to me, as we see this seemingly demure slave trying to gain a sense of agency and create something for her own. She might appear compliant on the outside, but when you get a peek inside her mind, you realise that she’s a force to be reckoned with.
Diem is also a fascinating character in his own right though. His past is haunting him, making his inner conflict and struggles very believable and captivating.
The character development throughout the story was so well done and I loved seeing how these characters’ individual journeys played into the overarching story. Also, it was a joy to see the slow build up of trust and love between these characters. Their relationship is unexpected, complex and bittersweet, but I absolutely adored it.

Finally, throw in a riveting mystery plot with lots of jaw-dropping twists and turns and a satisfying resolution, and the whole picture is complete. This book just ticked all of my boxes and it’s absolutely a new favourite for me.
This is the type of reading experience that I am always on the hunt for. I am completely satisfied with this entire story… and yet I am left hungering for more.
If you enjoy dark fantasy stories with rich world building, compelling characters, riveting mysteries, strange and macabre settings, thought-provoking themes and incredibly immersive and unique prose, then Dream of Death City is the book for you. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

Thank you to NetGalley and Small Heart Press for providing me with an eARC of this book. All opinions are my own.

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

Feel free to read the review on my website: www.lyjimenez.com/book-reviews/a-book-review-on-dream-of-death-city-by-pj-nwosu

Dream of Death City by PJ Nwosu is an adult fantasy novel, the first in a series of Sherlock Holmes-esque mysteries set in a dark fantasy world known as the Red Kingdom.

Two investigators are sent to Death City, an icy frontier surrounded by sunken ships, black pyramids, and drowned death gods. Thora, a Dust-caste slave, is desperate to prove herself as something more. To do that, she and Diem need to solve a mystery involving a Sun-noble girl who seems to have gone missing.

I want to start this off, as usual, with the good things. The best thing? A visual cohesiveness I don’t think I’ve seen before. It sticks faithfully to its color palette and death-themed motifs, giving a creepy and bleak atmosphere from start to end. You have rusted ships sinking to the bottom of a frigid sea. You have a dark moon whose dazzling red lights signal the coming of a death god. Frozen bodies are unearthed. Pale moths pick at dead whales along the seashore. “What’s dead is dead and all shall die” after all is a refrain you’ll be reminded of relentlessly (too relentlessly for my taste because you will hear it on every other page sometimes).

What I like about it honestly stops there. As a writer, I personally think that the vibes and aesthetic aren’t something to sleep on. After all, they’re one of the things that will give you the book’s unique feel.

The one another okay thing is the mystery itself. A girl is missing and though the characters do believe that the girl’s father loves her, he is, for some reason doing everything it takes to stall the investigation. It’s a good conundrum to start and the stakes are raised slightly. But it soon flatlines until its resolution. I wanted to feel the paranoia you get from a good mystery where you don’t know where something is going and where you just want to flip the page and know more. I didn’t have that feeling. I don’t even have a clue as to where the series is going by the end of it.

Dream of Death City makes a grave mistake from the beginning: the leads. As mentioned, Thora is Dust-caste (a slave) and Diem, the investigator she’s assisting, is Moon-caste (a free man). And I never got invested in them or in their relationship. There’s nothing in the first few crucial passages that make me attached to Thora in any way. In the first chapter, I had no idea who Thora was, what it meant to be Dust-caste, what the stakes were, etc. So although it started out with a building on fire, it did little to get my attention. There’s nothing remarkable about how Thora reacted to her situation and not enough set-up to let me follow the scene.

Consider Kaz Brekker in Six of Crows. Morally gray, yes. But Kaz’s character introduction immediately set up who he was and proved to you exactly how clever he could be. As for Thora…eventually, you might care about how she wants to be more than a slave, but I think that that information comes in way too late. She’s also described by fellow slaves as a “battle axe” but it remains just that: a description. I’m not given enough reason to believe that.

Diem is more of a shadow of a character than even Thora. I can’t get a grasp of a personality. Even his internal conflict is hard to pinpoint. He’s a jaded detective and… what does he want?

One could argue that he wants to be with Thora. However, the romance also falls short. I don’t know why they want each other. I don’t even know why they should be together. There’s no chemistry and the romantic subplot does nothing to convince you that this was earned. I understand that as members of a different caste they could not speak freely with one another, thus depriving us of any cute banter or any opportunity to accidentally brush hands. But couldn’t we have Thora speak freely to Diem in private? Couldn’t there be subtler ways to show attraction and chemistry?

Then there’s the matter of the prose. I do like how they all speak in a consistent way, a way that does make me believe these are people from some other place. But there are some word choices I wouldn’t have made. A building was described to have “hummed” with “screams.” And the skittering sound that little forest creatures made “wafted” from the underbrush. A little strange and a little hard to imagine.

