I usually read books that are recently released, but some of the times I find little jewels from the past like this one, most of the time they are high fantasy and quite edgy. I found this book after finishing Murderer of crows, one of the authors other books. I really liked her style so I searched for her other works and I got The Black Jewels series.

Anne Bishop has a unique talent to create interesting and original worlds for her stories and she did it with this book to. Although in this case we get an extremely complicated and dark world and it takes quite a while to really get an understanding about how the society works. So you don’t get a clear picture about the structure of it until almost the end of the book and even then you only see the life of the higher ups in the hierarchy. It’s an amazing world but incredibly deprived and most of the time disgusting. During reading it I often thought that there isn’t as many pervert, ugly and abusive people in the whole world as in this book. Even so I just couldn’t stop reading it. The story simply sucked me in and it was impossible to stop reading it. I can’t call the story beautiful because there is too much graphic negativity in it but it’s certainly fascinating and well developed. There is so much sexuality in it, savagely and vividly described but in case of the more crude words Bishop uses symbolism.
The whole story is built around a really twisted, pleasure based politics but not the good kind of pleasure. They use it as a punishment, and all of the leaders have a sadistic, pervert and arrogant personality, so in my opinion their world is doomed.
One of the strangest thing about it, that despite the fact that the story’s told from a couple point of view, maybe even from too many, but neither of them is Jaenelle side, yet we get a full picture. We don’t get into her head so it’s harder to connect with her but with a bit of persistence you got there. It’s a new solution at least for me, and I think it’s harder this way to give a balanced and complete story. Well the author executed it perfectly. So yeah, maybe there is a couple of unnecessary point of view in there which makes it feel like that the story has too much different angle, but as I mentioned previously in the end the writer balanced it out perfectly. But it’s true in the beginning this kind of multi- leveled plot makes hard to follow the storyline.

Daughter of blood is a quite long book and covers a relatively long period of time, namely years if I remember correctly. Overall I would say that the whole first book of the series is about character introduction and world building, but there is a little bit action too.
However I had a serious problem with it. There is a list of jewels and a short description about some of the titles in story, but honestly a world map or even just a detailed characterization about the people from different realms would have helped more in regard of following and understanding the story. It’s a minor oversight on the writer part.
Thanks to the multiple POV there is a lot of important character. Almost all of them is dark, intense, and original and has a strong presence. Sure some of them are terribly arrogant and power hungry but the main characters still loveable despite their shortcomings. My favorite was Daemon with even with his cruel and mean moments. I think he has perfectly justifiable reasons for his actions. I think I would have loved Lucivar too, but unfortunately he has a really short appearance and in the end his accusations pissed me of.
I surprisingly liked the book. It’s very well done even more so since this was the author debut novel. But I have to mention that you need a really strong and resilient mind if you want to read it since there are a lot of taboo and cringe worthy elements in it. The story is very dark, savage and harsh. The writer is extremely talented and has a twisted imagination, but I like her style. I’m certainly going to read the next book. 

This is, hands down, my favorite series of books. The characters are realistically flawed in their own ways, but portrayed in a way that their flaws serve as strengths as much as weaknesses. The world-building is top-notch, and the stories that link together the still-growing series is captivating.

So, I heard many good things about this books, like that they are the blueprint for our modern high-fanstasy books and that many authors took inspiration from here (like S.J.M)

The books are very diffrent from what I usually read in the fantasy genre- darker,mature...
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The writing style took me a while to get accustomed to because ot was written rather strangely. The interesting thing here ist that the story is told from the 3rd person but the f3male protagonist ( who is the center of the books) never has a chapter where we can see from her perspective. It is always told / seen by a bystander ( the male protagonists). I've never read a book where the main protagonist is not the primary pov.

It is a rathe  cruel and dark worldbuilding while being very intricate. 

There is a lot of suspense in the books bit not much excitement while reading them, they gave me a calm dark vibe .

This book is giant sick pedo fest. I can't rate it. I don't know what to rate it on. 

I'd goosebumps reading half of the time and the other half I can't even go through a sentence. 

I want everyone in this book to just drop dead except for the sweet, sweet Jenelle and all those innocent children. 

I wish every sick fuck die a horrible death in the next book.


╰➝ 3rd person pov
╰➝ Poorly constructed world 
╰➝ No time set/  language set
╰➝ Pedophilia, Rape, Slavery

CANNOT in good consciousness rate this anything higher than 1 star. Dont read this 💔

After this reread, I am positive that this is not a book/series that should not be in the romance genre. At least not the first few books. Also, the world building is kind of non existent. I have no idea where anything is and the travel is confusing. I would love more details. This book has a ton of triggers so it’s not for everyone.