Amazing! Ana Lal Din's debut is very ambitious, very promising and it delivers!
First, I can promise you that this book will definitely immerse you in a deeply South Asian inspired world that is so very dark and so very luring. The worldbuilding in this book is top notch!
Second, the characters are super complex and they are in a super complex world, thus they do terrible things but you still want them to be better (sometimes you want them to do terrible things)
And third, this book is original. It is such a new take on magic, on life and on truths told as stories in general, that as a South Asian person it warms my heart!
Fourth, the book deals with several difficult themes adeptly. Rape, prostitution, castism, slavery, and wars. Ana Lal Din doesn't sugarcoat things but she delivers her message clearly.
Fans of Sabaa Tahir's relentless pace and compelling, morally grey characters, Brandon Sanderson"s worldbuilding and G.R.R Martin's plottting will devour this book!
I believe Ana Lal Din is just setting the stage for the next book, but what a magnificent stage it is with cobras, magic, plots and a dark, dark world!

This book was honestly so good.
The worldbuilding was absolutely amazing - I loved the incorporation of languages, the way the world was built, how we saw different people living different lives. The author managed to showcase a lot of very important modern issues within her world and her writing, which I found really interesting to read about. Due to the complex worldbuilding, the book was sometimes a little slow and also confusing, but I didn't mind that a lot.
I really liked the characters. Roma was an amazing protagonist, and it was so easy to emphasize with her struggles and to understand her actions. I also loved the interactions between the characters.
The writing style was so beautiful, and one of the main reasons I enjoyed this book as much as I did. I feel like the plot was also pretty solid, but the pacing was a little off and the ending felt rushed in certain aspects. I would have liked some more explanations during the last chapters and some added details.
However, this was still a great read, and I would definitely recommend this book. It touches on some very important issues which I haven't seen discussed in fiction a lot.

The only way to describe this book would be *exquisite*. The writing style is gorgeous, the characters are so fleshed out and unique, and their pain and emotions are so clearly visible through the pages. The character’s perspectives on certain decisions in terrible circumstances are understandable and the world-building weaved with fantasy elements and a cultural background is perfect. Ana Lal Din masterfully uses the context of historical Arabian must hooky to create a multi-layered world, with clear distinctions between the elites and lower classes, as well as the destruction and power imbalances that come with greed and desire for wealth. Certain moments in this book are so beautifully described, showing snippets of happiness and an escape from reality even in this dark, treacherous environment.

This book works with so many themes and topics, knitting them into the environment of this time. These themes make up the identities of the different characters. These topics are difficult and horrid with the circumstances presenting in the world-building, but there are developed perfectly, adding depth and opportunists for victims to express their discontentment. These ideas are weaved into the world-building, working to show flaws in the world and the clear imbalances between different powers.

This story involves two perspectives, adding great depth to the plot and flow. Roma, even as a girl dealing with terrible pain from her past, continues to remain strong and fight for good and justice. She is wonderfully developed throughout this story, and we can clearly see her need to retain strength and a will to go forward to protect those she loves. Levi, on the other side of the power balance, has a clear background and motive to fix the unjust actions of his people. Due to the actions of his father, this is made difficult, causing him to struggle with morals and understand what is right and wrong. He, along with all the other characters, is so flawlessly developed, and even with the violent things he has done, he appeals to the reader through his intentions and respect.

I was initially a bit confused with the start as we were introduced to the world and the characters, and the first half felt a bit slow. As the perspectives are not labeled in every chapter, I did find myself needing to reread a paragraph or two to understand who is narrating. Even in this case, the perspectives are easy to understand as there is some context at the beginning of each chapter, and the story picks up and flows perfectly throughout the rest of the book.

The sceneries, the clothing, the gore are all so beautifully described, though retaining a dark taint due to the harsh circumstances of society. I honestly found it very interesting to be able to understand the snippets of the world’s language (Urdu/Hindi) used to add great authenticity to the world-building as well as greater distinctions between different classes due to the use of honorifics.

Overall, this book was absolutely amazing! The characters are developed beautifully, the world-building is *exquisite*, and the themes and topics add so much depth to the plot. The ending completely surprised me, and although I feel the need for more books after this (I have to know what happens next!), this could be read as a standalone.

I loved every moment of this, and will definitely be reading any and all books from this author!

This book blew me away.
Everyone add this to their tbr’s right now!