And last, let’s talk about worldbuilding and themes. They overlap in some ways but it’s hard to see how they mesh together. In the Red Kingdom, there are three castes: Sun-noble, Moon-caste, and Dust-caste, with sun at the top and dust at the bottom. I do appreciate that the caste system does have ramifications on the story. People don’t care as much when Dust-caste are the victims of crimes but when it’s a Sun-noble, everyone scrambles to help. It also affects the romance since it’s illegal for Diem and Thora to have romantic relations.

But then you have the death gods and illegal magic (known as the crooked beat) and so on. Sure, the death gods are the reason why they adapted the Red Reform (which established the society you see now). But how do the themes of memento mori come together with social class? What do all the motifs do for the storyline? What does that mean for Thora and the journey she has ahead? At some point, it starts to feel like the deathly atmosphere really is just atmosphere and it gets harder and harder to know what this is all really about.

CONCLUSION: Props to PJ Nwosu for the vibes. Dream of Death City did teach me a lot about how to have a solid vision of how a world should look and feel. And although the case started out with a good conundrum, my lack of investment in the leads kept me from staying interested.

Thanks so much to Netgalley for this arc!! I ended up enjoying the book much more than I thought I would- the world building is exquisite, for one, and I'm really looking forward to the next book in the series

I honestly just finished this book and still have no idea what I just read. It fell a bit flat and I forgot it as soon as I finished. Interesting concept though!

Thanks, Netgalley, and publisher for the opportunity to read and review!
Loved the story. A very strong start that gives an unexpected story boost at the beginning. After that, the plot develops gradually but keeps this intriguing pace that makes you follow through all the way until the end. The world-building is done well. The two main characters are very fitting teammates and both are not devoid of some great mistakes, but that only makes the reader feel both of them very close and sympathize with them. Definitely a story worth reading!

To be honest I'm not sure what I think or should write about this book.
I have read many books in my life but none were like this one. 
The only comparison that comes to mind would be one of the classics, from the old school writers, who wrote in a language where you always had to wonder what they meant by that. 
Don't get me wrong, the way the book is written is of course very interesting and definitely took a lot of work, but unfortunately I'm not the right audience for it.

This book was listed as dark fantasy on Netgalley and the blurb was promising, but despite the fact that the book was uniquely written, it had too many descriptions and details, and dragged on too monotonously, so I lost interest in the story very fast.

The story describes very dark times in human history.
The world is divided into noble classes and slaves.
It is very similar to the Medieval Inquisition times where people were afraid to speak their free opinions or even think about them without being punished.
Only in this story the described world is called the Red Kingdom.

I think the book is perfect for all classic fantasy lovers.
It has a mystery murder topic and a little touch of romance in the story.

Thank you to NetGalley and to the publisher for providing me with a digital copy of this book.

Unfortunately, this was a DNF pretty early on. Between the huge blocks of description, the lack of grounding the characters in terms of location/relationship/background, the repetition (seriously, it IS possible to indicate that the world has a distinct way of speaking without using the same few words in every...single....line of dialogue).....it just wasn't worth it to keep reading past chapter 5.

pj nwosu made one thing very clear: she’s one hell of a writer. you get completely immersed in this fantasy world where your caste decides your fate: a life of marvelous riches if you’re a sun-noble, a life of almost mediocre circumstances if you’re a moon-caste, and a life of ungrateful servitude and slavery if you’re a dust-caste. as a woman, furthermore, you’re always someone’s property no matter what.

we’re following thora, a dust-caste woman who belongs to the house of investigation as a slave, aiding investigator diem in quite complex cases such as bringing down corruption and those who don’t obey the red reform laws and the king of the red kingdom. our two main characters then find themselves in the midst of a peculiar case of a sun-noble’s daughter’s disappearance, where the father both overimposes resolution yet at the same time stops it from happening. it’s safe to say that he’s suspicious from the get go, especially as multiple young girls are vanishing and someone is working particularly hard to cover it up. it’s up to thora and diem to uncover this mystery in death city, a place where slavery has been abolished and women actively partake in the practice of the crooked beat – a sort of witchcraft that only women can feel in their heartbeat as a gift from the eleventh daughter.

i have to say that as much as i’d like to give this book 5 stars, the predictability was too eminent in the plot. the plot twists aren’t true to their nomenclature, and while what really happens is morally wrong – and a crime – the author builds the fantasy element of the story only to then have no real purpose when push comes to shove.

loved the characters, loved the world building and setting. i wish the second half of the book had gone differently. will still read the rest of the series :)

4.5

Thank you so much to netgalley and the publisher for allowing me access to the ARC of this book !

