In My Opinion

The Viper's Venom by Ipsitalali

Series: Queen's Gambit (book one)
Source: Gardenia: A Review Shop by -Chrysalis_Realm
Genre: Romantic suspense
Secondary/subgenre(s): Romantic comedy
Mature: N (abduction, alcohol use, blood, death, medical depictions, murder, non-explicit sexual content, physical assault, smoking, strong profanity, suicide, violence)
LGBTQIAP+: G (side characters, non-explicit sexual content)
Status: Ongoing
Special note: No "First Impressions"
Digging deeper: 50/100
Final thoughts: Complete
Note: Chapter 32 "Dramatic" was the last available chapter as of the publishing of this review.

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Digging deeper: 50/100

Cover & title: 8/10

I like the title. It's spicy and prepares me for a story that bites, although hopefully not me. I'm thinking more along the lines of betrayal within the story.

Overall, I love this cover. It's so unique. The plain gray background makes the vibrant purples and golds pop, and there's such an interesting contrast with the snake amidst pretty flowers and purple blotches. The glowing purple and gold font imprinted over it all really stands out, too. I love the scratchiness of "The Viper's" above the bold print "Venom," as if one is a handwritten scrawl and one is a stamp, and your name is visible but not intrusive.

The only critique I have is with the text at the top. It looks like it's cut off a bit, and I have to really squint and stare at it for a while before I can read it, even when I click the book on your profile page to pull up the larger image. I'd recommend shifting that down a bit so it doesn't look like it's cut off at the top and bumping the font size up a bit as well. You don't want it too big, because you don't want it distracting from the rest of the cover, but I think it needs to be big enough to read fairly easily. I'm not crazy about the font, because I think it's one that's hard to read, but that isn't too much of a problem with the combination of letters and words you have going on here.

Blurb: 2/5

Overall, this is good. Short, sweet, and to the point, introducing the main character and the plot conflict without giving too much away. It has a touch of humor to it as well, which I appreciate, and I'm interested to see how that plays out within a story that could be quite dark otherwise. My only critique here is with the placement of the first question. Right now, it starts the second paragraph, but that doesn't feel quite right to me. I think it would work better either tacked on to the end of the first paragraph or set apart as a single-line paragraph between the two paragraphs. The effect differs slightly depending on which way you go with that. I'm leaning toward the single-line paragraph, but it's up to you whether you want to change it or leave it as is, of course.