I want to first start out by saying that this book deals with extremely heavy topics. The author includes trigger warnings at the beginning. Please do your research and please read with caution.

The Descent of the Drowned takes place in a very corrupt world. As children, Roma and Leviathan were both thrown into jobs that they wanted no part in. Because of what he did in his past, Leviathan is known as the Blade. Because of their past traumas, Roma and Levi spend everyday trying to escape their pasts.

The culture and world described in this is absolutely captivating. The author is so descriptive with the world’s traditions and clothing and even languages. There is a focus on world building and character development in this book, but I think that focus was intended. There is a good plot, but I do think the most important part is the character development for Roma and Levi.
The beginning of this book is rather confusing, mainly because of all the new names and words thrown around. The author includes a wonderful glossary in the back of the book but it’s hard to flip back and forth to it in the ePub arc version, which is one of the many reasons i wish I had a physical copy while reading.

I found myself relating a lot to both our main characters. There’s an encompassing darkness within both Roma and Levi. The world has been horrible to both of them, and their own personal demons are always lurking in the shadows. Watching them cope and learn to move forward no matter how hard it might’ve been was one of my favourite aspects of this novel.
I hope that in the second installment of this series, Roma and Leviathan can grow together and learn to trust each other. I can already tell that this is going to be an incredible slow burn romance and has potential to be on of my favourite romances ever. Roma and Leviathan are two incredible people.

I didn’t want this book to end. As I turned the last page, all I wanted was more story, more info on our protagonists, more anything from this world. And don’t even get my started on the cliffhanger ending...
I think that is the true test if I loved a book or not. Although I don’t think this book was perfect, I was more than fully invested in our protagonists. It was heart wrenching and beautiful and enthralling. This book tapped at the darkest parts of me, it reached its fist our and grabbed my heart wholly.

Just as a reminder, this book deals with extremely heavy topics. It is not for the lighthearted however it is an incredible story and deserves to be read by anyone and everyone who don’t mind reading about such dark topics.

*thank you so much to NetGalley and the Books Forward and the Ana Lal Din for the advanced readers copy!

DNF at 10%
This book looks like a powerful and important story set in a colonized Indo-Persian world with rich mythology, but unfortunately this one wasn't for me. The world-building looks intriguing, but I didn't click with the writing style at all. It felt choppy and I had trouble concentrating on the book because of it, so sadly I did not finish it.

*Thank you to Ana Lal Din, NetGalley, and White Tigress Press for a free eARC in exchange for an honest review.*

Trigger and content warnings: mentions of rape, suicide, addiction, human trafficking, emotional and physical abuse.

"The gods were always angry. That was why people lived in constant fear of them. It was as if one couldn't worship them out of love or want. Anger, punishment, and revenge were the traits by which they were defined."

I got to start by saying how much I loved this book! From the first few pages, I was completely hooked; the story, the setting, the culture, and the entire world-building drew me in and I couldn't put down the book. The story follows 2 main protagonists–Roma and Leviathan. They come from very different backgrounds yet are similar in many ways. Both struggle to forget the demons from their past and deal with the ones that are plaguing them at present. Few chapters in I was fully invested in both of their storylines and the way it all came together, in the end, blew me away! Seriously, the twists and turns were so well thought out and satisfying *cough* Roma's last chapter *cough* IT JUST GAVE ME CHILLS 🐍🐍🐍 I cannot wait to see what's next for both of these characters–together and separately. I hope the next book will be a bit gentler for both of them and they can heal and develop some kind of friendship and later on maybe even something more. I feel like this couple has the potential to be epic just from the few interactions they had in this book. They will be the slowest slow burn and I am here for it!

In conclusion, I'm absolutely OBSESSED with The Descent of the Drowned. It has intrigue, ancient magic, budding romance, COBRAS, secret plots, amazing fighting sequences, and cool supporting characters. I'd recommend this book for fans of Hafsah Faizal's We Hunt the Flame series.

This was an excellent book! With a riveting plot, and detailed - and realistic - character development, you will definitely enjoy reading this title!

The Descent of the Drowned is a dark, lush, and immersive read! I thought it dragged a little bit too much, hence the three stars.

Thank you to Netgalley and White Tigress Press for this digital ARC!
The Descent of the Drowned is a shining debut that absorbed me from page one! (Side note: would recommend taking a look at the trigger warnings before reading) These characters are so well-developed and their arcs are completely satisfying. I love my morally gray and strong characters, and this book’s cast did not disappoint. The indo-persian setting is absolutely amazing and the writing is beautiful. And that ending! Highly Recommend!

