Thanks to Roaring Brook Press for the gifted ARC!

I absolutely loved THE LAST BLOODCARVER, and have been anxiously awaiting the end to this Vietnam-inspired dark fantasy. Again, the use of medical technology mixed with magic is so up my alley, and I love the tragic love story at the center. I think the duology is best read TOGETHER, because I had a hard time jumping into HIS MORTAL DEMISE a year after reading THE LAST BLOODCARVER. I did still enjoy this one, but not quite as much as book one.

Overall, I think this book is nearly perfect. Its the sequel to
the last bloodcarver. Its a YA series that explores both medical science like the human body and a girl who can perform blood magic. Which I found extremely interesting. It perfectly immerses both science and magic seamlessly. It explores dark themes like colonization and dealing with morality. I would make this duology into my top
ten for YA fantasy this year!

I wasn't able to get into this book. I read about 50% in and just couldn't finish. I think if I read it more in the fall then I would of devoured this book. I was so excited for it :(

[Note: His Mortal Demise includes a significant amount of body horror, including summaries of medical experimentation by a colonial power and detailed descriptions of injuries. In addition to this, one character enlists in a war, and there are serious injuries and death that occur in that portion of the book, including a sequence where a character is trapped in a partially collapsed building. There are also repeated, but short, incidents involving animal death.]

I absolutely loved The Last Bloodcarver, so I was very excited to get my hands on its sequel/conclusion, His Mortal Demise. On a structural level, author Vanessa Le’s decision to split the story into past (Kochin) and present (Nhika) made it possible to have two mysteries being investigated simultaneously: how to bring Nhika back to life and what happened to Kochin after he succeeded? Presenting the story strictly linearly would have undercut the first half of Nhika’s scenes as the reader would already know all the answers, but jumping back and forth between the two timelines was a great way to ramp up tension and inspire dread as Kochin’s point of view got nearer and nearer to the present.

I said in my review of The Last Bloodcarver that it took a while for me to warm up to Kochin, and I’m happy to report that I was immediately rooting for him (and his desperate desire to bring Nhika back to life) from the start in this book. It was fascinating to be in his point of view and get to understand his outlook on his life and his power. Following him into actual war as he tried to figure out exactly what he would or wouldn’t do in order to bring her back made for a compelling, if occasionally horrifying, journey. When Kochin found his moral/ethical line, it was a relief, even if it made things so much more difficult for him. In the last book, we spent a lot of time with Nhika making small connections with her family/heritage, and I appreciated that we got to explore Kochin’s relationship with heartsoothing and his family this time.

Nhika’s plotline of trying to figure out what had happened to Kochin and how the world had changed during her death was also a lot of fun. While the Congmi family took much more of a backseat in this book than the previous one, they were still a solid support for Nhika as she tried to track down what had happened to Kochin. I loved the slow reveals from her point of view, many of which provided ominous clues to what would be happening in Kochin’s story. And when Nhika and Kochin’s plots finally reconnected, it was immensely satisfying to see their devotion to each other rewarded.

Recommendation: If you enjoyed the first book in this duology, His Mortal Demise is a worthy sequel and conclusion. The dual narratives allow for two mysterious to be explored simultaneously and keep the suspense high until the plot lines finally converge. While the war isn’t wrapped up by the end of the book, the character arcs end in a satisfying place, and the genuinely hopeful ending leaves a reader believing that all will be well, eventually. The duology was a lot of fun, and I’m looking forward to what Vanessa Le writes next.

I ended up DNFing this book pretty early on, and maybe will revisit it but just could not get into it right now. I enjoyed the first book and its unique magic system and world, and after the cliffhanger at the end, was excited to see (spoiler alert) the MMC slowly go insane while trying to bring the FMC back to life. However, she came back to life in the prologue, and then his POV is set 6 months in the past while hers is present time. I don't really care to read 6 months in the past when I now know that whatever he did worked, so my suspense is gone. Alas.

Loved the first book but didn't remember a lot of the details so it took a little time for me to get into this one. I continued to enjoy the magic and the worldbuilding. Kochin's character development was also enjoyable to follow - I loved seeing him heal, grow, and stay true to himself.

