The Wrath and the Dawn Book Review/Discussion

Oh boy guys. I’ve been seeing this book around for ages on the blogosphere and i finally decided to read it! Yay, go me!

So this really felt like a Beauty and the Beast retelling. I never knew that i liked fairy tale retellings until i took a step back and examined my most loved books, (Lunar Chronicles, ACOTAR, Beastly, A Kiss in Time etc.)

The Wrath and the Dawn was inspired by a Thousand and One Nights though.

So yeah, i pretty much loved The Wrath and the Dawn!

Let’s get this review started!

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Title: The Wrath and the Dawn

Release Date: May 12th 2015

Pages: 388

My Rating: 5/5 Stars

Sequel: The Rose and the Dagger

Sequel Release Date: May freaking 3rd, 2016 *

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Synopsis: (From Goodreads)

One Life to One Dawn.

In a land ruled by a murderous boy-king, each dawn brings heartache to a new family. Khalid, the eighteen-year-old Caliph of Khorasan, is a monster. Each night he takes a new bride only to have a silk cord wrapped around her throat come morning. When sixteen-year-old Shahrzad’s dearest friend falls victim to Khalid, Shahrzad vows vengeance and volunteers to be his next bride. Shahrzad is determined not only to stay alive, but to end the caliph’s reign of terror once and for all.

Night after night, Shahrzad beguiles Khalid, weaving stories that enchant, ensuring her survival, though she knows each dawn could be her last. But something she never expected begins to happen: Khalid is nothing like what she’d imagined him to be. This monster is a boy with a tormented heart. Incredibly, Shahrzad finds herself falling in love. How is this possible? It’s an unforgivable betrayal. Still, Shahrzad has come to understand all is not as it seems in this palace of marble and stone. She resolves to uncover whatever secrets lurk and, despite her love, be ready to take Khalid’s life as retribution for the many lives he’s stolen. Can their love survive this world of stories and secrets?

Inspired by A Thousand and One Nights, The Wrath and the Dawn is a sumptuous and enthralling read from beginning to end.

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Ok, that goodreads synopsis is a mouthful. Let me try:

Basically this Caliph dude Khalid marries a girl from the empire every night, and then kills her before dawn the next morning. When our main character, Shazi’s best friend Shiva gets taken and killed, Shazi volunteers to be the next victim…so that she could kill Khalid and end this reign of terror. And somehow, Shazi survives the first night, and the next, and the next…

And it’s basically Aladdin meets Beauty and the Beast…

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My Thoughts:

Ok that beginning was rough, the first chapter usually for me determines how the rest of the book will go. I like my first chapters to be easy to read and not complicated, nope, this one was like what?

But since everyone seemed to really love this book, i pushed through, and man, was i glad i did.

This book picks up right away after the first several boring what’s going on chapters.

It was also kind of in two points of view, Shazi, and her fiancee Tariq. I kind of read the Tariq ones really fast because i just wanted to get back to Shazi!

I think that the author really knew what she was doing in terms of captivating an audience to make them want to read this book in one sitting.

Shazi manages to stay alive by ending her stories on a cliffhanger so Khalid would keep her alive to hear the rest, and that’s what the author, Renee does to us readers.

There was so much mystery surrounding everything in this book, especially if you, like myself, didn’t know that it was a beauty and the beast retelling.

I wanted to keep reading so much to find out WHY Khalid kept doing this.

And those scenes between Khalid and Shazi, ooooh, i could feel the chemistry from miles away!

But Tariq isn’t going to give up so easily…especially now…

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Verdict:

Oh my god, that ending though, i should have seen it coming though from the way Renee likes her cliffhangers and secrets…

I have so many questions, and i’m pretty sure it’s a duology, so please let the next book answer them and be as epcially awesome as this one!

My rating:

5/5 stars…though the beginning could have started out less confusing because it made me put down the book twice..

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Thank you so much for reading!

Share your thoughts below, do you agree with me, disagree?

Let’s have a friendly discussion!

*P.S. Story time! No really though, i finished this book in school at lunch, and my friends will testify that i went crazy. I scrambled to look up the release date of the sequel and then i turned into a lunatic. 7 months!!!??? I sent out and SOS please advise on how to handle this to all of my bookish friends, and then the rest of the day was me murmuring to myself 7 months over and over.

It was bad…