Spoiler-Free Review

If you enjoy atmospheric and gothic tales of love, friendship, and the blurred lines between reality and fantasy, The Last Tale of the Flower Bride is the book for you. 

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What’s The Last Tale of the Flower Bride about?

A marriage built on stories and secrets is threatened when a trip to the bride’s childhood home begins revealing the mysteries of her past – including a friendship that ended with the other girl’s disappearance. 

This was a unique blend of fairy tale magic with a gothic atmosphere. 

In a fun twist of the genre, rather than a dark, mysterious man, our gothic romantic interest was a woman. So, we were already off to an intriguing start. But more than that, we see this woman, named Indigo, through two POVs. One POV is her current husband, whom she married with the one stipulation that he never ask about her past. The other POV is Azure, her childhood best friend. 

For both of these characters, a relationship with Indigo is not just what it seems on the surface; it’s tense obsession. 

In the bridegroom’s chapters, we see the adult woman that Indigo has become. (It should be noted that this character doesn’t have a name, which is very reminiscent of Rebecca). There’s allure there, but also a sense of the unknowable. He wants to respect her wishes, but when circumstances bring them to the House of Dreams, aka Indigo’s childhood home, he can’t seem to help himself. Combined with his own shrouded past, the potential to know, to learn, is too much to resist. 

Azure’s chapters bring us back in time to Indigo’s childhood. Even as a young girl, Indigo has a quality of the esoteric. She’s hard to understand, hard to like, and yet Azure is magnetized to her. Her chapters are marked with coming-of-age and growing up. You can sense that we’re building toward something, but aren’t sure just what it’ll be. 

Threaded through the story is a sense of the fae and magic, to my surprise. But the entire time, I was never sure whether the magical elements were real, or if they were figments of these characters imaginations or perhaps even manifestations of mental illness. 

I also really enjoyed the audiobook. The narrators did a great job. I had actually just listened to Steve West in the last audiobook I listened to, The Heart of the World, and I was pleasantly surprised to hear him again when I picked up this one. West has an evocative voice; he gave so much emotion into his delivery here.

Should you read The Last Tale of the Flower Bride?

If you like the gothic genre as well as stories with two POVs that take place at different times, and anything with a little dark magic, you’ll like this one. I recommend it if you enjoyed books like A Dowry of Blood, Mexican Gothic, The Death of Jane Lawrence, or The Familiar. 

As with other gothic stories, this one prioritizes character over plot and lush prose over efficiency. So, I wouldn’t recommend it if you’re not a fan of the genre.