First of all, thank you so much to Netgalley, Ana Lal Din and White Tigress Press for providing my very first arc!
Secondly, oh my god.
This book might be a bit hard to get into at first because the language and the world building are so complex, but if it isn't worth it!
The zaat system is intricate and unique, the characters are extremely human and the plot leaves you hooked from the beginning.
I'm obsessed and I can't wait for the rest of the series!

a great debut, imo; i read it in one sitting.

although occasionally unpolished, the writing is well-crafted and heady with emotion, which i think can sometimes be hard to pull off in third-person. the setting, politics, culture, and people of the descent of the drowned are vibrant; the world-building i think is this novel's greatest strength.

this is a difficult, heartbreaking book; structurally it echoes a young adult fantasy novel, but—and this may just be me—the content is graphic and reads like it should be for an older audience. it is also incredibly slow; its complexity, and the various strands of its plot (which are all a bit miserable) make it a little overwhelming. i'm not sure if that would change if i were in a different headspace while reading.

as it is, however, i began to struggle midway through, faced with absolutely no reprieve from the myriad traumas every character experienced, over and over and over. it's not gratuitous by any means, but i found it tense in a way that i didn't love. i also felt either completely neutral, or outright unsympathetic, towards all of them save the protagonists, junho, malev, and—obviously—the children. this is pretty much what knocked my rating down: i think the author is heavy-handed, trying too hard here to do too much, and the execution may have been slightly more enjoyable if the plot had been narrower in scope. that said, however, the author depicts trauma and grief so expertly—it is both realistic and sensitive, and i appreciated that.

roma is easily the best character, but i was most intrigued by leviathan's (whose surname (?) i dislike immensely—it feels out of place lmao) more cerebral chapters and his encounter with the white wolves. i will say the description definitely led me to believe their paths would actually cross more than they actually did, but i thought the cliffhanger ending was great. i'll probably pick up the next one!

3.75 stars rounded up.

*arc received from netgalley & publisher in exchange for an honest review!

3.5/5 stars
Recommended for people who like: magic, fantasy, Indo-Persian culture, Indo-Persian mythology, dual POVs

Blog review for this book will be out 2/3/21

TW: rape, sexual assault, suicide, transphobia, human and child trafficking

The summary of the book sounded really interesting. I'm always gunning for more non-Western fantasy and mythology YA, so it was exciting to see Descent of the Drowned come up on my dashboard. I will say that the premise is a little off, since Chirag isn't the trigger for Roma wanting to escape the confines of being a Lamiadasi, though he is a focal point, and Leviathan isn't really exiled until about 60% of the way through the book. However, Din does come through with the promise of Indo-Persian fantasy and I really enjoyed the setting for the book.

To start with I'll say that the book does contain trigger warnings, so I was warned when I went into reading it, but based on the descriptions from some of the other reviews I didn't think it'd be an issue. Rape is mentioned, though not graphically, a lot. I thought it would just be at the beginning of the book and in some mentions of the past and that would be that, which for the first ~50% of the book it is, but the last quarter of the book gets very dark and it becomes a lot more prevalent. I know it's kind of one of the themes of the book and that it isn't graphic, but something about it just bothers me a lot. I don't think it was necessary for the ending, I think there were other ways to push that into happening, some of which were already in motion, and it definitely turned me off a lot to the book.

My next biggest complaint is about two character deaths that also occur toward the end of the book. Admittedly I'm more upset about the first than the second, but both do bother me and while I understand plot-wise why they happened, I am wondering why the first one had to be so damn brutal. It's a small thing, both characters are minor-ish characters, but they're the ones that you end up rooting for without necessarily realizing it, so adding that to the last 25% of the book was kind of a blow and, with the rest of the darkness of the ending, made it hard to enjoy the book.

These two points really drove down my enjoyment of the book, but up until around the 50-60% mark I was really enjoying it. For one, the setting is really well described and I felt like I was in the city or in the village or temple with Roma or Leviathan. The first half of the book definitely drags from a plot perspective, but Din definitely makes up for it in the richness of her descriptions. I enjoyed reading about the festival prep and the descriptions of Lamiapur, though life might have been less than stellar.