I really enjoyed the dual POV in this one! The alternating timelines quickly resolved the last book's cliffhanger but kept the mystery going of how exactly that resolution happened. I thought the writing had improved as well and I felt more emotionally connected to Nhika and Kochin and their relationship. This definitely felt like more of Kochin's book rather than Nhika's and I liked seeing Kochin's character development in how he feels towards himself and his heartsoothing. The ending with the antagonist was a bit too clean and easy for me, but I get that it fits with the overall tone and message of the duology.

Overall it was a satisfying conclusion to the duology and I'll be looking forward to reading whatever Vanessa Le writes next.

Thank you to Fierce Reads, Macmillan, and NetGalley for the eARC!

For a book under 400 pages this took me a long time to get into. I loved The Last Bloodcarver when I read it last year and was super looking forward to the second book in this duology. This second installment picks up about 6 months after the end of The Last Bloodcarver. Kochin goes to war, to infiltrate the island of Yarong , to find a way to raise Nhika from the dead. We see early on that he was successful- but not how he managed to do the near impossible. And the world the Nhika wakes into is very different from the one she left.

The switch in the narrative style, now a dual POV with a timeline split, made it feel like it took longer to be fully invested in the story. Aside from Kochin and Nhika many of the characters that we got to know in the first book fade into the background as the mystery of how Kochin brings Nhika back from death are slowly rolled out. Though once the timelines converged, everything picked up and I was fully invested again. In fact I wish more time was spent on the morality involved with heartsoothing and war, than on Nhika’s resurrection.

I wasn’t sure how Vanessa Le was going to manage finishing this story, with the way The Last Bloodcarver ended; I wasn’t sure who would make it out alive in this book either. In the end, it was a good conclusion to the duology, just not the type of story I was anticipating.

As much as I was fascinated by the first book, apparently this sequel didn’t piqued my interest at all… this book has 2 POV, Nhika & Kochin, but their POVs started on different timelines: Nhika in the present, Kochin in the past. It’s disorienting a bit and I needed awhile to get used to it. And thankfully later in the story, their timeline aligned.

The magic system was the only thing that kept me from DNF, because it’s cool. But other than that, I didn’t really care… on the first book I felt like the romance was artificial and this book still failed to change my opinion on that. Overall it’s just okay, i felt indifference on most of it. Still worth to read tho, for the magic system.

This was such an amazing conclusion to The Last Bloodcarver Duology. Much like my last review of the first book, I am absolutely in awe of the writing style and magic system. The writing style so easy to get lost in and not hard to follow, there's a lot of descriptions to really paint the picture and let you marinate in the emotions of the characters. The magic system, while complex as it blends magic and science, isn't hard to understand. I loved the characters and reading from Kochin and Nhika's perspectives, it was so satisfying to see them come together after spending the majority of the book apart. The themes of like self and culture and survival really came through and felt all aspects to be pretty heartbreaking.

Got dinged the .5 because I felt like there were so many red herrings as to what happened to Kochin and it kind of bogged down the pacing. I was about 73% of the way through and thought, "uh-oh... we're almost to the end and we still haven't found out what's going on..." While the ending wasn't THAT rushed, it shortened the payoff for me. The payoff being finding out what happens to Kochin and the couple's reunion. But I understand it, since it's a duology, you don't have the luxury of another book to wrap up loose ends in a satisfying way, hence the half deduction instead of the full star.

Still love the book though. Think it's a good ending to a duology. Had to round rating down to a 4 due not allowing me to do half stars

It’s The Last Bloodcarver sequel time! Vanessa Le’s duology comes to a spectacular end.

Beware, as unmarked spoilers for book #1 will follow!

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Okay, y’all. At the end of The Last Bloodcarver, Nhika died. Using the last of her strength, she healed Kochin and saved his life, passing along the bone ring that had belonged to her heartsooth ancestors in the process. Now, Nhika has woken up in one of the Congmi family’s other manors on the other side of the country. Kochin is nowhere to be found, and Theumas is now at war. Her entire world has turned upside down, and she’s desperate to find answers, but Mimi and Andao are hesitant to tell her the truth.

Six months ago, Ven Kochin almost died, but he was rescued by Nhika. Using technology developed by Dr. Sando during Sando’s attempt to resurrect his dead son, Kochin keeps Nhika in a comatose but stable state. With Theumas on the brink of war, he ventures home to see his estranged family and make amends before setting off on a fool’s quest to find a way to revive her. His own resources dwindling, he knows that he must make his way to the island of Yarong, from whence the heartsooths originally came. Who can he trust to keep Nhika safe while he searches for answers?

