I was provided with a digital ARC from NetGalley in exchange for a review.

This book was an excellent follow-up to Bloodleaf! It was just as action-packed and fast-paced, but with some even more excellent plot-twisting. I love that little Conrad's character was developed even more in this book, and he is just precious. We are also introduced to some new friends Aurelia has made during her time away, and they are instantly likeable and it's good to see that she has formed these new bonds after the loss of Kate in the last book. I will say that there was one subplot that was put into motion, but never really completed or explained as to why it was needed, but I have complete faith that it was part of setting things up for Ebonwilde and I can not wait until it is in my hands. I must know what happens to these characters next!

Interesting but a bit lackluster. I enjoyed this book and the previous book in the series--Bloodleaf. Aurelia is a strong heroine who is always facing the choice of sacrifice. Again, she does so here and she is willing to do what she must in order to save those she loves. I feel like this sequel could have had more. The writing is good, but could have been greater, the development more in depth. I loved the plot twist/ cliffhanger like ending which really was a surprise that saved the book for me a bit.

I received an Advanced Reading Copy of this book from the publisher and author in exchange for an honest review. All opinions expressed are my own.

What a ride. I swear this second book had more twists and turns than the first. I found the beginning of the story to be a lot of explaining what happened in the month between the end of bloodleaf and Greythorne, it was a lot of confusion and catching up but after that bumpy beginning, it became really enjoyable.
I think watching Aurelia deal with the fall out of her actions in bloodleaf was very compelling and seeing her struggling with the aftermath made her a much more dynamic character to read about. The ending left me breathless and I cannot wait for the final book

"She was fresh-turned earth and autumn leaves and caustic wind."

Bloodleaf was a dark, romantic, fairytale retelling, which I loved. In all honesty, I was worried Greythorne would not live up to it's predecessor, however, it was better!!!

The story starts months after Bloodleaf ended, but so much has happened. Aurelia is living alone at a tavern, where she tries to help the refugees that fled to Renalt after the fall of Achleva. Her fiancé, Zan, was killed by a usurper and the Tribunal are gaining support. Aurelia can no longer use blood magic without greatly weakening herself and after the king's coronation is stormed by the Tribunal, she is on the run.

I loved the plot of this story. There were times where I was slightly confused, however the author reveals small snippets of information gradually and I found myself eagerly awaiting each new twist. Where Bloodleaf was predictable, Greythorne took so many unexpected turns. The romance which was so prevalent in the first book takes a back seat, and the plot focuses more on magic, witches and history. I loved this, as it allowed Aurelia's character to develop independent of Zan's.

I adored Rosetta and Onal, and their sarcasm and bickering brought light to an otherwise dark tale. I also grew to love Kellan even more. The writing was lyrical and the world building continued to be amazing. Now I'm just annoyed I have to wait for the third book!!

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an arc in exchange for an honest review.

This is a chilling and haunting follow up to Bloodleaf, and there is no Sophomore Slump in sight! I found the exploration of grief and loss to be expertly done, and there are real moments of tenderness that I appreciated. I would highly recommend!

I really enjoyed this book; it keeps the fast paced twisty writing I loved in the first book. The characters are still great and I loved learning more about them and enjoyed the new characters as well. I also really appreciated that this book feels like its own complete story and not just a lead in to the third book, though the ending did leave me really excited for the third book. I thought the ending brought everything together really well and it made me so emotional. Overall I think it was a great read and I cannot wait for the next book.

After reading Bloodleaf, I thought, what could top this? Greythorne blew Bloodleaf out of the water. The plot was so packed with action, history, and the stakes were raised higher than I thought they could. Character development occurred between Bloodleaf and Greythorne and then propelled itself through Greythorne as well. We see lots of development for Conrad, Aurelia, and even Onal. And the ending? Left me breathless.

I wasn't expecting to like Greythorne as much as Bloodleaf. I assumed it would suffer from middle book syndrome and to lower my expectations. But it didn't. While we have some history and backstory thrown in, the book is jam packed with plot and we get a new, underlying story line to appear. I am so excited to see other people's reactions to Greythorne and I can't wait for book 3, Ebonwilde! Such a great sequel and I am so excited to finish this series!

I am so blown away by this sequel. This was everything that I wanted Bloodleaf to be. It had such amazing storytelling, and I was captivated every time I turned the page. It's such a beautiful story. The ending crushed me, I NEED to know more! I want to know what will happen next.

