Foxglove King

Lore’s world teems with drug running, spying, and uneasy agreements. Unable to leave the city of Dellaire because of a mysterious connection to the catacombs that lie beneath, Lore tries to keep a dangerous secret—that she has the power to channel Mortem, the magical death essence left behind by the Buried Goddess Nyxara. In the face of deceit and betrayal, she finds herself allied with and attracted to Gabriel, a dispirited warrior-monk of the Presque Mort, and Bastian, the sly prince in line for the throne. Although this fantasy romance provides plenty of sexual tension, obfuscation, and royal conspiracy, the characters, whether protagonists or schemers, have little depth or subtlety. Emily Ellet’s narration is generally solid, but she falters when reading dialogue, and her characterizations occasionally seem out of sync. Lore is given the voice of a petulant 14-year-old instead of the somewhat hardened woman in her mid-20s that she is. The antagonists are portrayed as one-dimensional, almost melodramatic characters.