There are two kinds of love - one born from smiles, and the other from screams.
The Last Tale of the Flower Bride
by Roshani Chokshi
Genre: Adult Fantasy
About: A scholar of myth marries the woman of his dreams. She's beautiful and tinged with the magic he's sought since he was a child. But she makes him promise never to look into her past, to never pry beneath the mask she wears. Yet when she learns her aunt is dying, she's forced to return home and in the House of Dreams, secrets begin to whisper to them both.
Thoughts
This book has everything I love to read; mythology, tragedy, unreliable narrators, mystery, mystical places, and a moody house. The writing was also an absolute dream. I highlighted so many sections on my kindle and sometimes it was simply pretty, flowery prose, but a lot of the time the words twisted so darkly that you could feel the weight of the novel; Chokshi really had something to say here and the story sinks into your bones while it sings all around you.
Needless to say, I was completely transported. Both viewpoints fascinate and I loved how myths and magic were folded into the narrative so that we're never really sure if our characters are experiencing something otherwordly, or escaping a darker reality. This is a dream with teeth. A story with blood inked through the pages. It has a slowish pace, but those slow steps through the story feel electric with anticipation for what's to come. I was never bored. I could never look away. It gripped me from the first line to the last.
SPOILER Section...
Of course no book is perfect and there were a few things I didn't love but I also can't really fault the author because I don't see how these issues I had could be changed. One was that the husband's narrative voice sounded like an old man so I actually didn't get that he was young until far later. But I also loved his voice so it wasn't a bad thing that he sounded distinct. And the other was the ending. Around the 60-70% mark, I began to see what the twist was going to be and... I didn't like it. Indigo's character was so clearly different in nature to Azure's that I didn't understand why Azure did some of the things she did later in life, when those were clearly the more natural actions of Indigo's character. Such as wanting her husband to be afraid of her, or living her life wrapped in a story instead of becoming part of the real world, which seemed such a defining difference between the two of them. I also didn't understand how Tati confused them in the end. She simply identifies Azure as Indigo by smell and discards the voice and the touch of her face and hair - hair that she herself cut? The same with the drunk girl - I was under the impression that Indigo and Azure look similar but, as they got older, they grew into different body types so I don't know how a person with sight could mistake them up close. But, again, I think the ending had to be the way it was. It might not have satisfied me as some points didn't ring true, but I don't see how the story could have ended any other way.
Overall
If you loved The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, you'll fall straight into this one. The prose is as lush, the world both cruel and lovely, and the characters are wrapped in magic.
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