DNF @ 14%

I did not like the writing. I'm not really good at picking out what POV books are, but another review said this was third person omniscient, so maybe that's something I'm not into? I'm not really sure.

It felt like I was being read a story, but with the multiple POVs (I think 6?), it was just too much and I couldn't connect to it.

Thank you to Netgalley and the author for the eARC. My thoughts are entirely my own.

I thought this was very good and I will have to add this to the shop shelves. Thank you for the chance for us to review.

I want to start off by saying that I think the marketing failed this book a little. It was not at all what I was expecting, which makes me sad for rating this book low. I expected a romantasy akin to authors suggested in the blurb, but the romance was not a strong element in this at all.

In Blood, Iron and Bone the worldbuilding was easily the strongest element—I could really picture the dark, Otherworlds setting. I also loved the variety of fae characters and creatures, and the magic and prophecy elements.

However, this book was not for me. There's too many POVs (6!) that change mid-chapter, and pacing that often felt too slow.

It was not my cup of tea, but I could see someone really liking it who likes a lot of characters, perspectives, and doesn't mind the romance being on the back burner.

Thank you NetGalley and Victory Editing for an e-Arc of Blood, Iron and Bone by Sera Foxe.

Blood, Iron, and Bone had a great idea, but it didn’t work well for me. The story was interesting, but it stars very slow and doesn’t pickup until around the 60 % mark. The characters are difficult to connect with due to the constan switch between first and third person across six different POV’s; add in the fact that there’s more than one time line, and it just made the book hard to follow. There’s also no chapter headings so it was confusing and frustrating to constantly have to figure out whose POV you were reading from.

I also wasn’t the biggest fan of the romance which was on me but it was just one more to dislike.

In the end, the book has some really great moments, especially in its creative and unique world-building. But the repetitive story structure and weaker characters held it back from being as good as it could have been

This is not say that people aren’t going to love the book because I can see it becoming popular and with the many tropes this has, it’s a perfect romantasy story.

This book had a lot of potential to be amazing. For me it was a little confusing and overwhelming. Now that I have read it once I may circle back in a few months and reread it and I think I might enjoy it more the second time. It is still an interesting book and am curious to see where this series will go!

Honestly I wanted to love this book, and it held such promise but I just couldn’t connect with the characters or the story
It was interesting though and maybe a sold 3.5 stars just wish it had a bit more

Aurelia hears a call in the night and follows it to another world. Andar is betrothed to the future High Queen of Aithrim but their relationship seems unable to progress past friendship. Nova is human but has been a servant in Aithrim her whole life and has no hope of ever returning to her own world. This assorted group of humans and fae must come together to prevent Aithrim from falling into permanent darkness.

The world building in the book was done well. Getting the perspective from multiple characters gave depth and insight into how fae and humans lived in Aithrim.

The pace of the book was a little slow. The book takes place over only a couple of days and it seemed to take a long time for everyone to meet and the story to move forward.

The romance was underwhelming. Aurelia and Ardan feel an instant connection but we don’t really see them build their relationship. I cared more about Nova’s relationship, but it also was an instant connection without much growth. Overall, I liked the world and characters but was a little bored by the story.

the title absolutely made sense after I completed reading the book— blood, there many instances where blood gets slipped, iron is harmful to the magical creatures in the book whereas bone also have it uses in the book. (I'd hate to spoil it for anyone)

I appreciate the glossary in the book— it helped me to grasp new terms, the phrase "Tù mo ghra" was my favourite one!

At first, I was quite confused with the scene changes from otherworld to earth. It took me sometime to get adjusted with it. There were mainly six characters whose point of views are written in the book, the wonderful part is I didn't get confused with these povs but I did expect the characters to have more depth and intensity. It wasn't a slow burn— yet it lacked the intensity and chemistry between the characters which somehow made it fall flat for me at some scenes. The same goes with spicy scenes (or which were supposed to be spicy), they lacked flow and intensity that made those scenes quite uninteresting for me to read.

The writing style complimented the world building in the book, there's extensive world building with prophecies, history, myths and lore. The writing style was simple and was what made navigating between different point of views in the book pretty easy. The best element of this book was the world building element for me!

