Okay okay okay.... the plot? Amazing. The writing? Amazing. The characters? Amazing.

Some thoughts though, the one thing i was lacking was full on action and i felt like the book was slightly on the slow side due to this. But besides that the plot was great and the mail characters journey and growth was interesting to read and I like how she changed as the story went on!

Overall i felt like this book was easy to read and follow and the story definitely pulled you in an made me want to finish it in one sitting!

Thank you to netgalley, the publisher and amazing author for an arc in exchange of an honest review.

This was a strong start to the Reave series, it had that concept that I was looking for from this type of book. The characters worked well together with the concept and uses the world perfectly. It left me wanting to read more in this series and from C. Miller.

I was very interested in this book based off the description. I was eager to see what would happen and assumed I would read it quickly.

In reality I could only read so much before I had to stop and could not bear to continue. For a week or so I have started and stopped reading this book and today I have put it down for the last time.

In a world where only the very powerful are able to make decisions regarding their own lives, Reave is about a young woman who has only known the life of a slave since she was 8 years old. She has no autonomy over her own body or what happens in her life. One day she meets and falls for a man she should have no interest in.

My impression is that we are supposed to root for the main character and understand that she is just naive and that is why she makes the decisions she does and behaves the way she does. I really disliked her and find it very hard to read a book from a first person POV when I can't stand them and am not rooting for them at all. The way she spoke and thought and choices she made were incredibly frustrating.

The book relied heavily on dialogue for any plot advancement and was very slow for anything to happen. I made it halfway through the book before I gave up on reading it as nothing of ingerest had happened and I honestly stopped caring.

I felt like there was a very interesting world in this book and I just wish the plot had been better.

I'm sure this book would be wonderful for some readers but unfortunately it just missed the mark for me. Due to this and the fact that I found it a chore to keep reading I am rating this book a 1/5.

Spice 🌶️🌶️/5
This book is written in such a way that you know very little at the beginning and follow the Aster's journey of discovery, of herself and the world opening up to her. She is very, very naive, but that's due to her very limited life experience. The nearest I can tell the book is set in a post-apocolyotic setting, though I could be wrong about that as it wasn't clear.
For around the first half of the book, you follow Aster only and it's not till after that point that Aster and the reader realize there is much more going on.
I did enjoy the book and will probably read the rest of the series, but I have two small complaints:
First, I did have a hard time with some of the wording throughout the book, such as this sentence..."That she’d said what she had in the way she had gave me a better indication of her feelings on the matter."
My second small issue is that the MMC was hard for me to connect with, I was left at times wondering if he and Aster were really going to end up together at the end of the story. The book ends on a slight cliffhanger, so we'll see!

This book surprised me. I don’t think it will be for everyone because it has a slow pace. I enjoyed that pace though, because it was unfolding information to us little by little. It wasn’t predictable.

Aster is a young servant girl who barely remembers anything except for life within those walls. She’s so frightened that she makes herself invisible to the rest of the house, except for her daring excursions to the library, which result in punishment. This is the first taste we have of her will, and her personality peeking through. I enjoyed seeing her evolve and the relationships she built along the way.

Near the end I was thinking…how will this end? Surely this will be unsatisfactory, so much is left to do. I take it back, because the ending was perfect in my opinion. I love to be surprised, and have it well-planned too. That ending was powerful without being cheaply out of left field.

The things I disliked about the story were:
Chase’s name. When compared with the name “Ahren”, which is very appealing, it was kind of silly.

I also felt sometimes the flow of the writing was not great. I did eventually get used to it, but that’s not normal for me to have to re-read sentences often. It felt kind of clunky.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC! I would read book two based off of this experience.

Reave took me on an wonderful journey through the eyes of Aster, a young, naive girl navigating a cruel and corrupt world. I absolutely loved Aster as the main character. She's inexperienced and sheltered at the start, but there's a quiet strength in her that gradually blossoms. Watching her growth felt like watching a puppy slowly turn into a wolf. What really sets Reave apart, though, is the slow-burn development—not just in the romance, but in Aster's character arc. There's no instant love, no naive female lead suddenly becoming wise or fierce overnight. The author takes the time for Aster to grow naturally, which I found incredibly refreshing. Her transformation is gradual, thoughtful, and entirely believable.

This is a slow burn with a high level of focus placed on character development. Typically this would lose my interest but being inside Aster's head was so enjoyable - I was hooked! She's clever, blunt, strong willed and insightful, I couldn't get enough.

There are two central male characters—Ahren, the stern Lord of the House, and Chase, a deadly Reaper who serves as an assassin for the city. Ahren starts off as cold and rigid, but as the story unfolds, he becomes unexpectedly lovable, with a warmth that caught me by surprise. Chase, on the other hand, is everything you'd want in a strong, protective male lead. His "touch her and die" attitude comes across perfectly -the first time we meet him, he breaks a man's arm for touching Aster improperly. The chemistry between Aster and Chase is slow-burning but intense, with so little said between them, yet their emotions speak volumes. I couldn't get enough of them.

Reave is very much about Aster's transformation, and it does an amazing job of keeping you hooked as you watch her evolve. The setting is dark and gritty, filled with danger, and it’s clear that Aster is on the path to something big—I can't wait to read the next book. I want to see Aster burn it all to the ground.

If you're looking for a character-driven story with a fierce yet developing female lead, brooding male characters, and a slow-burn romance, Reave is the book for you.

Thank you Victory Editing NetGalley Co-op for this ARC!

Thank you to NetGalley for allowing me to read the ARC of Reave by C. Miller. This was a fantastic novel. I stayed up till way too early in the morning to finish it because I could not put it down. Aster was a fantastic character, with so much growth, and twists and turns in her backstory. I was NOT prepared for that ending, so I really hope that the next will be out soon. And that I can read the ARC of that one as well. I will be getting this as soon as it comes out. Fantastic world, the characters had depth, the storyline was interesting, and I loved how some of my feelings changed throughout the book about specific characters. If you know, you know. I will be recommending this all over! FIVE STARS!