This was an absolutely fantastic read. I originally was interested for two reasons, the dark and Gothic vibes from the cover, and the mystery element. Both of these lived up to the hype !

The investigation in this book was a slow burn but engaging and intrueging! And our MCs were so well written that it was both heavily plot and character driven.

The world building is also well done and has those dark vibes that were promised in the books cover. Would definitly love to read more from this author !

"What is dead is dead and all shall die."

Dream of Death City is a huge memento mori. This book is highly atmospheric. It is dark, it is full of death and red at the same moment. This book feels like its cover and I love it.

Thora, the main character, is a Dust-caste, a slave with no bright prospects with no rights. She is bright, brave, and proud, but in her world, it leads to pyre burning. She cannot speak without permission, she cannot love who she wants and she cannot escape. Once slave, forever slave. Diem is a low-investigator, he is a free man, but still too low on the ladder. He is the first person who treats Thora like an equal. As you can see - they are no chosen ones.

This story is raw, strong, and without miracles. In this book, we can see characters fall, bleed, and break. PJ Nwosu made a fantastic job with worlbuilding and character development. I can only recommend Dream of Death City to all lovers of high fantasy. This series can be the new Game of Thrones of this decade.
5*

Thank you Small Heart Press and NetGalley for an eARC!

I received an ebook arc of this book from NetGalley for my honest review.

This was a darker feeling epic fantasy/dystopian style novel. The first in a series. I thought the concept was really interesting, having a culture so obsessed with death. The death giant was a really cool imagining.

This is a wordy book. Like, lots of words. Everything is described so well, which is great, but found myself skimming descriptions a lot.

In the beginning you get dropped into chaos and have no idea what’s going on. The main characters, Thora and Diem, already know each other but I couldn’t grasp on what level. Are they friends? Best friends? Co workers? Acquittances? Do they wave when they pass in a hallway? I got nothing from them. Until around 30% in when Diem is like, “I dream about Thora.” And I was like oh! Ok..
There was not a lot of dialogue up until around 20% of the book. I think it hindered me from getting to know and care for these characters. Like they were in a bubble, and I was definitely outside the bubble.

The language is very different. The word “true” is used in almost every sentence of dialogue of every character. “True, reckon, hankering” are words you see a lot. Also..
“What’s dead is dead and all shall die” x100. It’s said.. a lot.
It got a bit repetitive. Viceroy Bearin is a longer-limbed insect man. If you read it you’ll know..

The pacing was a bit off for me. It seemed like a lot of slow parts, but by the end there was a lot of action. 50% and 70% I remember action happening.

Not a lot of romance. In fact 1 out 10 level of romance. I wanted more. But I’m just a romantic.

I liked the book, but I don’t think I liked it enough to continue in the series. I didn’t really enjoy the ending much.

Such a rich, dark fantasy with vivid imagery, compelling characters, and a twisted world that makes your spine shiver. P.J. Nwosu's imagination knows no bounds and it pays off so well in this book!

Thank you Victory Editing for a digital ARC copy of Dream of Death City.

Rating: 4.6/5 ⭐
Spice Rating: 1/5🌶

I absolutely loved this writing style and I was just enthralled with the world and the story. This is definitely a dark fantasy mystery, and the topics addressed as well as the Red Kingdom itself are very dark and harsh. The Red Kingdom is a strict government with a brutal caste system and ran by religious zealots. Once a dust/slave (even slaves born to slaves), always a dust.

The FMC, Thora, is Dust-Caste and craves better than laundry and scrubbing floors. She's part of the Investigator House and works closely with a Moon-Caste (middle class) Investigator, Diem. They meet during brutal circumstances on a previous mission and form a camaraderie from their shared experiences. They are sent on a mission across the Thousand Islands to Death City, an island far from the reaches of the Red King, with less strict adherence to the brutal ways of the Red Kingdom. This mission is to find the missing teenage daughter of the local Sun-Caste Nobleman. Despite being summoned to find out what happened and why, they are met with resistance constantly and things quickly move past a simple runaway or kidnapping.

This story kept me completely riveted and kept me up most of the night to finish it because I just didn't want to put it down. The worldbuilding was topnotch, and the author throws you into the deep end, which I'm a huge fan of. The characters have so much depth and evolve over the course of the story and you really feel how downtrodden Thora and Diem are. They both struggle against their circumstances (most outside of their control) and things don't always go as planned. Even the setting itself lends well to the overall dreary mood of the book and left me wanting more stories set in the Red Kingdom.

There is some romance between the main characters, it's extremely slow burn (and forbidden), and the chemistry is great.

Overall, if you like dark/moody fantasy books, harsh and unforgiving settings and stories, with tons of interesting characters dynamics, definitely give this a shot. I am very eager for the next book.

"What’s dead is dead and all shall die."