I enjoyed the characters as well, and Din did a good job of making Leviathan a sympathetic character (to a point). For Levi, he's grown up with the brutal training of his father and has had to deal with killing some of his people. Despite that history and some animosity, he clearly cares about the clans and wants to help them. He also has a good bond with his two comrades, Malev and Junho, though he can sometimes be a bit too hard on the latter. It's also clear how much he cares for his horse, Cinder, whom he developed a strong enough bond with that the horse basically roams free but never runs off. Leviathan also makes at least one major mistake, though, about 55-65% of the way through the book and I definitely didn't like him for that, though he does at least feel regret about it.

Roma has got fire in her, even if she lets it lay quiet until about halfway through the book. Her past involves sexual assault, and she still has trauma from it and doesn't like to be touched. She also clearly cares about the clans and risks getting in trouble a couple times to help them, though it isn't explained how she came to know Mai and Khiraa and the rest of them. I thought it was nice that Mai was something like a mother to Roma when she visited the clans, since Roma really does need someone like that in her life. She's also fiercely protective of some of the other Lamiadasis, though she might not always understand them, and she is particularly protective over Chirag, her brother. Something I'm confused about re: Roma, is how she really did seem to know that Lamiadasis were just glorified prostitutes from the beginning, but is shocked upon having it revealed to her. Like...she touched upon that 'secret,' using almost the exact words used in the reveal, but is still surprised and kind of reels from the revelation, which seemed odd.

For side characters, I actually found myself really enjoying Yoshi, even though she could be a bit harsh at times. She is brash, and she may make a bad decision, but she does seem to care about other people and unlike some of the others, she'll tell hard truths to Roma straight to her face. Chirag was cute, though he wasn't actually in the book as much as I'd been expecting. I do wonder, though, why Roma didn't mention a specific ability of his that could've saved them some trouble if she had.

On Leviathan's side, I liked Malev more than I liked Junho. Malev certainly seems to be the more sympathetic of the two, both as a character and to other characters, and has some lines he won't cross. Junho was a character I actually liked until the Incident about halfway through the book, after which he's rather harsh to Roma over being angry at Levi for something that even Levi feels bad about and for which she has 100% justification for being angry. I liked the parts with the White Wolves, though, and I wish there'd been more time spent with them, rebellions are kind of my literary jam.

As for the ending. There's a revelation at the end (two technically, but I'm talking about the second one) that I would've appreciated having a bit more build-up. There are hints about it dropped throughout the book, and I was picking up on something, but I was kind of confused about what was actually happening by the time we got to the revelation and what the significance of remembering vs. not was. Also, I'm still not entirely certain what the reveal actually revealed. Like, yeah, the character is different and powerful...which we already knew, but it doesn't really give a ton of background on what that new title actually means, so a bit more explanation would've been nice.

Overall, I liked only about 50% of this book, maybe less. The beginning was fine, and I even could've dealt with what happened in the middle, but the ending was just...a lot. It definitely brought down my enjoyment of the book and I don't think I'll reread or check out the sequel. Also, as another reviewer mentioned, I think this book should be rated as new adult or adult, it's a bit heavy and dark for YA.

3.5 stars

First of all, this book is categorised as YA, but with a large chunk of the YA audience being teenagers and people under the age of 18, I believe this book should be moved into the New Adult category. The book does come with trigger warnings so the reader is aware of the story they are approaching, but I still found the book hard to digest.

I liked the writing style and the world building. The book is set in a world that I have read very little about so it was an intriguing and interesting experience for me.

The cliffhanger left me with a book-hangover, but again I really struggled with some of the darker elements to the book, and I’m unsure if I want to continue with the series.

I was given an ARC of Descent of the Drowned thanks to Ana Lal Din, White Tigress Press and NetGalley in exchange for my honest review.

The Descent of the Drowned is a dark and enthralling story.

First, you must be aware that this book mentions (but not in too explicit scenes) rape (involving young kids and teens), self-harm, torture, murder, and physical abuse.

This book deals with a lot of topics. Some are darker and heavier than others, but everything is well developed, and it is consistent with the storyline and the world in which the two main characters live. The traumatic events are not there only to elicit the reader’s compassion, they help us understand the past and complexity of the characters as we realize how these awful events are part of their everyday life. For the lower casts of the society, and the outcast clans, the days are filled with fear and poverty, people hardly know who to trust and they can only rely on their family and friends since the authorities in place do nothing to help them.