Thanks NetGalley and agency press for a free early review copy!

This book had so much going on it was difficult to follow and love at times. Too many points of view and entertwined aspects of curses and prophecy.

I’d like to thank Netgalley for the opportunity to read this prior to release!
This book is told from the POV of 6 people. It is immersive and will require some time and patience to world build. It may be confusing at times, but you will understand. This is a great read and a good start to the series. I have listed some tropes below.

If you love magic, and you love the lore that is fae, you will also enjoy this one of a kind story telling..
• Multiple POV
• Fated Mates
• World Building
• Magic
• Fae x Human

Blood iron & Bone
1.25⭐️3🌶️


6 POV
Fae + Humans
Dated mates
Found family
Chosen one
Curses
Prophecy
Witchcraft


The blurb for this book was great. I was excited to start it. The premise had so much potential.

I wish it was otherwise, but the inconsistent shifts between past and present tense as well as 1st and 3rd person within the 6 POvs was absolutely too much for me. The lack of chapter heading that stated which POV the chapter was in really hurt the flow of the book.

This book needs another round of line editing. The structure and style of what is here is not refined. There are many poorly structured chapters. I found at-least one moment in each chapter that needed heavy restructuring and proofreading.

The writing was drawn out with many moments that failed to move the plot forward. It fell into the trap of being overly descriptive at inoperative moments and relying on internal monologuing to world-build. I wanted to be shown, not told. I feel like this book was really made to set up the action for the next book.


This book just really wasn’t for me.



Thank you NetGalley and Agency Press for the DRC of this book. All opinions are my own.

This an ARC review for Blood, Irone, and Bone by Sera Fox, thank you to Netgalley for sending me this ARC copy.

This book will be published 21 March 2025

This book was 3-star- read for me. I think the plot and premise behind this book was really intriguing, but I found the execution of it fell a little flat. I found the first ten chapters or so were quite slow and the introduction to all the POV characters also took some time. The latter two thirds of the book improved, I found the plot okay, but I did find the character development for several of the characters to be lacking.

I would consider this book to be moderately spicy, I am expecting it to get spicier in the upcoming sequels.

The storyline mostly takes place within Aithrim (the faery realm) and focuses on several POV characters including:
- Aurelia Bartlett- grew up in the human realm, never feeling like she belonged.
- Princess Skyelark (Lark) – a fae princess; destined to become High Queen of the realm once she marries Andar
- Andar- a highborn fae; is the son of the Commander and his marriage to Princess Lark is prophesised to overcome the darkness in the realm. Neither he nor Lark truly feel that their match is right, they feel more like siblings than lovers.
- Nova- a human, stolen as a child by the fae. She is Lark’s maid. Humans are considered less-than in the eyes of the fae
- Alasdair- Cillian’s Captain, has two chapters in his POV in the entire book.
- Cillian- a fae soldier, stationed at the castle for further protection ahead of the impending marriage and coronation of Lark and Andar. He is sent by Captain Alasdair to deliver a message to Commander Waymar (Andar’s father) regarding a potential threat, he then goes on several reluctant side quests while on this mission

I found the character development for Aurelia, Lark, and Andar to be lacking, I found them a little boring and that they kind of just let things happen to them, it didn’t really feel like they were fighting or scheming to get what they wanted. I think their characters could have been fleshed out a bit more.

I really liked Cillian and Nova’s characters, I think they were more interesting and their stories within the entire plot more compelling. I also really liked Aife who is Lark’s half-sister, she was a side character but I think she was really entertaining.

I feel like Alasdair’s chapters could have been better served in Cillian’s POV, I think he is better as a supporting character rather than a POV character. I think we would gleaned more about Cillian and how he perceived his captain had these chapters been from his POV.

I think the story setting and overall plot was okay, but I do think with fine tuning and fleshing out the world and characters more the book would have been so much better. The use of foreshadowing in this book was good, but, I found that the foreshadowing was so obvious that I knew what was going to happen anyways so it took the shock factor of a good twist out of the story, if the foreshadowing had been more subtle I think it would have hit better.

I do think I will read the next book in the series because I am interested in the story but I am really hoping Aurelia, Andar and Lark really step up as characters and try and fight for themselves and their world. I am looking forward to learning more about Nova and Cillian’s journey, and I really want more Aife because she is awesome.