Oo I was caught by the blurb to read this and man I'm happy I did because I abostly loved this book. Highly recommend it. Kept me pulled into it to where I couldn't put it down at all. 5 star book and I might actually reread it. I abostly loved it and already told a few people that they needed to read this book ASAP

((Thanks to Netgalley and Small Heart Press for a copy of this book in an exchange for a honest review))
I was less than 100 pages in when I realized how invested I was in the world author PJ Nwosu had been building for a while. The Red Laws, all the mythos around the Dead Daughters, the black pyramids… I truly felt as I was one of the passengers in the creaky boat the main characters use to get from Mainland to Death City, listening to the grandpapa in exchange for a coin: the giants in the water, whether gods or monsters, were definitely watching me.
And the crooked beat… I could feel it, ever consuming, slowly at the beginning -bear in mind that the pace might feel ‘blocky’ at times, for the author makes sure the reader knows every single thing that is happening both outside and in our main characters minds- and then it became faster and faster, gradually, clue by clue, twist by twist, until it was impossible to put down the mystery and the evolution of Dust-Caste Thora had become.
Some people describe this book as a mixture between a dark fantasy and a Sherlock Holmes case, and I feel that, even if they are correct, there’s something missing in that description, because Low Investigator Diem is not s Sherlock and Dust-Caste Thora is definitely not a Watson, even if some similarities could be found if we looked at the TV adaptation with Martin Freeman. (Not Benedict Cumberbatch for Diem, that’s for sure).
For those who are not fans of sagas, the case itself starts and finishes in this book, there’s no need for more, but at the same time it doesn’t answer all the questions related to the world, its politics and its beliefs.
The author herself offers a prequel in her website, for those who want to know more about the case that occurred just before the one narrated here. And I definitely need it.
What’s dead is dead and all shall die.
…and then live again.

Dark Fantasy Sherlock Holmes. 3.5 stars (rounded up to 4)

If not for the slow pace, I think I would've really enjoyed this. PJ has some hauntingly beautiful prose, especially around the subjects of death, gossip, love, and morality. The characters constantly sit in the grey area between good and bad, death and life, and as the readers, we get to question everything right along with them.

I would not like to live in this world but I'm so intrigued by it. I'd love a prequel about Eleven daughters who were sacrificed and that time period before the Red Kingdom. At times it did feel like there was too much incorporation of their religion into everything, and the dialect choices (overuse of true, reckon, etc) did make the reading a bit tedious. BUT THE CROOKED BEAT, I wanted more of the magic world (but wasn't disappointed about how little we really got into the details of it)

Thora is a great protagonist! Her constant battles with longing for freedom/speaking her mind and "knowing her place" made every scene where she talks full of so much tension.

My biggest complaint was just the pacing. I think it could've been a hundred pages shorter. The prose did get a bit much at points, and I found myself skimming through paragraphs of descriptions (which hey if you like that, this is the book for you) to get to the dialogue and action. I didn't feel like I was on the edge of my seat waiting to see what would happen, partly because of the pacing and also because none of the plot twists surprised me.

Very well written, would read the next book to find out what happens to Thora and Diem.

Thank you to NetGalley, Small Heart Press, and the author for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I read about 25% of this book before deciding not to finish it. It's not the type of fantasy that I like, and I also found the blocky text was hard to follow--and it made it difficult for me to get invested. I have not posted this review on Goodreads because I feel that other people who like this tone and style will still enjoy this book!

I enjoyed the dark and gothic aspect of this book. However, I found the world building a little problematic at times. The moths flying around in a frozen landscape was off-putting to me, among other details. A world focused on death was certainly creepy, but a bit shallow to me. I didn't feel the depth of their beliefs, and honestly, neither did the characters feel the depth of them. Perhaps some of these issues will be smoothed out in book 2.

This was an interesting book, however. I enjoyed the unique mystery/fantasy world.

I've never read a novel that was so visually cohesive from beginning to end. Oily black, foggy white, dusty grey, crimson red, fragments of gold. The colours swallow the characters as they, people from the capital city, travel to the edge of the Red Kingdom and get immersed in the corruption and solemness of Death City. It's enjoyable to see Thora persevering in her goal to rise above her Dust-caste status but getting disillusioned about doing it nobly since everyone around her is dipped in shades of grey. While there is a slowburn between Thora and Diem, I enjoyed that it doesn't overtake the professional relationship they have. It took a while to complete the story; there are parts where it's slow and chock full of descriptions and dialogue (to be expected) and parts when you race through the sections because of the adrenaline, action and mystery. The best thing about this novel is the culture of Death City, which Nwosu notes in her author notes as something she greatly worked on, and it shows.

Thanks to Netgalley and Small Heart Press for providing me with the e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.