Such Pretty Flowers by K. L. Cerra had an exciting premise horror thriller focusing on botanical elements. In ways, that book lived up to this, but it also didn’t quite do it for me. Continue reading to get my fuller take on this new release.
Summary
“Get it out of me.”
It was the last message Holly received from her brother, Dane, before he was found cleaved open in the lavish Savannah townhouse of his girlfriend, Maura. Police ruled his death a suicide sparked by psychosis, but Holly can’t shake the idea that something else must have happened—something involving another message he sent earlier that night about a “game” Maura wanted to play.
Determined to discover the truth, Holly begins to stalk Maura, a magnetic, black-eyed florist with a penchant for carnivorous plants. But what begins as an investigation quickly veers into a fixation that lures Holly into the depths of Maura’s world: Savannah high society, eerie black roses, and a whisper of something more sinister. Soon Holly is feeling a dark attraction to the one woman she shouldn’t trust. As Holly falls deeper for Maura and her secrets, she’s left with only one choice: find out what happened to Dane or meet the same fate.
Review
(Disclaimer: I received this book from the publisher. This has not impacted my review which is unbiased and honest.)
Characters
Honestly, I did not like any of the characters in Such Pretty Flowers. Holly, the main character, made so many bad decisions that it was unbelievable to a certain point. And Maura just felt like such an obvious villain. Granted, her motives were not actually all that obvious until later revealed, but I was pretty over the sexy irresistible villain thing mid-way through.
Other minor characters seemed to appear and disappear. These characters just slipped through my fingers and I could not tell whether or not they added to the overall book. Either be more fully situating the characters in the narrative or removing/combining them with others would have been better. Unfortunately, the characters were too one-dimensional to be interesting to me as a reader.
Plot, Pacing, Themes
I thought the overall plot was pretty compelling. I love plants, I love some gothic horror, what is not to love from the summary? When reading Such Pretty Flowers it was up and down with the pace, starting slowly. As a result, it was difficult for me to be immersed from the beginning. Putting pacing issues aside, Cerra has good bones for a creepy psychological thriller. Unfortunately, the follow-through was not there.
If there was less focus on the ill-begotten romance between Holly and Maura, there would have been more time to fully delve into the southern gothic horror that seemed to be the draw for many readers. There were some, what I would describe as side-quests, that Holly used to investigate her brother’s death; Such Pretty Flowers did not explore these enough to be actually helpful for the plot and seemed tangential. Again, decrease the repetitive description of how Holly doesn’t trust Maura, but still gets sexually involved, and increase aspects of the novel that actually build up the plot.
Overall
I’m always here for a good gothic horror novel with Sapphic romance. Such Pretty Flowers does not hit that mark very well. The romance is obviously wrong as Holly doesn’t trust Maura since she thinks she was involved with her brother’s death. The execution of the plot did not lend itself well to being gothic horror or psychological thriller as much as it could have. Granted, I’m hoping that Cerra releases more as their career continues!
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