A world filled with betrayal, death, politics, ambition, secrecy, and magic.

Lore spent the first 13 years of her life deep beneath the city of Dellaire, in the catacombs raised by The Night Sisters. In the 10 years since she has escaped and was taken in by Drug Runners who employed her, and gave her a way to stay relatively safe, fed, clothed and house, while helping her conceal her power of wielding death. When a drop goes wrong and she is forced to reveal her skills, she is taken into the fold of the royal court, and the church it serves. She is tasked with spying on the heir, and to help solve the mystery of dying subjects, but not everything or everyone in court is as they seem.

This start to a new series was leaps and bounds better constructed than the debut series by this author. The world building was imaginative, unique, and left me very intrigued. Some of the character traits and plot points were cliched, but I genuinely had a great time and flew through this story. There were twists and turns I didn't see coming, and a natural chemistry and banter between the main characters that felt very well executed.

I love Hannah Whitten's devotion to feral, angry, dark girls with equally dark powers. I see so much in common with Lore and Red and Neve from the Wilderwood duology, and yet the stories and worlds were so different. I loved the political intrigue, the mystery, and the deep religious lore of The Foxglove King. It took me a little while to get into the story and to understand all the world building, but once I did I couldn't put it down. Plus, I'm a sucker for a love triangle. This one has two equally swoon-worthy love interests - a deeply devoted religious type (aka big Matthias from Six of Crows vibes) and a devious prince who definitely cares more than he lets on. I really don't know who to root for and I like it that way! I can't wait to see the way the rest of the series develops and to learn more about this world.

I was a little “meh” on For the Wolf and haven’t bothered tracking down the sequel yet, but I enjoyed this much more. I’d call the audience for this more New Adult than Adult: the main characters are 23/24, there’s a love triangle (a YA trope I’ll admit I don’t hate), the characters have a certain self-absorption.

The vibes on this reminded me of Seven Faceless Saints: a pantheon of gods, some of whom have fallen; some of the main characters distrustful of their society’s religious fervor; great ST between two of the characters who distrust each other but can’t help themselves; amorphous setting evocative of an 18th century European city judging by the names, technology, and stone building–filled metropolis.

Overall, this was enjoyable and I look forward to reading what happens next in the fantasy/mystery and romance storylines set up in this first book.

This was a great start to a new favorite fantasy series! This book was fast paced, full of mystery and intrigue, with a hint of romance. I really loved the characters, who were well written and interesting. The magic in this book was very unique and fascinating. There were hints of a love triangle, and I can’t wait to explore these relationships more! After that ending, I cannot wait to read the next book and find out what will happen with Lore, Bastian and Gabe!

This was a great start to a new favorite fantasy series! This book was fast paced, full of mystery and intrigue, with a hint of romance. I really loved the characters, who were well written and interesting. The magic in this book was very unique and fascinating. There were hints of a love triangle, and I can’t wait to explore these relationships more! After that ending, I cannot wait to read the next book and find out what will happen with Lore, Bastian and Gabe!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ The Foxglove King | Hannah Witten

So I always say this about fantasy books but I find that reviewing the first book is often hard because there is so much word building. This book is no exception. Once I got in to it though, I loved this world. It was dark and such an interesting magical system.

If you like morally grey, this is for you. Each character’s motives are questionable and there is lots of betrayal. I loved it. I do however love both Gabe and Bastian and I am really excited to see what happens with this trio!

Read this if you like:
☠️ Skirting Death
☠️ Surprising friends and even more surprising enemies
☠️ Fated Destinies

I can't lie, I was pretty bored throughout a lot of this book. The magic system was pretty cool and unique but alone wasn't enough to make reading it worthwhile. Unfortunately, the main character is independent and strong but still gets caught up in pointless and irritating love triangles which just doesn't seem consistent with her character.

Overall, this was well-written and had potential but just missed the mark for me. I preferred Whitten's other series far more than this one though that may be a controversial opinion. I just wasn't as charmed or intrigued as I hoped to be.

Fantasy, forbidden romance, check and check, say less. What did I love about this book? I loved the main character's badassery, I loved the setting, I loved the secondary character(s) and I loved the adventure. I did find the magic system a little confusing at first, hence why this is not a five star review but overall I think the author did a great job and I would definitely recommend this to fantasy fans and people who loved books like ACOTAR.

"Ah, yes." Bastian tied off the linen on her hands. "The kneecaps are the eyes of the legs.”