Vanessa Le’s writing is just as solid in His Mortal Demise as it was in The Last Bloodcarver. Nhika and Kochin’s split narrative is clever and well-managed, keeping the tension tight as his timeline ticks down and hers continues on into wartime. I’m thrilled to have gotten a chance to read this one. My utmost thanks as always to MacMillan and NetGalley for an eARC in exchange for a fair review. His Mortal Demise dropped on Tuesday, 3/18/25. Go check it out!

This review originally appeared here: https://swordsoftheancients.com/2025/03/21/his-mortal-demise-a-review/

I loved The Last Bloodcarver and while I did enjoy this book, I was also a little disappointed.

It felt like book 1 was Nhika's book, and book 2 was Kochin's book, though obviously there were some POVs in each. I really like Kochin and I enjoyed getting to see him grow and develop into his ability and background more. However, the structure and pacing was harder to get into than for the first book. Book 1 had a central murder mystery pushing the plot along in a fairly linear way, while this book goes back and forth between present day, six months prior, present day, five months prior, etc, breaking up some of the immersion and tension. The central mystery from the last book's cliffhanger (will Nhika be brought back to life?) is solved in the first chapter, and I found a lot of the conflict in this book to be less engaging than the previous murder mystery. I also wish we had more of the Congmis in this book.

However, I did really love all of the scenes where Nhika and Kochin were together, and I think this book really built on that relationship in a way that felt true to both of the characters. I was satisfied with the ending and felt it worked well with the rest of the story, and I enjoyed getting to know Kochin's family better.

His Mortal Demise is the second book in The Last Bloodcarver duology. I loved the first book so this was a highly anticipated 2025 read for me. Unfortunately I was somewhat disappointed. Let me start with the good: the last 20% of this book - wow! It leaves you gasping for breath, it’s so epic. Scenes that feel like they’re straight out of movie, so action packed one minute and then heart wrenching the next. Extremely satisfying conclusion. But you have to get there. I very rarely DnF books and had this not been an ARC I’d have come close to it - and of course I would have missed out on the amazing last part. It’s extremely slow paced, meandering and separates our two main characters for almost the entire book. The Last Bloodcarver showed us that Kochin and Nhika scenes light up the page - making His Mortal Demise a shadow in comparison.

Thank you to Macmillan Publishing Group and NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for an honest review .

I thought this book wrapped up the duology really well! I liked the introduction of the dual timeline/POV, I really enjoy when a book has me trying to piece together how the past led to the present.

The moral dilemmas were really increased in interesting ways, I liked how the issues weren’t black and white, meaning I couldn’t predict what characters would decide since there wasn’t really a right choice.

I liked the development of the characters and relationships, I thought they followed up on the first book well.

I didn’t enjoy this quite as much as the first book, but I think that’s just down to personal preference. I liked the murder mystery of the first one, and I’m not a fan of WWI-ish settings like was happening in a chunk of this story. Not that it didn’t fit with the story overall, just not so much what I liked reading about.

I think this is a great duology that brings a lot of unique aspects to the genre.

Thanks to the publisher for the copy.

Thank you to NetGalley and Macmillan Children's Publishing Group | Roaring Brook Press for the digital ARC of “His Mortal Demise” by Vanessa Le.

I had received “The Last Bloodcarver” in a monthly book box, and was absolutely sucked into the book. Once I saw the second half of the duology was being released I knew I had to read it - it’s already on my list of books I will be buying.
The first book left off with such a cliffhanger, and the second picks up where it left off. Nhika is alive, and the question for her is ‘where is Kochin,’ but as the reader we know exactly where Kochin is - Once again I am seeing gorgeous, and descriptive world building right from the start. Looking at Kochin’s POV in Chapter 2 felt like I was walking alongside him and experiencing his return home with him.

I can see the necessity of the story being told through Kochin in the past POV, but the timeline/order in the story did throw me off a bit, and it felt a bit disjointed - even though the more I read I realized it was filling in a lot of the gaps that Nhika would have missed. Both perspectives did help with seeing the grief process from both sides, and coming to terms with what’s happened, and seeing the conflict in their world.