Had a hard time following this one. Not saying it was bad just not for me personally. Too much going on.

I liked this one but I did find it a bit challenging. There's a lot of povs and sometimes that's okay but in this situation it was a little hard to keep track of everything. It's got fae and romance though so it's still pretty good!

DNF at 16%

I went further than I expected, I must say.

It just felt like reading about three characters who constantly complained about their lives and how they wanted more. Which I understand, but to have to read "I'm nothing. I'm bored" yada yada...it got incredibly annoying and I lost interest, I'm sorry.

Maybe it gets better, I don't know. I just know it was not for me.

Signing off,
B.

(Free ARC from NetGalley and Agency Press that I chose to review after reading - Cross-posted on Goodreads on February 27th, 2025)

Blood Iron and Bone has a bit of everything. There’s a great adventure to be had when fae and humans meet. Told in 3rd person, this story follows 6 different POVs and spans the distance of two realms: the human realm and the fae realm. What happens when everything starts to mingle? How does a prophecy fit in to all of this?

I was looking forward to reading Blood Iron and Bone because the premise is interesting, it's high fantasy, there are elements of magic and prophecy at play, as well as a bit of hidden identity, however, there is a lot going on that made the story a little difficult to follow. This book has so much potential but with everything going on, it was really hard for me to enjoy it to the fullest extent that I could have. On it's own, the narration and the multiple POVs are great, I actually really enjoyed that process. When combined with worldbuilding, it felt jarring because the shifts and changes were so sudden and as a result, the it felt more chaotic than I think it should have.

If you are someone who enjoys elements like this or doesn't mind a slight bit of chaos, then this book could be for you. This book is the first in a series and there is so much potential. The doors open to many possibilities and I look forward to seeing what additional adventures will come up.

Thank you NetGalley for gifting me the opportunity to read this ARC! All opinions are my own.

🩷 Book Review 🩷
📚 Blood Iron and Bone
💫💫💫

I did end up enjoying this book but it wasn't till the 60% mark that everything started to fall into place.
This book has 6 POVs and normally I'm a more the merrier type of reader but when you have to do all of their redemption arcs, I'm going to get confused and slow down with the pacing.
I think my favourite aspect was the world building. I'm a sucker for the details that don't drag on but helps you to feel immersed in the world and this provided that.
This book is tagged as having Fated mates, it delivers but it's also slightly lost in and amongst the multiple POVs.
I will definitely be continuing the series, I felt like this book was alittle on the dense side for a reason and I don't mind that.

Thank you Netgalley for a copy in exchange for an honest review.

Tropes
* Multi POV
* Third person
* Fated mates
* Prophecy
* World building
* Chosen one
* Fae x Human

This was an extremely unique start to a fantasy series. The world building was very detailed and I loved the anticipation for what’s to come. The story follows 6 main characters (PoVs) which was a lot for my little brain but they’re all important in their own right, even if we don’t quite know how just yet! There’s prophecy, mix ups, fated mates and an animal sidekick!
My favourite character was actually a side character Aife who is a delight 😅 all knowing and flitting in and out, I can’t wait to see more of her! I did feel like this book is a build up to what’s to come and I do want to see what’s in store for all those main characters!

Thank you to NetGalley, agency press & Sera Foxe for providing a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Quotes
* a bargain with the Otherworld is binding
* She’s just a woman. But history has always feared woman
* An overabundance of possibility and hope—nectar or poison?

This could be an interesting series as it builds on the ideas set up in this first book. A lovely example of a fae world. I especially liked the tales of changelings and the cross over from the han world. The book was very slow to start and I had to upload through the first third but it's worth persevering. Shows promise as a series

I thought this was a very unique and refreshing fae story! I loved getting in the heads of all six of the main characters, which really made me have to use my brain to follow along with the story in the best way possible. The only thing is that I found it was almost too much and made me confused sometimes with what was going on. I also think that the pacing was kind of slow at the beginning and a rush towards the end. Other than that I loved the interesting world-building, the dynamic range of characters, and, of course, the romance!

Overall I think this was a good introduction to this world and I am excited to read more.