(Cover picture courtesy of NetGalley.)

COBWEB BRIDE (Cobweb Bride Trilogy, Book One) is a history-flavored fantasy novel with romantic elements of the Persephone myth, about Death’s ultimatum to the world.

What if you killed someone and then fell in love with them?

In an alternate Renaissance world, somewhere in an imaginary “pocket” of Europe called the Kingdom of Lethe, Death comes, in the form of a grim Spaniard, to claim his Bride. Until she is found, in a single time-stopping moment all dying stops. There is no relief for the mortally wounded and the terminally ill….

Covered in white cobwebs of a thousand snow spiders she lies in the darkness… Her skin is cold as snow… Her eyes frozen… Her gaze, fiercely alive…

While kings and emperors send expeditions to search for a suitable Bride for Death, armies of the undead wage an endless war… A black knight roams the forest at the command of his undead father… Spies and political treacheries abound at the imperial Silver Court…. Murdered lovers find themselves locked in the realm of the living…

Look closer — through the cobweb filaments of her hair and along each strand shine stars…

And one small village girl, Percy—an unwanted, ungainly middle daughter—is faced with the responsibility of granting her dying grandmother the desperate release she needs.

As a result, Percy joins the crowds of other young women of the land in a desperate quest to Death’s own mysterious holding in the deepest forests of the North…

And everyone is trying to stop her.

[Full disclosure: I received a free ebook from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.]

An unique alternate history?  A fast paced plot with lots of twists?  Awesome main characters?  Great writing?  You seriously can’t ask for anything else in this fantasy/alternate history book.

After reading Cobweb Bride I can’t believe that I didn’t discover Vera Nazarian sooner.  She’s an amazing writer!  Not only can she write great suspense and throw insane plot twists at her readers, she actually knows how to describe her scenery.  One of the major downfalls of fantasy novels today is that there isn’t enough description of the setting.  The author knows what their world looks like so they don’t feel it’s necessary to describe everything to readers.  But Vera Nazarian has not made this assumption and her descriptions throughout the novel are beautiful.  The world she’s created is so vivid, so real and gorgeous!

It’s Percy’s gradual development as a character that I liked best, though.  In her own house, overshadowed by her beautiful older and younger sisters, she’s shy and very timid.  Yet at the same time, you can sense an inner strength about her.  It’s only when she decides to join the other Cobweb Brides heading for Death’s castle that you see the real Percy shine through.  She’s tough, smart, resourceful and a brilliant leader.  Authors take note: this is what a strong female lead really looks like.

I could rave on and on about the characters like Vlau and Percy, but I don’t want to spoil too many things.  Let me focus on the plot for a few sentences, if you’ll indulge me: I was glued to my computer for all 293 pages.  I’m dead serious here.  The apocalypse itself wouldn’t have stopped me from reading Cobweb Bride.  Vera Nazarian added some incredible plot twists and it ended on such a cliffhanger that I want the next book, Cobweb Empire, right now.

Seriously, I can’t praise this book enough.  You need to read it.

I give this book 5/5 stars.

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