From Blood and Ash

Title: From Blood and Ash
Author: Jennifer L Armentrout
Publisher: Blue Box Press
Year: March 2020
Pages: 452
Series: Blood and Ash #1
Genre: Fantasy (New adult)
Reading Time: 23 Feb - 1 Mar
Binding: Kindle
Goodreads

Stars:
★★★★☆

Blurb:

A Maiden…

Chosen from birth to usher in a new era, Poppy’s life has never been her own. The life of the Maiden is solitary. Never to be touched. Never to be looked upon. Never to be spoken to. Never to experience pleasure. Waiting for the day of her Ascension, she would rather be with the guards, fighting back the evil that took her family, than preparing to be found worthy by the gods. But the choice has never been hers.
A Duty…
The entire kingdom’s future rests on Poppy’s shoulders, something she’s not even quite sure she wants for herself. Because a Maiden has a heart. And a soul. And longing. And when Hawke, a golden-eyed guard honor bound to ensure her Ascension, enters her life, destiny and duty become tangled with desire and need. He incites her anger, makes her question everything she believes in, and tempts her with the forbidden.
A Kingdom…
Forsaken by the gods and feared by mortals, a fallen kingdom is rising once more, determined to take back what they believe is theirs through violence and vengeance. And as the shadow of those cursed draws closer, the line between what is forbidden and what is right becomes blurred. Poppy is not only on the verge of losing her heart and being found unworthy by the gods, but also her life when every blood-soaked thread that holds her world together begins to unravel.

Review:

I knew I had to read this book when my Sarah J Maas fan group on Facebook was absolutely filled with posts and comments on this book. This is always a good and a bad thing. You know the genre is likely to be right as these are people with similar tastes to your own however it tells you little about the writing style. I was also promised a lot of steamy and spicy scenes and the amount that was talked about led me to a bit of disappointment. That disappointment combined with the pacing and big reveal being something I guessed in the opening chapters, I had to knock a star off. It's definitely still an addition to my list of favourites though.
I have mixed opinions on Poppy, I like that she's fierce and strong but she's also led a very sheltered life. Her feistiness just comes out a bit too much, not everything needs to be met with a snide remark or biting retort. But I can also understand why she'd be constantly angry having been so sheltered. It also comes out that she's extremely naive, there are ways she handles situations which shows she doesn't really know how to handle people. If she were just a little more intuitive she'd get herself out of so many situations but she's too quick to anger for that.
I enjoy the range of characters we have, Hawke is certainly fun though his tendency to flirt or tease in every sentence can get a bit annoying (also opened up to some just plain weird writing), a very steamy opening with him but 80% of the rest of the book is just mindless teasing. This is exactly the thing I was promised by readers and just left me feeling so frustrated, I got bored of the sexual tension because it went on too long. The release of the tension was great but that build up was just painful. Our other range of characters all kind of fall to the sides, Vikter is protective but powerless to truly protect Poppy, Tawny is that kind of useless character that's Poppy's only friend and then those in power. They're certainly interesting but we don't really see much of them and the really interesting ones are only mentioned as they're based elsewhere.
So then, world building. I like this world. The names of places aren't particularly difficult as they're mostly different spellings of real or already imagined places which is a bit weird to me. I like the fantasy element and I enjoyed that it was a while before things were really explained on that level and that comes with Poppy coming out of her sheltered state. We're going to see much more in the future books and I'm excited for it as I feel we definitely need to travel and meet others as this overall plot moves along.
In terms of pacing, as I've said above, long. A really steamy opening few chapters sets you up for a really steamy, action packed book. When that doesn't really fulfil itself until the last few hundred pages, there's going to be some disappointment. There was so much build up I was pleading for us to move on. Once we did it was fantastic, but I felt like a good 100 pages of Poppy as the Maiden could have been massively reduced and made for a more action packed story.
Don't get me wrong though, that ending is marvellous. So much is revealed we can't really talk about it as it's all such a spoiler. I'm very excited for the series to progress as I've read lots of people enjoying the second book more. Here's hoping I do too!