My only real complaint is that once the two timelines converged, the story was almost over, and the pacing sped up quite a bit.
Overall 4/5

3 stars

I was totally in love with the first book. So the start of this was rough for me. Our main characters aren’t together, and it flops back in forth in points of view and timelines. The prose in parts seemed more repetitive than I remembered the first being. Maybe it was the lack of mystery that let my attention waver? I think eventually it does pick up and come together. I could devour a whole book with them together and happy. It deals with themes relevant to our society in a way I think YA readers can grasp.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for an advanced copy to form opinions from.

"It's the gift of healing passed through my culture—our culture. My grandmother was a heartsooth. When the Daltans came, they destroyed the gift and anyone who might pass it on. They invented a new word for it, bloodcarving—that's the name Theumas uses too, isn't it? They pillaged graves because they believed our corpses might give them the same gift they despised about us. They've tainted the very memory of heartsoothing. It's your history, too. Don't you care to preserve it?"

brief spoiler right off the bat -
(the way this book opens up with Kochin LITERALLY traveling with Nhika’s DEAD BODY IN HIS BOAT????? LIKE JUST SAILING AROUND LIKE THERE’S NOTHING TO SEE HERE??? i’m weak.)
anyway... lmao.

His Mortal Demise opens up with two timelines: one that immediately follows Nhika’s passing and how Kochin decides to react afterwards, and then one that occurs six months later that follows Nhika waking up, with no idea how she got there or what happened in the time she was “dead”.

we quickly learn that shortly after Nhika died, war broke out and is still on-going in the present.

we then follow Nhika as she navigates a new war-torn world, while trying to understand what happened to Kochin, and we follow Kochin as he struggles to accept Nhika’s passing and goes on a journey to try and find a way to bring her back.

obviously by page 1 (so this isn’t a spoiler) we know he was successful in someway, but we don’t know HOW he managed to do it. I loved this aspect a lot, especially while working through the dual timelines as the book progressed. I had several theories on how Kochin did it (none of my theories were correct, which kind of made it more fun) and I think just being able to theorize and try to guess where the story is going can make it more enjoyable to read. it definitely adds an element of being immersed in the story and kind of feeling like you have a personal stake in what happens.

I thought this was a great ending to the duology, but do feel like the world building could have been more clear (I never managed to get a clear handle on what kind of time frame this world exists in, like in the sense of how much modern technology/medicine/etc do we have here). and the history of the war and the colonization of Yarong felt like it had the potential to be amazing to read about, so I was a little disappointed that we didn’t get to explore that history more, or even what became of Yarong after Kochin and Nhika’s story ends. the introduction of Lanalay made this even more disappointing because she had such a STRONG connection to what happened to Yarong. that said, I think if I take a step back and just appreciate the duology for what it is, I think I can picture Lanalay as a symbol of Yarong - she fought for her family and was able to take control of their history and (hopefully) prevent people from trying to abuse them in similar ways in the future. I’d like to imagine that by Kochin taking a stand as well, Yarong will make a comeback in the future of this world.

I also liked that the villain in this book wasn’t a stereotypical black-and-white villain. there were more layers to him and Kochin saw that, even though he had every right to refuse to see it.

plot: ★★★★★
I really enjoyed the dual timeline aspect of the plot. the story opens simulaneously immediately following The Last Bloodcarver and six months after those events. I loved the mystery of trying to understand what happened alongside Nhika in the “present” time, while also getting to see how Kochin made plans to try and bring Nhika back. seeing the chapters progress in the timeline closer and closer to merging together was probably what kept me reading past my bedtime. every time I got to a new chapter and saw we were a little closer, I felt like I had to keep reading because I wanted to know what happened soooo bad.

writing: ★★★☆☆
I mentioned this in my review of The Last Bloodcarver, but I noticed it more in His Mortal Demise: WHAT kind of world are we existing in here??? the visuals and the description of SOME of the technology make me picture a much older, more rural, area. but now we have Iron Man style robots to send to war??????? what is happening lmao

don’t get me wrong, it’s cool and all, but it’s jarring to have a picture in mind, and then feel like I need to turn it on its head to try and rework it to fit the story. idk, I guess I just wish we would have gotten a few paragraphs at any point that explained what technological advances we’ve seen to paint a better picture of how advanced the world might be and/or if it’s a matter of equity/disparity like it IS super high-tech society, but those in lower classes never get to see it? kind of like a Star Wars type of universe?

but the way the author portrays war time and the more gruesome side of medicine was REALLY well done. I am not a squeamish person, but I was grimacing a couple times.

