Review--A Touch of Chaos by Scarlett St. Clair

 

The World Will Burn

Persephone, Goddess of Spring, never guessed a chance encounter with Hades, God of the Underworld, would change her life forever—but he did.

A fight for humanity and battles between gods, it's a world Persephone never thought she would see. To end the chaos, she must draw upon her darkness and embrace who she's become—Goddess, Wife, Queen of the Underworld.

Once, Persephone made bargains to save those she loves, now she will go to war for them.

 

 

 

 

I finally finished Scarlett St. Clair's A Touch of Chaos that brings a conclusion to the Hades and Persephone series and what a whirlwind of s series it has been! This was such a fun take on the Greek gods, as most retellings I've read don't always have that modernity to them. Sometimes they do, but then it takes it up to a true modernity level! This series is definitely modern, but it's like the gods and goddesses are still the ones I imagined from my myth reading days!

As we know, when A Touch of Malice ended, things were in chaos! Lol. No pun intended! Hades was Theseus' prisoner in the labyrinth and Persephone was about to face the wrath of the unleashed Titans in the Underworld. You can't get more chaotic than that!

The book truly did not disappoint with the action! I positively loved that about this one! Persephone's mission is to rescue Hades and Hades mission is to get back to Persephone. Of course, defeating Theseus will have to be taken care of as well, as that is the big mission at large! And that is going to take a might fete for sure, more power and ammunition than Hades and Persephone have at the ready even!

Meanwhile, we do get to have Theseus' depraved point of view as well! I love getting the villain's point of view, even if it only further incites my dislike of them! Theseus is definitely a depraved villain, one you just want to see die! The things he does to others...it's not for the faint of heart, that's for sure! I do appreciate that St. Clair gave another proper disclaimer as to some trigger causing scenes within the book. She notes what those triggers are and in what chapters. So that was a nice heads up to prepare myself for.

Theseus plans to get Cronos to join his side of the war between him and the gods. Of course, he does plan on betraying Cronos further down the line because as we know, Theseus is only faithful to himself. I truly wished I could've seen this character truly suffer! I mean, that's how great St. Clair's writing is. You viscerally hate the villain and want to see him die a truly painful and slow death!

With over 500 pages and the hero and heroine separated for the first 1/3 of the novel, you would think things would move at a slower pace, but they really don't. The three parts of the novel do tend to lean towards acts in a play. Each part comes to a relative conclusion before moving onto the next one to continue the larger story arc and they all flow together seamlessly. In this one, we get Persephone, Hades, Theseus, and Dionysus' points of view, so we pretty much cover all the borders at play here.

I did find myself deeply involved with Dionysus and Ariadne's story the most! Yes, this is the Hades and Persephone series, but I couldn't help but enjoy seeing their story develop. St. Clair hints at who her next "feature couple" will be, I can only hope that these two are still on her list for future books as well!

There was a great deal of romance in this one, and yes, you're probably thinking it's a romance book, so yeah. It has to be there! Lol. And it is! Probably a bit more than this "light on the romance" romance reader would like, but what can you do! While I may not always be for the more intense romantic interludes I do still enjoy the romance between Hades and Persephone. I can't remember which version of the original myth I read about these two was, but I did feel like I was always wondering if the love was true on both sides, and honestly, I thought Eros' love arrows were involved, so yeah, it might not have been true love. But don't quote me on that, as it's been soooo very long since I read those myths and my book is sadly in storage somewhere!

The ending was great! I truly loved where all the pieces landed and how loose ends were tied up. Of course, I am now wondering about one tiny detail...minuscule in the grand scheme of things but yeah...definitely wondering about that now. While I was satisfied with the ending, I did feel like some of the end battle scenes were a bit rushed. I mean, I was expecting a grand final battle, and truthfully it came off a little anticlimactic to me. Just like poof, happy ending! It is a little more detailed than that, but I expected a wee bit more to be honest. Then there was still quite a few pages to read after the victory so I was left wondering a little. True, we just wrap up with Hades and Persephone and I can't help but want to know what Dionysus and Ariadne did as the last time we saw them it was just after the victory and I'm like wait, don't leave them yet, where are they going and what are they going to do?

So yes, I was left with a few mild disappointments and a few unanswered questions, but it didn't detract from my enjoyment too much. St. Clair makes it clear that she is not done with this world just yet, even though Hades and Persephone's chapter has come to its conclusion. It will be interesting to see what all she does next and I will be looking forward to the next tale!

Overall Rating 4/5 stars