Lore escaped the catacombs successfully and has been trying her hardest to just not get caught in the last 10 years. The problem is that she has the power to wield death magic, and sometimes she uses it on pure instinct. When she is revealed and taken to the King, she is given a choice, spy on his son for him or die. She is thrust into a world of glittering nobility, with Gabe a duke turned monk by her side. She's been instructed to stay glued to Bastian, the roguish prince, and through it all she learns things she could have never imagined.

Whitten can officially do no wrong as far as I am concerned. I have loved every book I have read of hers and this one is no different. She has a way of creating a magic system, while also creating an atmospheric world I can see in my head and throws in characters full of depth and wit. And she does it all beautifully! Her characters feel real, regardless of magic powers and fantastical lands. The world she created here was very different than her previous series and I'm so glad that it is. It stands to reason that Whitten is a talented author and I can't wait to read the next book in this series!

Fantastic! Please read it!!!!

Take a dash of necromancy, a side of horror, but make it a fantasy obsessed with religion and you have The Foxglove King!

I really enjoyed this one. It is a slow burn where information is given to us gradually.

I loved the dark vibes and the ridiculously original magic system and emphasis on religion. In this world a dead god is literally leaking magic and poison can extend lifetimes.

I will say, this book took me awhile to read. The book is slow moving, which isn’t a bad thing, but I wasn’t turning pages quite as quickly as normal and found myself reading slowly.

There is political intrigue, mortem/spiritum magic, villages of people being killed, talking corpses, and a church with many secrets. 👀

I had read that it was a love triangle but honestly I didn’t feel that so much given the fact that the romance is very much a B plot. Is there some romance? Yes, but not very much.

I’m holding out hope that book two ramps up the romance. ❤️

All in all, I thoroughly enjoyed it! Trigger warnings for death, necromancy, and magic performed on corpses. —Truly there are a lot of corpses so be warned.

Thank you so much to the publisher and NetGalley for the advanced copy!

"Aim for the kneecaps."
"Ah, yes." Bastian tied off the linen on her hands. "The kneecaps are the eyes of the legs."
They both stared at him. Then Gabe shrugged.
"That's actually pretty good advice."

Lore was born with death magic, Mortem, and as hard as she tries to keep it a secret, she learns that she's been watched since she was thirteen when she accidentally raised a boy from the dead. 10 years later, as a spy for her two adoptive mothers, she accidentally raises a dead horse back to life in front of the wrong people.

Forced to work for the Sainted King and his brother who is the leader of the Presque Mort, a group of monks who use Mortem, she's told to spy on the King's son Bastian to figure out if he's turned traitor for an enemy kingdom. Gabriel, who is part of the Presque Mort, is her partner in the King's court, teaches her how to use and control Mortem. She's soon torn between Bastian and Gabe all while trying to figure out her power. Who can she trust? Who is using her?

I'm not going to lie, this book took me about 10% to actually get into. The descriptions of Mortem and the world-building was a little confusing and I struggled to understand what exactly was going on. But boy oh boy, when it got good it was fantastic. I started to understand the world and all the different roles that everyone plays. The idea of the death magic, Mortem, was incredibly interesting and such a cool idea.

Lore is such an interesting character and I loved her. She's fierce, soft, tough, and smart, navigating the court with ease alongside Gabe. Lore knows what must be done and is the type of person who doesn't trust anyone at first. Gabe, however, I found to be both loveable and frustrating. He's sworn to celibacy, but soon develops feelings for Lore that he finds to be confusing and he doesn't know what to do. Bastian on the other hand was so much fun. He's witty and sassy, friendly, loyal, a bad-boy, but also sweet and kind.

This book was so freaking good and I'm so happy that I read it! It had some funny moments, a lot of tense situations, mystery and intrigue, the love triangle, and an excellent ending that makes you want book 2 right away!

Why is this book not all over bookstagram and TikTok??? It is INCREDIBLE. I will start recommending this when I hear readers are in a slump. It’s unique. It’s fun. It’s addicting. I am going to buy this for all of my family. I can’t wait until my physical copy gets here.

I was excited to read this book because I enjoyed For the Wolf and For the Throne. I found this book to be really interesting; it had good world building and character information. The story was a bit slow at times and I would have liked more plot, but since this book is part of a series I think it was good set up. I liked the religious themes and the dark gothic setting,

This was an interesting read. The world building was cool, the magic system/elemental powers made sense, and the FMC was relatable.and believable. She had limitations to her powers and she had to figure out how they worked, which I appreciated.
Lore finds herself between a rock and a hard place when her powers are discovered in a very public way. She is given an ultimatum, become a spy for the king or be sent to a work colony.
This decision puts her in the midst of a mystery with wide ranging political implications. She has to put her trust in two men who have opposing views and deep rooted animosity.
While I liked the story, there were times where I felt it dragged and the pacing was off.
Overall, I like this one and would recommend.

