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Thank you to Edelweiss and the publisher for giving me a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Full review closer to publication date.

I had my initial hesitations with this book. When the love interest was introduced well before the plot had been developed, a few red flags were raised. However, Kiva did not lose too much of her true self in the love interest, which I was grateful for. While the book is dark and morbid, parts of it were handled in a way that could only be described as respectful. Kiva had a long history of self-harm, and the book even discusses how this becomes an addiction. Jarren discusses drug addiction from a loved one's perspective. These topics are difficult to handle in a respectful and well-researched way, but Noni managed to do so. Initially, I considered this a four-star read. The book's pacing could have been better, and the world-building could have been a little denser. As is often the case with dark fantasy books, the romance wasn't entirely necessary and at times made me bored. The plot twist at the end of this book is all together where the five-star rating comes from. Generally, I wouldn't allow the epilogue to be worthy of an entire star, but I have made an exception in this case.