Happy Thursday and a very happy book birthday to Anela Deen’s In the Jaded Grove! I discovered Anela Deen last year when I read Beneath Cruel Fathoms and have been a fan ever since. Her stories are beautifully written, and I love the characters and immersive world-building. Let’s check this one out!
About the Book:
Title: In the Jaded Grove
Author: Anela Deen
Series: Kindred Realms #1
Synopsis: Simith of Drifthorn is tired of war. After years of conflict between the Thistle court and the troll kingdom, even a pixie knight known for his bloodlust longs for peace. Hoping to secure a ceasefire, Simith arranges a meeting with the troll king—and is ambushed instead. Escape lies in the Jaded Grove, but the trees of the ancient Fae woodland aren’t what they seem, and in place of sanctuary, Simith tumbles through a doorway to another world.
Cutting through her neighbor’s sunflower farm in Skylark, Michigan, Jessa runs into a battle between creatures straight out of a fantasy novel. Only the blood is very real. When a lone fighter falls to his attackers, Jessa intervenes. She’s known too much death to stand idly by, but an act of kindness leads to consequences even a poet like her couldn’t imagine.
With their fates bound by magic, Simith and Jessa must keep the strife of his world from spilling into hers—except the war isn’t what it appears and neither are their enemies. Countless lives depend on whether they can face the truths of their pasts and untangle the web of lies around them. But grief casts long shadows, and even their deepening bond may not be enough to save them from its reach.
LINKS: Goodreads | Amazon | My Review
Rating:
Favorite Parts:
- The love story, of course! Simith and Jessa have a wonderful story, and I enjoyed watching their feelings for each other grow.
- The character development is strong!
- The dynamic world-building. It is vivid and descriptive and magical!
- The writing style. Deen’s style is immersive and poetic, and I absolutely love it!
Favorite Lines:
Words had been a sword before she lost them, the false catharsis of inflicting pain on others-as if she could transfer some of her own by lashing out.
It was safer to drift rootless than to reach for a shore that might be torn away in another storm.
Love was such a strange creature, to reknit that which it tore apart with equal ease.
A broom is sturdy because its strands are tightly bound.
Some battlefields were impossible to leave, even after all the fighting had ended. No wonder she hadn’t been able to write a single poem in a year. Words had become fallen comrades, scattered like casualties.
She spoke of the rain like a sky of grief. Of the wind and missing voices. Of the drowning soul. Words could never fully articulate what it was to lose so much, but it sketched a shadow, like an afterimage from a nuclear blast burned onto the walls of her heart…It dragged her pain into the world like an incantation and made it real, a weight she could touch. She hadn’t realized it could be this way, that in admitting aloud–I am hurting. I am lost.–there was rescue.
No monster lives but for the evil others have done before him.
Love was such a strange creature, capable of mending what it once tore apart.
Doesn’t this sound fantastic? And that cover is gorgeous!!! I love Anela Deen and this new series! I’d love to hear your thoughts on the book and cover. Comment below!
I’m ashamed to say that I haven’t even gotten to Beneath Cruel Fathoms yet. Glad you’re still loving this author’s work!
I am. there’s something about her writing style that I love. She pulls you right into the story, and the romances are soooo good!
I’m not familiar with the author, but that cover is beautiful, and the book does sound good!
I enjoy her writing – great romance/fantasy!