Nicole's Reviews > A Kingdom of Flesh and Fire

Was this fun?
Extremely.
Do I want to read the sequel ASAP?
Oh yes.
Was it perfect?
Not by a long shot.

I just finished reading this book and I’m thinking I read over 500 pages and what progress has been made since the total kickass From Blood and Ash? Not much. However, I read it fairly quickly and wasn’t bored at all. Nonetheless, it doesn't deserve 4 stars because it had its share of flaws. While they did not affect my enjoyment –most of the time- they certainly made me lower my rating.

Sadly, I can't discuss this book without any spoilers for the first one.

I’ll simply make a list of the pros and cons. I'm feeling too lazy to write comprehensible paragraphs.


Cons: this won’t be a short list but I want to say that I liked this book in spite of these and I grew fond of the characters a lot.

✏ Poppy’s violence. Oh, Poppy is so violent. It was so forced. She spent the whole book wanting to stab Cas or Kieran. And Cas saying he’s turned on by that. And it went on and on. Most characters –who don’t hate her- talk about her violence. Ok. We got it. Enough already.
✏ Poppy’s questions.she's special because of this.
✏ Poppy and Cas fighting their attraction. Not discussing their relationship. Cas taking too much time to explain his reasons for wanting to marry her –which of course was going to drive her crazy. ¼ of the book was spent on those two bickering or kissing. This isn't slow burn anymore this nonsense. Also, some adjectives were used too many times like “indecent” “intriguing” especially when JLA was trying for dirty talk between our MCs.
✏ Another ¼ was spent on Poppy’s inner monologues. Which led to nowhere. Absolutely nowhere. Not ashamed to say I skimmed through those parts.
✏ Barely any major event happened (view spoiler)[ I spent the first half wishing she doesn’t get captured and the other half wishing she does. (hide spoiler)] we only had one minor event which promoted for the second big major event and then the last few pages. Yes, I enjoyed it anyway but when I finished the book and looked back, I realized the summary would be rather short for this amount of pages.
✏ Poppy being all so special with special abilities, I’m sure this will be explained later but I felt that this book became too fantastical? Sure it is fantasy but the first book did not set up the world-building for this level of fantasy. Almost like whatever cool idea occurred to JLA she squeezed somewhere without giving much explanation.
✏ I thought I was missing something but I read some other reviews that shared my opinion. We still had info-dumping. In a second book. I was confused a few times but lacked the energy to find what I’m missing so I carried on.
✏ This book going to erotica books kind of places, sure I do appreciate some scenes but the Joining? Euh...
✏ HEARTMATES AKA ANOTHER WORD FOR SOULMATES AKA MATES EXISTS IN THIS WORLD. WHY WHY WHY.


What I liked: which I’ll keep brief because of the 4.7 rating avg, most reviews are raving about this book.

✏ I genuinely love Poppy and Casteel, even though they do not communicate enough in my opinion, not nearly enough, I like them as individuals.
✏ I also enjoyed the secondary set of characters, especially the wolven. Kieran, Netta, Jasper, etc. But I only wish we had less dialogue about Poppy's personality. Or simply fewer pages so the events that took place can be seen as more significant.
✏ I’m very curious about how this story is going to continue, I can only guess part of it but because I wasn’t paying attention to all the info shower, I missed some stuff, so yeah no idea what is going to happen now but I am waiting for some heck of an explanation. A logical explanation might I add.
✏ Did I mention the fun? I think I did but I need to emphasize how much I enjoyed reading this book (with its outdated title). It took me 7 days to finish because it was a very busy week but I was reading in most of my limited free time. Which is mostly before sleep. Which means I had to struggle to stop reading. I ended up sleeping after 2 am on workdays.


Shortly, the strength of this book lays in its addicting quality and its characters even if their interactions weren’t the best all the time. If you enjoyed the first book, you’ll also enjoy this one too, although you most likely won't find it as good.