Book Review: A Dawn of Onyx

I devoured A Dawn of Onyx by Kate Golden, the first book in The Sacred Stones trilogy last week. It was so good!

The novel follows Arwen Valondale, a young woman with healing powers, from the kingdom of Amber. She lives with her little sister, her sick mother, and her brother has been gone fighting the war with the their enemy, the Onyx kingdom, and hasn’t been heard from in quite some time. When her brother comes home unexpectedly and injured, she learns he was able to escape after almost being captured and that he stole money from Onyx. He wants his family to run with him to another kingdom where they might be safe from Onyx and won’t be punished by their own kingdom for him abandoning his duties.

But while trying to run away, Arwen gets captured by some Onyx soldiers and one of the soldiers in the group has been gravely injured. She heals him and instead of them killing her, they take her back to Onyx with them. She makes a deal with the king, Kane Ravenwood. She will be treated well if she stays in Onyx as a healer and he will try to find her family to let them know she is okay. Arwen may be with the enemy now, but the more she learns about them and the kingdom, the more she realizes there is a lot she doesn’t know and maybe Kane and Onyx aren’t the bad guys she’s always been made to believe they are.

This book was so addictive and hard to put down. I read it so quickly. I loved the storyline, Arwen, Kane, and the side characters like Griffin and Mari. This is a slow burn, but in the best way possible and not like you’re dying for them to finally get together. The flirting and tension is so good that I loved every minute of the slow burn. And Kane is so perfect. He is made to seem like the big, bad, evil king, but he’s actually such a good person and a softie!

I can’t wait to see what happens in the next book.

Read this if you want a steamy fantasy romance with the slow burn, forced proximity, and enemies to lovers tropes.

*This post contains affiliate links.*