The Silvered Serpents by Roshani Chokshi: ARC Book Review

^{This is a spoiler-free review.}

The Silvered Serpents by Roshani Chokshi

Expected publication September 22nd, 2020 by Wednesday Books.

My rating:

They are each other’s fiercest love, greatest danger, and only hope.

Séverin and his team members might have successfully thwarted the Fallen House, but victory came at a terrible cost ― one that still haunts all of them. Desperate to make amends, Séverin pursues a dangerous lead to find a long lost artifact rumoured to grant its possessor the power of God.

Their hunt lures them far from Paris, and into icy heart of Russia where crystalline ice animals stalk forgotten mansions, broken goddesses carry deadly secrets, and a string of unsolved murders makes the crew question whether an ancient myth is a myth after all.

As hidden secrets come to the light and the ghosts of the past catch up to them, the crew will discover new dimensions of themselves. But what they find out may lead them down paths they never imagined.

A tale of love and betrayal as the crew risks their lives for one last job.

Content Warnings: mentions of child abuse, suicide, anti-semitism, violence and gore

Thank you to the publisher, Wednesday Books/St. Martin’s Press, and NetGalley for providing me with an e-ARC of this book. All thoughts are my own.

“Hope squeezed through the cracks of logic… She could not see her hope for what it was, nothing more than a silvered serpent.”

This series!

It’s been SO LONG since I’ve felt about a series the way I feel about The Gilded Wolves!

The excitement, the intrigue, the drama! This book had me on the edge of my seat waiting to see what happened next. Even more so at its conclusion, knowing that there was still so much more of the tale to come.

Only recently have I started reading newer series that are still in the works, with upcoming instalments that have yet to be released. So, it’s been so long since I strayed from reading stand-alone novels or, if choosing to venture out into a book series, delving into one that hasn’t already been concluded. I forgot the feeling that grips you when reading an amazing, totally compelling book series without a complete finale. That insatiable need-to-know that can’t be fulfilled no matter how much you want it.

And The Silvered Serpents brought all that back to me. Oh so effortlessly.

Honestly, even looking back on the book series I used to love – checking religiously to see when the next installment in the series would be published and flying through them the second I could get them in my hands – I think The Gilded Wolves/Silvered Serpents blows almost all of them out of the water. I can’t think of any other book series I’ve read that include so many different literary genres, gripping plot-twists, imaginative world-building and unique, round characters.

And Chokshi manages to not only do so, but do it flawlessly.

The Silvered Serpents built off everything that worked in The Gilded Wolves, and made it even better. Chokshi obviously took advantage of the ~free real estate~ from an additional book to delve even more deeply into the fantastical (and thematically pointed) world-building of the international Order of Babel and the motivations of the main characters (which just made me fall in love with them more; as if that was even possible).

If her track record is any indicative, Chokshi is on a role. And, personally, I can’t wait to see what come next. ❤️

Have you read The Gilded Wolves? What were your thoughts?

Are you as excited as I am for the next book in this series?

Let me know!