There is a lot of information in the first chapters, and it was a little confusing at first, but it is nothing major, and it did not prevent me from understanding the story. Everything eventually makes sense as I continued reading, I got used to the titles and the different deities. The glossary at the end does help a lot to understand the titles and thus the relationships between the different characters. I admit that some parts were harder to read because they involved young kids, but these moments are part of what makes this story so poignant. It shows us a world where greed and fear rule over compassion and love, and where the ugliest parts of human nature are shown.

The pace is a little slow for the first half of the book or so, but the description of Roma’s life is interesting, so I did not mind reading about her at all. We get to know her and Leviathan better, see their thoughts, their fears, and their flaws. Roma’s chapters are full of hardships and trauma, but it is not the only thing that defines her, she is very cynical, strong-willed, and resilient. She hopes for a future where she would be free of slavery, she is a great character and she really grew on me. Even though Roma and Leviathan are two very different persons, their stories are both about fragile hope, a quest for freedom, self-discovery, guilt, and empowerment. The author has a way to get us invested in the characters' stories from the very beginning.

One thing that bothers me a little is that the magic-system is not clear. It took quite a while before it was explained, and even now I am not exactly sure how it works. I hope we will have more details in the next book (hopefully there will be a second book?), I would also like to have more backstory about the secondary characters.

The ending was unexpected, but not exactly a cliff-hanger. Overall, this is a heartbreaking story, but beautifully written and well developed. I would definitely recommend it but be aware of the trigger warnings at the beginning of the book.

I would like to start out and say this is book is quite dark and tackles a variety of horrible issues and can be quite triggering. The author has provided the trigger warnings in the beginning of the book and they are physical and emotional abuse, mention of rape and sodomisation, sexual assault, suicide, bigotry, drug abuse, and human trafficking.

This book is set in a colonised Indo-Persian world and is inspired by pre-Islamic Arabian mythology.

Now, I am from India myself and I believe though it was painful to read, the author accurately captured the horrors of sacred prostitution. It was in my opinion, well done. Dēvadasis in India still exist and is still practiced to this day. It really hit home for me, all of their struggles and pain knowing it is still prevalent here.

The story revolves around the two main characters
Roma and Leviathan.

Roma: She was such a good main character, I could feel her pain and struggles through the book deeply and wanted so badly for her to escape what she had been forced into. She is a strong willed and determined character, very protective of her brother Chirag and we can see that in the way she is ready to sacrifice herself for him. Although she is degraded, hurt, and abused, she never backs down and always fights and tries to persevere. Her story was so well written and I loved reading her arc throughout the book. She always questioned the system she was manipulated into and never believed the reasoning for her pain, she reasoned that her worth and self was much more than she was taught and she evidently was proved right of course. I loved seeing her take power for herself at the end, through all the hardship she’s been through. I CANNOT wait for what that will lead to in the next installement.

Leviathan: He is an intriguing character, a true morally grey one. At the moment he is more bad than good, with how he was brought up and raised and is trying his best to unlearn that and be better. One thing about him is he never makes excuses for himself and realises that his actions are wrong but does them any way, which is the exact problem. I can't say I love him but I did thoroughly enjoy reading about him and watching him discover and try to learn what’s right and wrong and to try and use his opportunities to help the people around him instead of being the weapon he was raised as.

I adored the side characters as well, (Ashar, Junho, Chirag and Malev etc.) they were well fleshed out and added depth and humor to the story many times.

I loved the writing and the world it was set in although, the world was a little hard to follow with. Lots of names and tales with not a lot background were dropped and it was a little confusing although this may have just been with me. It was quite a slow paced story and I feel like not much happened so much as creating a serious groundwork for the story to really pickup and start in the next book which was the only reason I lowered the rating a little bit. This was still fine as it really allowed the characters to shine through and for them to be really fleshed out, developed and understood.
This as easily a 4.5 stars read and that ending absolutely shook me and I’m eagerly anticipating the next book.

arc provided by netgalley for an honest review

first thing i want to mention is that i know that this book is categorised as ya but i would categorise it as high fantasy. there are a lot of dark topics mentioned and explored and a good chunk of the ya audience is children and this is not something i would recommend to them. this is a beautifully written book and i cannot wait for more people to read it but this is not something i would recommend without informing them about these topics because they can be very triggering.

the descent of the drowned is set in a colonised indo-persian world and inspired by pre islamic arabian mythology.

