My Favourite Quotes From Renee Ahdieh’s Books

Renee Ahdieh is one of my favourite authors. I especially love her beautiful writing which has me completely immersed in her books and leave me thinking about the books long after I have finished reading them.

So I thought I would share some of my favourite quotes from each of her books!

The Wrath and the Dawn Duology

My soul sees its equal in you.

For nothing, not the sun, not the rain, not even the brightest star in the darkest sky, could begin to compare to the wonder of you.

You have a beautiful laugh. Like the promise of tomorrow.

You are strong. Fierce. Capable beyond measure

And he smiled a smile to shame the sun

Flame in the Mist Duology

The only power any man has over you is the power you give him

To me, you are magic

Words are foolish. Promises are useless. Anyone can say anything to get what it is they desire. Believe in actions and actions alone.

Love was a sunrise. A welter of crimson that rose much like a warning. Slowly and almost in secret.

All I strive for each day is to convince my shadow I’m someone worth following

The Beautiful

She was no lamb. She was a lion

I’m a girl who would rather experience life than watch it pass by from my window

I imagine it would be freeing to care only about oneself. Alas I am not a man.

Love is looking at someone as if the stars shine in their eyes

Sometimes a girl must make her own magic

I highly recommend you read her books if you haven’t they are absolutely amazing!

The Beautiful By Renee Ahdieh – ARC Review

Thank you to Hodder and Stoughton for sending me an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I have loved all of Renee’s books and The Beautiful was no exception! Once I started reading I was completely hooked!

Rating: 5/5

Synopsis from Goodreads:

In 1872, New Orleans is a city ruled by the dead. But to seventeen-year-old Celine Rousseau, New Orleans provides her a refuge after she’s forced to flee her life as a dressmaker in Paris. Taken in by the sisters of the Ursuline convent along with six other girls, Celine quickly becomes enamored with the vibrant city from the music to the food to the soirées and—especially—to the danger. She soon becomes embroiled in the city’s glitzy underworld, known as La Cour des Lions, after catching the eye of the group’s leader, the enigmatic Sébastien Saint Germain. When the body of one of the girls from the convent is found in the lair of La Cour des Lions, Celine battles her attraction to him and suspicions about Sébastien’s guilt along with the shame of her own horrible secret.

When more bodies are discovered, each crime more gruesome than the last, Celine and New Orleans become gripped by the terror of a serial killer on the loose—one Celine is sure has set her in his sights . . . and who may even be the young man who has stolen her heart. As the murders continue to go unsolved, Celine takes matters into her own hands and soon uncovers something even more shocking: an age-old feud from the darkest creatures of the underworld reveals a truth about Celine she always suspected simmered just beneath the surface.

Renee has made me completely and entirely fall in love with her books and her writing. Ever since I read The Wrath and the Dawn I have been hooked! If you haven’t read any of her books then you need to go fix that asap!

The Beautiful is set in New Orleans and although I don’t know much about it, after reading this book I most definitely want to go and see it. Renee’s writing is beautiful and you become completely immersed in her world. She creates this wonderfully dark atmosphere with rich and vivid world building from the setting to the clothes and food. I could see all of Celine’s beautiful clothes and was practically salivating reading the scenes which describes the food they ate.

I’m a girl who’d rather experience life than watch it pass by from my window

One of the things I love about Renee’s books is that her female main characters are all so wonderful and Celine is no exception. She is smart and witty and outspoken. She fights for what she wants and doesn’t let anyone walk all over her. I related to her so much and how she was so tired of being told what to do and being treated as if she isn’t capable of doing anything herself and just needs to be saved by a big strong man. She is a badass and won’t allow men to talk for her.

And of course a Renee Ahdieh book would not be complete without a swoon worthy male main character, in the case of The Beautiful, his name is Bastien. Say hello to you newest book boyfriend. I loved him from the moment we met him. He is roguish and charming and because we see him from Celine’s point of view it made him really mysterious and intriguing, and even though we know that is no gentlemen you can’t help but fall in love with him.

And I really loved the scenes between Bastien and Celine. They have such great witty banter and the romance that slowly builds between them is intense and left me screaming at them to just admit their feelings! The angst and the tension that builds up between them was done so well! I also really loved the side characters, every single character is so complex and there’s more to them than we initially see from them.

It’s the land of the free in idea only, then.

One of my favourite things in this book was seeing how diverse it was! All the diverse characters including both Celine and Bastian. And I really loved how Renee showed the social inequalities and how being a person of colour meant they were limited in what they could do in life despite being capable and qualified and how unjust that was. It was also interesting to see that Celine was white passing and as a result of that she had to hide half of herself and her heritage to the point where she doesn’’t even know anything about her mother and where she is from and so feels like she is missing part of herself but that because of this she is able to take opportunities that would otherwise be denied to her.