Things I Remembered About Bloodleaf, Which I Read A Year And A Half Ago, Before I Started Greythorne:

1) I really enjoyed it.
2) Bits of it were based on The Goose Girl.

Things I Remembered About Bloodleaf, Which I Read A Year And A Half Ago, As I Read Greythorne:

1) It had words, I assume, or maybe I imagined them.


This is a proof, I know that, so I'm dearly hoping there'll be a recap in the actual book. Usually there are reminders in the narration, but either I missed them or there aren't any in this book. I enjoyed the writing, the descriptions were lovely, but I genuinely had no idea what was going on at any point or who anyone was.

I loved Boodleaf — raced through it in less than 24 hours. So I was thrilled to be picked to review Greythorne.
Greythorne picks up a few months after Bloodleaf ends and some BIG things have happened.
I like Aurelia — she's resilient and complicated and I like that she's not afraid to use her power or to fight against things she sees are wrong/for the people she loves. I also really liked some of the supporting characters that got more page-time in this book.
I honestly think I would have really liked Greythorne if it was a standalone novel — it deals with refugee treatment, the dangers of self-righteousness, and sacrifice — but as a follow-up to Bloodleaf it felt haphazard. Rule for magic (and time travel?!) were revealed — rules that weren't event hinted at in the first book. Similarly, the "bad guys" in Greythorne were wholly different from those in Bloodleaf (not even hinted at in the first book, really).
By the end, I felt satisfied by the story, but disappointed in the haphazard way it all seemed to come together.

Bloodleaf was one of my favorite reads over the last couple of years and I was so excited to see that the follow up was on its way. Unfortunately, I felt that Greythorne was lacking in many ways from the first.
The characters were all there and they all had pretty much the same personalities from the first book. But then they never changed. In a way, I felt that they slightly digressed into more cookie cutter characters rather than breaking the mold and growing. I could not connect very much to Aurelia anymore and struggled to enjoy her journey.
The storyline was somewhat disjointed and jumped from place to place without much explanation. The narrative seemed to be heading towards a more historical look at what was going on, but I never felt that I got a fully satisfying story about the past.
I don’t want everything to be negative here. I did get through the story and I did like the journey that it traveled, but I just felt that there was so much more polishing and attention to detail that needed to be done.
I’m not sure if I would like to continue on with Aurelia’s story. I would have liked to know more, but I don’t have the interest to read another novel at this pace. I know those that enjoyed the first book will grab this sequel up quickly, and may get a more polished copy after editing. I will confer with them before deciding on further purchases.

I enjoyed this! The plot, pacing, and writing were just as good as the first book. It was a really good book!

I was very excited to be approved for this title because I loved the first book so much! Each character added something special to the story and when they were going through something rough I felt for them. I was hoping to love this one. The blurb is great and the new cover art is amazing! Unfortunately, I found myself not connecting to much in this one.

Let's start off with a positive. One thing I love about this author is her writing. It's enjoyable to read and you can tell she puts a lot of emotion into her words. There were parts of the story that I enjoyed and felt for the characters in that moment. It was just so easy to see the heartbreak that was between them.

My biggest gripe with this book would be the plot. From the beginning a horseman is introduced and I thought that he would be a bigger part of it but I was wrong. He was mentioned a couple of times and then we find it that he is just a story, nothing more. I would have liked more because it gave me Sleepy Hollow vibes.

The villain of this story just didn't work for me. She was more part of the background than anything. We do get snippets of her plans through visions from Aurelia and there is also a few pages from her point-of-view. She just didn't sell the whole villain thing very well. At the beginning when she was introduced I was for it but as the story progress not much was really done by her and her climatic moment wrapped up easily. Plus, I'm just not really a fan of revengeful villains. 🤷‍♀️ She also got a redemption arc, which I didn't see coming but I also didn't care much for it.

Aurelia and Zan's relationship is not good. Since he has been gone for 6 months (well thought to have been dead and shows up.) their relationship is in turmoil. If that wasn't enough then she finds out she can't touch him or she dies because blood magic. They spent all the parts they had together arguing and then she gets swept away by the end of the book. I didn't feel the love between them and it made it very hard to care about their relationship.