we have two main characters in this book:
— leviathan: bastard son of the immortal tyrant but also son to a mother from one of the persecuted clans. he is considered casteless but is a brutally built weapon who executes in his father’s name. he believes that his soul is a lost cause but as we read more we learn that maybe there is a way for him to get out of his father’s clutches.
— roma: a sacred slave of a goddess who wants nothing more than her freedom and safety for her brother. but as others start to learn, she draws people towards her and is slowly intertwined with levi’s storyline

ana lal din’s writing is absolutely marvellous and i kept wanting to keep on reading. the world building, the setting, and the characters all sucked me in. i normally do not like slow paced books especially if it’s a fantasy book but i loved the way this book was written. this is not a book you want to read quickly, there are a lot of characters and revelations and i would recommend going back sometimes so you can refresh your memory on who the characters are.

i loved both main characters as well as several of the side characters (chirag, junho, malev, ashar). they’re all vastly different characters and their loyalties lie in different directions and all very important. a big part of this book is mystery and learning more about all of the characters after each revelation has been a wonderful experience. i cannot wait to see them all interact with one another. several of them share scenes but i’m intrigued to see them as a group share some scenes.

while this book has dark topics, i found myself laughing several times because these characters really are hilarious. i love the bond between chirag and roma, levi and junho and malev as well as that of the white wolves. they’re all very devoted to one another and would die for each other.

one thing i particularly loved is that levi knows he is not a good guy and unlike most morally grey male characters, he doesn’t try and victimise himself because of that. he has a fucked up childhood and is constantly struggling with his inner demons and the damage that his father inflicted on him. roma to a degree does understand what it is like to live with a terrible past but they are both very different characters and have very different views and ways of thinking. levi has a very strategic mind and it every intriguing to read about but he does what he does for his end goal and unfortunately most of the time there is collateral damage, collateral damage he knows will happen but he is looking at the end goal. meanwhile roma very much thinks about the collateral damage and in her case, her brother. she’s seen countless family members brutally suffer when a relative does something and would never wish that on her brother.

i absolutely loved this book and i cannot wait to read the next one.

trigger warnings: physical and emotional abuse, mention of rape and sodomisation, sexual assault, suicide, bigotry, drug abuse, and human trafficking. (provided by the author)

5 stars. Thank you to Netgalley and White tigress press for sending me an arc in exchange of this honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

The descent of the drowned is a slow paced read that deals with such heavy topics. I was very surprised to see the author include a trigger warning in the beginning of the novel and I found that these topics were very well dealt with.

I love the setting of this book, the indo-Persian world was so exciting to explore and the Arabian mythology was enticing. The characters I found were very strong and independent making them extremely likeable and seeing them overcome their challenges made them very realistic and Ana Lal Din did a wonderful job.

This book was entertaining and kept me on my toes, I fell in love with the characters and I got so attached I even cried. I would certainly recommend this book.

Arc provided by White Tigress Press via Netgalley in exchange of an honest review .

Thank you to Netgalley, Ana Lal Din, and White Tigress Press for a free ebook copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I first want to say this book covers a lot of very deep and dark subjects. Here are some trigger warnings: this book does discuss assault(a lot), human and child trafficking, drug abuse, and violence.

Now I’m normally one for dark books and dark stories, but even for me, this book was a bit difficult to handle and get through. I though eventually something good would happen, but it never become truly lighthearted, everything wrong just seemed to happen, which is unique for me to read in a book.

This story follows Roma and Leviathan who live very separate lives. Roma is basically a glorified prostitute who is supposed to be descended from the goddesses, and Levi is basically the bastard son of the king, or lord of the land. They both have dark pasts, or dark events that have occurred to them.

I really admired Roma for being so strong throughout the book despite what had happened to her in the past, and doing her best to protect her brother, her sisters, and other female friends. It is just awful, so awful what happened to her. There were many times when she wanted to give up. And she had said one time that she maybe she didn’t have the courage to end her life. Well, I think it takes courage to keep going, to fight and keep living, not give up. I’m glad she kept going, especially when nothing ever went well for her, ever.

Now Leviathan, or Levi, I love him. I love to read about a dark morally grey character that is trying to figure out who he is, who he should be, what he should be, what he should do. Should he be like his cruel and terrible father, or his lovely and kind mother? This boy is fighting some dark events that happened from his past, and he knows he’s responsible and it’s created this monster out of him, and yet, he wants to fight his violent tendencies. He wants to do what is right. I loved his growth through the book from being violent and pretty much uncaring, to someone actually trying to take control of his life and actions and be a better person. He was my favorite character and had the most growth in my opinion.

