REVIEW - Of Shadow and Light (Essence of Ash #1) by Melissa McSherry

The Book

Release Date: 24 July 2023

Goodreads Link

When finding about her impending arranged marriage, with no other way of escaping her fate, and the help of her best friend, Darakai flees her Kingdom. What she doesn't expect is to flee into the arms of a sexy, toned male, smelling of leather and pine, with a husky voice. Together they let down their walls and build a bond unlike any other, until betrayal leaves Darakai once again, fleeing from her problems. Only this time completely alone and heartbroken.

This book is a dark fantasy romance. Please mind trigger warnings!

**WARNING**
This book is intended for adult audiences and contains adult themes.

My Review    5 STARS

This is the debut book for this author and it is a brilliant start to a very dark series between Darakai and Wilder.

Both a Prince and a Princess, they have been raised to believe that the light and the dark can never be together, let alone have children.  All children born of this type of union are killed.

However when their parents reveal to their children that they are to have an arranged marriage to each other, they both flee their kingdoms, hoping to get away from their fate and the arranged marriage to an unknown.

But fate has other plans.  Wilder the Light Prince escapes and finds kind people in the forest.  Darakai the Dark Princess escapes with a friend, but runs into trouble and is found by Wilder.

With close proximity, both keep their true identity under wraps, but Wilder figures it out but keeps quiet, especially as they fall for each other and Darakai likes Wilder's darker side.  But when Wilder finds out a secret, he keeps it to himself until it it too late and he breaks Darakai's trust.

We do get a kind of happy ending at the end of this book, however there are a lot of unanswered questions and certainly a lot more of the pairs story to come.

Really looking forward to the next book.