“I’d had more than twenty years to make peace with the lightless space between what you cannot believe is a truth and what you know must be a lie.” – p.12
The Last Tale of the Flower Bride by Roshani Chokshi is a spellbinding and darkly romantic page-turner about love and lies, secrets and betrayal, and the stories we tell ourselves to survive.
THE PLOT, CHARACTERS & STORY PROGRESSION
I really liked the dark allure of The Last Tale of the Flower Bride. The way that Roshani writes feeds on your inner curiosity and keeps you gripped before you even turn the first page. The twisted secrets that linger in the characters thoughts keep you trapped in this ever-lasting desire to know the truth.
In that we follow the story of Indigo Maxwell-Casteñada, a wealthy heiress, and her marriage to a scholar, the Bridegroom. He remains nameless the entire book and is asked specifically to never pry into his wife Indigo’s past. This peculiar request is accepted by the bridegroom, but the news of Indigo’s dying, estranged aunt makes this request harder to keep…
“In her kiss lay wonders—the humming of firefly wings and the secret of alchemy. On her tongue was the ghost of roasted plums, forgotten poems. I was so entranced that I almost didn’t notice when she bit down. When I pulled back, her teeth looked rusty. And only then did I realize she’d drawn blood.” – p.11
The structure of the book is written from multiple points of and also from multiple timelines. Admittedly, this can get a bit confusing later on in the book. I found myself going back to reread past chapters to fully paint the picture in my mind between time periods and characters.
The evolution of the power dynamics between Indigo and Azure is where this book truly comes to life. Coming from very opposing backgrounds, the house draws them together. As the book progresses this power dynamic is tested. Azure progressively realizes that a life steeped in fantasy was not what she wants. The desire to escape to a faerie world is the focal point of their friendship, and the novel persists to contrast the enigma of control fairyland holds with the uncontrollable nature of the real world.
WORLD BUILDING, ATMOSPHERE AND SETTING
The Last Tale of the Flower Bride is imagined in a place called the House of Dreams. A decadent mansion Indigo grew up in. The house is itself a character and seems to have otherworldly awareness of the people who are inside it which I really liked. In fact, I’ve never read anything like it!
This atmosphere beautifully combines difficult real-life scenarios with a twinge of fantasy to make you question was is real and what was that of the imagination. All of this amalgamates to create a story about grief, abuse, and neglect. It’s a story about how cruel life can be to children – so much so that they’re forced to create their own magical worlds of safety.
“Reality?” she repeated, with a touch of scorn. “Reality is what you make of your surroundings. And the world outside my own cannot touch me.” There was a note of sadness when she said this, as if she were a ghost and her hands now passed through things once reached for with ease.” – p.10
THE VERDICT
The deep meaning behind the characters and enamoring writing style give this book a solid 3 stars for me. However I did struggle to keep up with the ever-changing perspectives and time period changes which took some of the enjoyment out of the read for me. I would have also liked the Bridegrooms character to be more fleshed out and for their relationship to have been given more backstory. It was hard to be enthralled by the ending due to this!
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