DNF at 20%. I unfortunately think Hannah Whitten's stories are not for me. I read For the Wolf and while I didn't think there was much character development or chemistry, there was a decent story idea there. The execution just wasn't done well. I decided to skip For the Crown, but was interested in reading a different story from her. When I read the synopsis of this one, I thought maybe with a duology under her belt, I would enjoy this one more.

While the writing has improved, the story telling has not. The first several chapters are an info dump of the setting, the society, the main character, her motivations and history, her magic powers, the religion of the community as well as a bunch of other day to day information. Unfortunately all of this is bland and lacks any character. The setting can best be described as Generic Old European. If you're going to take the time to describe the clothes, make it more interesting than black pants, white tunic.

Lore's magic system is interesting and again, a great concept, but when described sounds so boring. She reanimates dead things. This is a problem because you shouldn't do that. Because it's wrong and religion. It lacks any sort of spark and any reason as to why I should care about her and her magic. We're told that this is very dangerous because this type of magic is "wrong" and she could be killed for it being "wrong," but again, everything is so generic that we're told, never shown. We're never shown an example of how hard the church is or how straight laced the society is. Instead we're shown a church with a Goodwill closet?? And maybe it's supposed to show us that the church isn't what it seems, but it's way too early to be wise to the information.

When the info dump is finally over we jump into the generic plot. We need your dangerous bad power to save the kingdom. This hot member of our religious sect will help you. Oh hey, he's a secret prince, who knew. Oh hey, that guy you're supposed to spy on to help the church is also hot and seems interested in you. The love triangle is smacking you in the face from the second you learn about these two dudes, except you don't care because neither one is very interesting and neither is Lore for that matter.

To put it bluntly, I was bored and didn't care enough about any part of this book to finish. If I read 100 pages and am not hooked and still have 300+ pages to go...no thanks.

The worst part about reading a book so early is having to wait for the next in the series. I thoroughly enjoyed this one. I am in love with Lore, Gabe, and Bastian. I can’t wait to see what’s in store for them now.

The court thing reminded me of The Great which was fun. I liked how Lore and Gabe’s apartments felt comfortable to me as the reader, as well as to them as characters - being the only place they didn’t have to wear their façade’s.

While I don’t know how the relationships between the three will pan out, I’m partial to the found family trope and I love the three of them together even with the tension volleying between them.

Can’t wait for more!

Rating: Solid Book, 3 stars

I feel like there wasn't anything particularly bad about this book, just that I never really connected with it.

What I Liked:
- I liked the main character, Lore. She was fun to follow and I felt like she had decent personality
- I enjoyed the death magic and learning about how that worked
- I enjoy the court setting. I feel like it wasn't as much of a focus as I would have liked, but I still love a good court story

What I Didn't Like:
- I feel like the love triangle-esque setup of Lore, Bastian, and Gabe felt rather forced. I never believed in or cared much about her relationships
- I felt like the final reveals were pretty predictable
- I didn't love the setup of the Church because it felt like a rather surface-level replication of the Catholic Church focusing on cliches
- There wasn't very much court intrigue, which was a disappointment
- Overall there was something about the writing style that felt sort of choppy, like there were pieces deliberately being withheld that really shouldn't have been. I feel like this was how the mystery was created rather than weaving it into the plot

Basically I disliked or was indifferent about more than I liked, but it wasn't a bad book. Somewhat forgettable, but I was intrigued enough that I finished it. I don't really know where the series will go, but I may give it a try whenever it comes out. I'm not opposed to reading more, I just don't know if I'll ever really care to reread it to continue down the line.

Thank you to Orbit and NetGalley for an advance eARC in exchange for an honest review. The Foxglove King released March 7, 2023

i have to start off by saying the premise and overall plot was quite nice. i always am drawn to a court political intrigue. i think the main aspects that took away from the book for me was the writing style and the love interests. i felt like the writing style didn't completely encompass the atmosphere i was expecting.

This story had interesting world buiding that I had a bit of a hard time understanding. The story took a bit of time to get going. I enjoyed the last half of the book more than the first half.
I like the characters and the strong main female character. The magic ability to raise the dead was an interesting concept.
Although the story was a bit stop and go, I did enjoy it overall.
3.5 stars

Very interesting plot and characters. I highly recommend for anyone who enjoys the high fantasy genre. The forbidden romance is so captivating and I love how creative the powers were and the incorporation of the religious orders and treats of war. Some points were a little bit info dumpy but overall a strong start to a new series!