Song of the Forever Rains (Mousai #1)
E. J. Mellow
Montlake
Published July 1, 2021
Amazon | Bookshop | Goodreads
About Song of the Forever Rains
The Thief Kingdom is a place hidden within the world of Aadlior. Many whisper of its existence, but few have found this place, where magic and pleasure abound. There, the mysterious Thief King reigns supreme with the help of the Mousai, a trio of revered and feared sorceresses.
Larkyra Bassette may be the youngest of the Mousai, but when she sings her voice has the power to slay monsters. When it’s discovered the Duke of Lachlan is siphoning a poisonous drug from the Thief Kingdom and using it to abuse his tenants, Larkyra is offered her first solo mission to stop the duke. Eager to prove herself, Larkyra accepts by posing as the duke’s potential bride. But her plans grow complicated when she finds herself drawn to Lord Darius Mekenna, Lachlan’s rightful heir. Soon she suspects Darius has his own motivations for ridding Lachlan of the corrupt duke. Larkyra and Darius must learn to trust each other if there is to be any hope of saving the people of Lachlan—and themselves.
Welcome to the world of Aadilor, where lords and ladies can be murderers and thieves, and the most alluring notes are often the deadliest. Dare to listen?
From the award-winning author of the Dreamland series comes a new dark romantic fantasy about a young woman finding hope in her powers of destruction.
My Review
I liked a lot of things about SONG OF THE FOREVER RAINS. One is the way both central characters wrestled with guilt over a parent’s death. The other is how things happened to challenge what they believed to be true about their own role in those deaths. I found those emotional journeys pretty compelling.
Another thing I liked was the constant banter between characters– especially Larkyra and her sisters, but also between Larkyra and Darius, too. I thought the dialog as a whole was really sharp and well-crafted.
It took me a little while to get into the story, though, and I’m still not totally sure why. The prologue is interesting, but doesn’t intersect the story for a while. So, maybe I was distracted trying to figure out how things pieced together? I didn’t expect the story to be told from the youngest sister’s perspective based on the prologue. The prologue was in an omniscient viewpoint, so maybe it just took me time to adjust to that.
Darius is a strong character and so determined to do what’s right, which I really liked. I think I would have liked his character more if he’d had some kind of flaw, though. Sometimes I had a hard time really believing in him because he just seemed so perfect.
Once I hit about the 25% mark, though, I was really invested in the story. I read the rest of the book probably more quickly than I read that first 100 pages. I liked the first part, but once I got into the story, I definitely invested a lot more time and energy into reading all the way through to the end. When I had to stop and take breaks, I kept thinking about it in between.
I think readers who enjoyed DOWN COMES THE NIGHT by Allison Saft or THE WAKING LAND by Callie Bates will want to check this one out for sure.
Content Notes
Recommended for Ages 16 up.
Representation
Major characters are white. Some minor characters are described as having black or brown skin.
Profanity/Crude Language Content
Mild profanity used infrequently.
Romance/Sexual Content
Kissing between man and woman. One extended explicit sex scene and several references to it afterward.
Spiritual Content
Some characters have the ability to use magic.
Violent Content – Trigger warning for self-harm and torture/abuse.
A character uses magic to control the actions of another person, including using them to harm the person. Some scenes show or reference graphic self-harm.
Drug Content
People without magic sometimes become addicted to a substance which gives them false magic for a short time. Even the good characters in the story, while acknowledging how destructive the addiction becomes, ignore the issue as long as using the false magic only happens under certain controlled circumstances.
Note: This post contains affiliate links, which do not cost you anything to use, but which help support running this blog. I received a free copy of SONG OF THE FOREVER RAINS in exchange for my honest review.