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The Last Tale of the Flower Bride by Roshani Chokshi
Fantasy

The Last Tale of the Flower Bride

by Roshani Chokshi

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Quick take

This lush, gothic fairytale follows the moment when a dreamy marriage risks transforming into a childhood nightmare.

Good to know

  • Illustrated icon, Icon_Romance

    Romance

  • Illustrated icon, Icon_FemaleFriendship

    Female friendships

  • Illustrated icon, Icon_Unreliable

    Unreliable narrator

  • Illustrated icon, Icon_Ornate

    Ornate

Synopsis

Once upon a time, a man who believed in fairy tales married a beautiful, mysterious woman named Indigo Maxwell-Casteñada. He was a scholar of myths. She was heiress to a fortune. They exchanged gifts and stories and believed they would live happily ever after—and in exchange for her love, Indigo extracted a promise: that her bridegroom would never pry into her past.

But when Indigo learns that her estranged aunt is dying and the couple is forced to return to her childhood home, the House of Dreams, the bridegroom will soon find himself unable to resist. For within the crumbling manor’s extravagant rooms and musty halls, there lurks the shadow of another girl: Azure, Indigo’s dearest childhood friend who suddenly disappeared. As the house slowly reveals his wife’s secrets, the bridegroom will be forced to choose between reality and fantasy, even if doing so threatens to destroy their marriage . . . or their lives.

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Free sample

Get an early look from the first pages of The Last Tale of the Flower Bride.
The Last Tale of the Flower Bride

Chapter One

THE BRIDEGROOM

Once upon a time, Indigo Maxwell-Casteñada found me.

I had been lost a long time and had grown comfortable in the dark. I didn’t imagine anyone could lure me from it. But Indigo was one of those creatures that can hunt by scent alone, and the reek of my desperate wanting must have left a tantalizing, fluorescent trail.

Before Indigo, I avoided places where money served as pageantry rather than payment. I clung to the opinion that they were loud and crass, the shabby but sturdy armor of a poor man. In those days, I was poor. But I had become rich in expertise, and it was in this capacity that I served as a visiting curator to L’Éxposition Des Femmes Monstrueuses. The exhibit had brought me to Paris on someone else’s dime and, eventually, to the Hôtel de Casteñada.

Once one of the royal apartments of Louis XIV and Marie Antoinette, the Hôtel de Casteñada now ranked among the finest hotels in the world. The vaulted ceiling, a restoration of the original, I was told, still showed indifferent, muscular gods reclining amidst gold-bellied clouds. Ivy lined the walls, through which the snarling faces of stone satyrs peered and panted at the guests.

It was common knowledge that each of the Casteñada hotels centered on a fairy-tale motif. I gathered this one was an homage to Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve’s La Belle et la Bête—Beauty and the Beast—and while I hated to admit it, something about it seemed not of this world. It was so lovely I could almost ignore the crowd of models and DJs, red-faced businessmen and whatever other brilliantly arrayed and ostensibly vapid creatures such beautiful places attracted.

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Why I love it

The Last Tale of the Flower Bride is a very special breed of story.

To call it a gender-swapped Bluebeard isn’t inaccurate, but it is reductive. After all, the best fairy tale reimaginings do not simply pay homage to their source material but rewrite them so thoroughly that they can cast off the inspiration, exist without demanding any knowledge of it. In this way, any allusions to the original fable serve as delightful garnishes, while the work becomes its own meal.

This is what Roshani Chokshi does. And while there are certainly nods to Bluebeard—from the many iterations of the color to the deal Indigo extracts in exchange for her love, that the bridegroom must never pry into her past—the novel Chokshi gives us is so much more. She has managed to maintain the aura of a fable while creating something urgent and modern and thoroughly adult.

This is a love letter to the particular love that blooms between teen girls, where friendship tangles with obsession, as well as the lust that takes hold when we fall for someone we do not—cannot—truly know. A fairy tale that’s fermented, grown stranger and richer. Chokshi commands the senses with her lush prose, creating an intoxicating cloud, an experience at once visceral and intellectual.

As a writer, this novel is a marvel.

As a reader, it is a decadent delight.

I didn’t want it to end. And yet, I couldn’t put it down.

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Member ratings (3,141)

  • Katie B.

    Decatur, IN

    I was a little unsure of what I was going into but I absolutely loved it! Such a unique piece of literature and I’m just upset that it’s so short. I was so immersed in the story and loved till the end

  • Madison J.

    Green Bay, WI

    So stunning, you’ll truly believe magic exists in the real world. It’s exquisitely gothic in all the best ways, with plot twists to rival a thriller. Absolutely loved the experience of reading this.

  • Abby O.

    Mars Hill, ME

    Ok I won’t lie this book was weird, but I really loved it. I’m still not 100% sure what happened but that’s one of the things I loved, it’s somewhat left up to interpretation. Overall really good

  • Sam O.

    Fitchburg, MA

    Completely wondrous and magnetic world that you can’t peel your eyes away from. This book was so dreamy and I flew through it like I was in a race against Time itself. Loved the dev of the characters!

  • Kalin S.

    Newton Falls, OH

    This is one of the most beautifully written books I’ve ever read. Beyond that, the story is magical and captivating. This is one of those books sure to stick with you for a long, long time. Stunning.

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