The story itself is intense and thrilling and will keep you on the edge of your seat wanting to know more. It kept me up reading late into the night because I was so enthralled by it and I just needed to know who the murderer was. We are slowly given the information and as it becomes more tense near the end and then when all is finally revealed you are left with your mouth hanging open because you did not see that coming! We are left on one hell of a cliffhanger and I have no idea how I am going to wait until next year to get my hands on the next book!

Friday Favourites – Favourite Side Characters

This is hosted by Something of the Book who created this tag out of a love for lists. There are different topics for us all to be able to take part and you can find the prompts here. There isn’t a specific number of favourites so it’s entirely up to you how many you share. You can share your most or least favourites too!

I often end up loving the side characters as much, if not more, than the main characters. I would love to see some of them get their own books or novellas or even a point of view! Just give me more of them! So here are some of my favourite side characters!

1 Sevro Au Barca from Red Rising – I loved him from the moment we meet him and I loved his friendship with Darrow. I’m kind of scared to read Iron Gold because I can’t cope if anything happens to him.

2 Clara from Ayesha at Last – She is a wonderful friend to Ayesha and is actually the one to introduce Ayesha to Khalid. I loved her relationship with both of them and how much she supports Ayesha and I loved her story arc too.

3 Lubayd from The Kingdom of Copper – Look he was Alizayd’s first proper friend and I love their friendship so much! He protects and supports Ali even more than Ali realises and I just love them.

4 Despina from The Wrath and the Dawn – She is a badass and I just wanted to see more of her. Give me more please!

5 Yasmine from We Hunt the Flame – She is a wonderful friend and sister to Zafira and honestly we do not get to see enough of her. I am hoping we get to see more in book two!

6 Ilsa from This Savage Song – Another character that I adore yet we don’t see nearly enough of!

So these are some of my fave side characters!

Let me know your faves too! Who do you wish you could see more from?

Top 10 Tuesday – Books From My Favourite Genre

Hey booknerds! I’m taking part in another week of Top Ten Tuesday!

Top Ten Tuesday was created by The Broke and the Bookish in June of 2010 and was moved to That Artsy Reader Girl in January of 2018. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together. You can find more information here

So I haven’t done a Top 10 Tuesday in a while but I really liked this prompt so here we are!

This week I’m going to share my 10 favourite fantasy books. Fantasy is my go to genre for reading, though I have been reading a lot more sci-fi and dystopian books lately too.

So here are my favourite fantasy books:

1 The City of Brass by S.A. Chakraborty – I mean are you even surprised at this point? It’s no secret how much I adore these books!

2 Six of Crows by Leigh Bardugo – I adore all the Grishaverse books but this one is my absolute favourite!

3 This Savage Song by V.E. Schwab – This is the first Schwab book I read and it is still my favourite! I adore August and Kate and the concept is so unique and interesting!

4 The Last Namsara by Kristen Ciccarelli – I really loved this book and read it in one sitting!

5 Throne of Glass by Sarah J Maas – I have a lot of love for this series despite it’s issues and I especially fell in love with the characters

6 Grace and Fury by Tracy Banghurt – One of my top reads last year and I am so excited for the sequel

7 The Wrath and the Dawn by Renee Ahdieh – such swoon worthy characters and beautiful writing I still adore this book even though I read it years ago

8 Rebel of the Sands by Alwyn Hamilton – this trilogy broke me. I was a sobbing mess by the end

9 Flame in the Mist by Renee Ahdieh – I adore the female characters in this book and I really loved the story

10 An Ember in the Ashes by Sabaa Tahir – This book is so brutal and kept me on the edge of my seat and I completely fell in love with Laia and Elias

So these are my favourite fantasy books!

What are your favourite fantasy books? Or your favourite genre?

Top 5 Wednesday – SFF Characters I Would be BFFs With

Hey booknerds! It’s another Top 5 Wednesday post! This is hosted by Sam over on Thoughts on Tomes where you share you top 5 for the chosen topic for that week. You can check out each weeks topic over on Goodreads.

This week I’m sharing some characters I would love to be friends with! I adore these characters and their personalities, and I feel like if they were real we would probably be friends and bond over something!

1 Cress from The Lunar Chronicles – she is a total fangirl and I would definitely bond while fangirling with her

2 Zainab from The City of Brass – she’s so sassy and fun and I would love to hang out with her

3 Shahrzad from The Wrath and the Dawn – I would love to be friends with her I feel like it would be really fun and exciting

4 Amani from Rebel of the Sands – I think it could be so much fun to hang out with her

5 Hermione from Harry Potter – I have always wanted to be friends with her since I was a kid!

What fictional characters would you want to be friends with?