There was also a time travel type aspect that I felt didn't really work for this particular story. You see how everything worked it's way out by the end but I just wasn't a fan of it.

The plot twists weren't surprising and I think much of that had to do with me not feeling connected to the characters.

Overall, I'm just sad and disappointed with this one. As an anticipated read I want it to be everything. I probably only liked one-third of the book, maybe a bit more but I wish I would have liked the whole thing. I will probably read the third book only to see how it plays out since the ending left on a cliffhanger but I will go in with lower expectations.

I'll be honest, it took me a long time to get into this one for a couple reasons. First, I wanna start out with how little I like the cover change. I LOVED Bloodleaf. I loved everything about it, including the cover, and now that this new cover looks completely different and not even as cute as the first cover, I'm sorely disappointed. I mean, can't people who already bought Bloodleaf be offered a book cover that matches?? Why do publishers keep doing this mid-way through series?? Do they think this is cute, because it's not, it's annoying, and y'all should know your readers got OCD about this kinda thing and their books on their shelves matching and whatnot!!

Second, this book started off super slow, and way different from what I thought would be the start after Bloodleaf. I kept putting it down and coming back to it. However, when this book finally does pick up, it PICKED UP. So much happened and, even though it was different, I was just so excited again for this story, and then the ending leaves you dying (which, I probably should've expected, because of Bloodleaf's ending) All right, you got me, where's book 3?

I really enjoyed this book and found it to be a lot more enjoyable than the first, which I did enjoy as well. It felt faster paced than the first.

I also really enjoyed the setting details which I felt were really well done. It was really vivid and the worldbuilding was sufficient, building onto the already established.

In addition, the character development was really well done. It was really interesting to see the ways in which the characters grew throughout the book. I enjoyed the protagonist more in this book than in the last.

It was more a 4 star read than as 5 star for me, but only because it was a little bit slow in the beginning and the protagonist did bother me at points throughout the book.

I also wanted to take a moment to comment on the cover change. As a whole, I do really like the art on the cover of this book, but I like the original cover better and it honestly bothers me a bit that my copy of bloodleaf won't match this one. Maybe, there should be a dust jacket released to match the original, or one for bloodleaf to match this one.

I received an Advanced Reading Copy of this book from Netgally. I loved Crystal Smith's first book Bloodleaf. I couldn't wait for the next book. After the ending of Bloodleaf I was ready to dive right into Greythorne to find out what happened next with Aurelia and Zan! This book is full of suspense, both plot wise and character wise. The stakes are high and everything and everyone is on the line.

Boy, was I worried for Greythorne. Not because I thought I wouldn’t like it, but because it says in the synopsis that Zan dies. I did not take that well. At all. But I had faith and Crystal Smith and pushed on. I’m glad I did.

“Greythorne” heads more into the mages/witches and the world’s lore than in the first one. (Which I was SUPER excited to learn! We dive into Aurelia’s blood magic, and the effects it’s caused.) “Bloodleaf” feels like an introduction into this world. “Greythorn” tests the world in new and exciting ways. I loved how Crystal Smith brought about consequences from the first book. In other words, what happens after an evil king tries to destroy everything? Obviously there are some economic and societal drawbacks to that unstable time after a successful revolution, and “Greythorne” is all about this.

In addition to the world building, “Greythorne” builds on the character growth that had already started in “Bloodleaf.” It is so realistic to do this, because people never just have one character arc, but thousands upon thousands. I loved seeing how Aurelia, Zan, Conrad, etc all dealt with the repercussions of book one. (And the repercussions of what happens in the beginning of book two.) There are some solid feelings in here. The characters are SO WELL DONE. Gosh, I love Crystal Smith’s writing. She had me crying all over Twitter.

All around, “Greythorne” was a solid sequel. I’m dying for the next one. I GOTTA KNOW WHAT HAPPENS!!!!

A story with good characters, interesting plot and beautiful imagery. It was difficult to get into the story. After a few chapters I started to like it. Overall, I liked the book.

I was a bit nervous about the potential change in tone regarding the change in setting, but I really shouldn’t have been. This author is very atmospheric and really knows how to engage the reader. I enjoyed the new characters and twists. I really am looking forward to more from this author.

This ia simple and easy: the cover got me hooked then the story grabbed me.
Thank you to the writer, publisher and NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest feedback.