Blood Rose Rebellion by Rosalyn Eves

"A magical tale unlike anything you've read before." —Bustle "[A] richly imagined 19th-century historical fantasy." —EW, A- The thrilling first book in a YA fantasy trilogy for fans of Red Queen. In a world where social prestige derives from a trifecta of blood, money, and magic, one girl has the ability to break the spell that holds the social order in place. Sixteen-year-old Anna Arden is barred from society by a defect of blood. Though her family is part of the Luminate, powerful users of magic, she is Barren, unable to perform the simplest spells. Anna would do anything to belong. But her fate takes another course when, after inadvertently breaking her sister’s debutante spell—an important chance for a highborn young woman to show her prowess with magic—Anna finds herself exiled to her family’s once powerful but now crumbling native Hungary. Her life might well be over. In Hungary, Anna discovers that nothing is quite as it seems. Not the people around her, from her aloof cousin Noémi to the fierce and handsome Romani Gábor. Not the society she’s known all her life, for discontent with the Luminate is sweeping the land. And not her lack of magic. Isolated from the only world she cares about, Anna still can’t seem to stop herself from breaking spells. As rebellion spreads across the region, Anna’s unique ability becomes the catalyst everyone is seeking. In the company of nobles, revolutionaries, and Romani, Anna must choose: deny her unique power and cling to the life she’s always wanted, or embrace her ability and change that world forever. “A fast-paced historical fantasy full of magic, romance, and adventure!”—JESSICA DAY GEORGE, New York Times bestselling author of Silver in the Blood

This was a difficult book for me. It had many positive aspects but many negative ones as well. I'm going to start with the negative, then move to the positive to end on a good note.

First off, the writing seemed all over the place to me. I really struggled to place myself in the story and the character's world and this was largely due to the writing style not matching the story. It is hard to explain but I do not think the writing was consistent with the depth of the story and the world if that makes sense. That being said, the writing quality did improve as the book went on and that was nice to see. On top of the lackluster writing, the plot was lacking the action typical of this genre that gets me into the book and hooked on the story. The plot was interesting sure, but I was not that invested in what was going to happen. And the way this book ended I have no idea how there are going to be two more books in this series. With a chapter or two more, this book could have tied everything up and been a fine standalone fantasy novel. The epilogue left a little bit open as to when the consequences of the end of the book are but not enough that I'm dying to read the next installment. One final thing I want to mention is something that conspired between two characters that really bothered me. We have multiple instances of distant cousins kissing, while this take place in the 1800s and that may be something that was more normal back then, it still left me uncomfortable every time it happened. These characters are most likely not endgame for Rosalyn Eves, but I still do not think it was necessary to the story.

As for the positive aspects of this book, the magic system is by far the best part of this book. We have this fascinating magic system that I really wish we had more backstory and information about. There definitely was not enough world building done to fully explain the magic system and how the binding worked and how things were before the Circle. But this idea of a magic reservoir that people dip into when they go to cast a spell is unique and I even enjoyed the little bit of information we got about the different castes within the magic system. There are a lot of different powers that I wish we had gotten to delve further into. Maybe that will happen in subsequent books but not sure based on how this one ended. I'm not sure I will continue with this series, I may pick up subsequent books but I have no need to do so as I do with other first books in series.

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a copy of this book!

DNF ~ 30%

To the people who read this book all the way through, I applaud your patience and determination. The only reason why I didn't DNF this at 10% was because my car broke down and while I was waiting for the mechanic to arrive, this was the only book I had in my car. Go fucking figure.

2-2.5 stars.
I received a copy of this book through netgalley, nut all opinions are my own

First thought after finishing: meh

I enjoyed the beginning of this book and was sooooo excited. I felt like I kept waiting for the reason of my excitement to be met.... and realized 80% into the book if I put it down and never finished, I'd be okay with that... skipped pages here and there to get to the end.

Anna is a character I wish I could like, I just wish she'd make up her mind!! Also, making up her mind then backing out because of a reason she already must have known before, but just didn't think about??? I guess???

I like the way the rebellion was written though, I think that is fairly realistic and heart-breaking- I just didn't care enough. I really wanted to care about the characters and if I had listened to this as an audiobook, maybe I would have. For now though, ugh.

Weirdly enough there were a few times I had to flip back a page while thinking “what did I just read?” “How did we get here?”
I was bored with a story I did not think was going anywhere, not just slow pacing but almost backward at times as if they needed to make stuff up to hit a word count (as a student, I get that).

Probably won't read the sequel, I just don't see a point. But, if you like semi-historical fiction and fantasy you might enjoy this more than I did.