pacing: ★★★★★
the dual timelines make the story go by very quickly. the beginning is a bit quieter, but it doesn’t feel like it’s slow, because you’re dropped right in the middle of the mystery. Nhika wondering how she got here, and Kochin wondering what to do after Nhika’s death.

romance: ★★★★☆ (3.5 rounded up)
Nhika and Kochin worked out soooo much better together in this book than they did in the first one. I just think they weren’t given enough time in The Last Bloodcarver to really connect and get to know each other beyond their shared history. this did make it a little weird in His Mortal Demise because it made it seem like we shifted into “insta-love” territory, but it didn’t feel like that for very long (partially because Kochin would talk to Nhika in his head, which feels like cheating in terms of relationship building, but whatever).

Nhika and Kochin’s romance had a major “tragic love affair” mood to it. I felt like I was constantly waiting for something to go wrong. while it makes for a bit of a tense reading experience, it also made me root for them harder than I would have if I hadn’t been scared for them.

characters: ★★★★☆
I loved Kochin’s interactions with the fake Nhika he imagined, but it made me sad that it was imaginary. it made me wish we got more banter between them during The Last Bloodcarver. I think if we had had those moments before, these reminiscing moments would feel more heartfelt/impactful.

I really liked the Congmi family’s interactions with Nhika as well. they took more of a backseat in this book, but you could still see them caring for her and wanting what’s best for her. especially Trin. I felt this way when I read the first book as well, but I desperately wished we got more time with Nhika and Trin interacting. they have such a fun brother/sister relationship. I would have loved to see more of them, especially seeing them get to lean on each other more and be more vulnerable together. even without all that, we still got some cute moments of them teasing each other and looking out for each other, so I am thankful for that at least.

and I mentioned this already, but the introduction of Lanalay felt... oddly placed. I’m choosing to see her as a metaphor for the country of Yarong as a whole. she felt almost like a ghost or a spirit rather than an actual character. like her entire purpose in the book (to put it vaguely) was to get the papers about her grandmother. when you look at it like that, she didn’t mean much directly for the plot, but if you pull back and look at the reason why she’s stealing the papers and what that means for the Yarongese and all heartsoothes, the existence of her character makes a lot more sense.

over-all: ★★★★☆
I thought this was a great ending to the duology. part of me wants to say I wish it had been a trilogy so that we could have gotten more character interactions and more of the world building/history of the world, but I worry that a trilogy would have started to feel too drawn out, so I’m happy with the two books.

I knew from the reviews that this was going to be a good read and it did not disappoint. While it started off a bit slow it pulls you in with the mystery of what exactly happened to Nokia and where is the man who saved her life. I enjoyed the dual timelines and felt it added to the tension and curiosity of the story. The ending was a bit too neat for my taste as was the way the opp was handled but all in all it was a satisfying read. I was able to read it without reading the first book but I’m sure the first will make the second an even better experience.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the arc

I don't know how it was done, but this book was better than the first! I fell in love with The Last Bloodcarver, the rich world and the characters were so appealing to me. I didn't know how the sequel could possibly follow it. Not only did it follow, it completely exceeded all of my expectations. The dual pov and timelines were so incredibly complex in how they related back to each other, and Le did such an amazing job of revealing information at just the right time to achieve maximum emotional and psychological damage. And I loved every minute of it. Nihka and Kochin mean everything to me, I loved seeing just how far they would go for each other. I feel conflicted about the books being a duology - on one hand, I just want more of them! On the other hand, leave them alone and let them live their happy ending in peace! This book absolutely destroyed me and put me back together, I cried no less than three times and was pacing the room for hours while reading.
Truly an incredible fantasy duology that I will keep coming back to.

This was a stunning conclusion to The Last Bloodcarver duology. Kochin is determined to bring Nhika back to life by using his heartsoothing abilities. In another timeline, Nhika wakes up and is determined to find Kochin. I loved getting both Kochin and Nhika's POVs in this book, and felt like it really helped me understand Kochin's backstory a lot more. The POVs were told on different timelines which just made me root for the main characters to be back together. This book had plenty of suspense, some plot twists, and absolutely gorgeous writing. I listened to the audio while reading along and loved the duet narration. Jason Vu and VyVy Nguyen were both fantastic and brought the characters and their emotions to life in a really immersive manner.

Thank you to Macmillan Children's and Macmillan Audio for the advance copies!