Now the story was different and much darker than what I am used to. What I do wish is that there was more world building. I was unsure where anyone was located, or how far the different places people went were. I also was confused by the timeline. I thought it was a fantasy world set more in the past, and yet there were some random modernness to it, such as the guns, the cigarettes, and some of the dialogue.

That is really my only qualm about the book. Otherwise, it is a unique world, with unique characters, and seriously a unique story. And the way it ended, I’m just left wondering what????? Like what just happened? It took an even darker turn and I didn’t even know that could happen at this point! I’m unsure whether I will read the next book only because this story was so dark, and it was difficult to get through. Maybe after a year or and a lot of lighthearted reads, I will be able to read the sequel 😊

The biggest thing I think worth mentioning is content. This book is marketed for Young Adult readers. The "honor rape" and other topics seemed a bit heavy for Young Adult readers. But...perhaps many parents and younger readers will not mind this content. I personally loved A Handmaid's Tale and felt many of the same vibes from this book. For my own personal enjoyment, I liked the book. It may not be suitable for all readers, though.

I think the writing of this book is lovely! The story was engaging. The cover is stunning. It's a pretty heavy story, but I tend to enjoy that kind of thing. I appreciate the opportunity to review this book!

I want to thank Netgalley, Ana Lal Din, and White Tigress Press for giving me a chance to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

Before reading this book, I want to give trigger and content warnings for rape, suicide, self harm, other forms of gaslighting and violence towards women.

Okay, for the characters first; I love the personality of Roma, I love how she questioned almost everything in this world. Like she is stubborn but in a good way and despite feeling trapped she still cares for others. She doesn't just settle for what the system says and she really stands up for what she believed and love. The portrayal of trauma she's experiencing are so raw and honest, and I think she is a good example of a damaged character but still standing strong. As for Leviathan, he also has issues and battles in his own head but what makes him a good character is because even though he has those issues and burden, he still really cares not just for other people but also to animals. I love that trait of him. He clearly have flaws and the way the author writes this flaws of him is kinda realistic. And the bonus thing for his personality is he has the best responses to other characters, like a straight-up savage I must say.

This book is tackling serious and heavy topics, but the good thing is the author writes it in a balanced way, like you were not be overwhelmed with heavy topics but also she writes it in a way that is realistic and do not invalidate the topics. In the first 10% of the book, I can already see the unfortunate situations of the lower born people in this book, it doesn't just "tell" us that the situation of this people are bad but instead it actually "show" us. The way the author narrates how messed up the situation of every low-born people in this world is so good. I honestly feel more bad for the situation of EVERY women in this book--- high born or low born--- the men just treated them like a pawn and they're always the one who should adjust for the men. Like they are some objects that can be tossed aside like a trash.

The situation of some characters in this book are so horrible and really sad. There are so much trauma and suffering in this book to the point that I want to scream at the author to give them a fucking break just for once. Lol. But the good thing is, it's not THAT heavy to read. My problem with reading fantasy books are i'm easily too overwhelmed with emotions while reading, and I really hate that. But this book? It's not the case. I mean it's so dramatic and dark but not too over-whelming. Even though there are so much tragedy in this book, there's still that thing that it stops you from being so overwhelmed, and I can't explain what is it. But you'll know it you read it!

As for the world-building of the book, it is well-written. Like the cultures and religions, the beliefs of the people and the political system. It was all in-sync. I also love it that the author also pay more details of like clothing of the characters and their accessories to the places of each scene itself. This was such a fascinating read.

Although i'm assuming that this is a slow-burn fantasy, I still really enjoy the thrill of reading it. I keep saying to myself "just one more chapter" because the thrill in this book are so good that it becomes so addicting and keeps giving me the need to know what happens next. A plus point also for thought-provoking statements about beliefs and power.

My only problem with this book is that it's a little hard to get into it. Like I need more explanation to some parts of detail of this world, for example the terms they used or the names the character calls each other. It just makes me a little bit confused at the start.

But overall, I rated this book 4.5 out of 5 stars! This was such an enjoying read. And i'm really hoping that this is a series or has a sequel. Because I need more from this world!