Butterfly Palace By Colleen Coble

Butterflies are great and all, but Butterfly Palace takes it a little too far.

See, the owner of the house is obsessed with butterflies. Huge collections of the things. Some of them flying and flapping around. Some of them . . . not.

The only thing he’s more obsessed with is his political aspirations. Unfortunately, it seems like there are quite a few other people obsessed with those aspirations as well.

Not to mention the Servant Girl Killer whose path keeps swerving towards Butterfly Palace.

Yes. Welcome to Butterfly Palace.

The setting of Butterfly Palace was so intriguing—equally gorgeous and eerie. There were so many plots going on and so many suspects running around that I had no idea what to expect. Then the ending came and smacked me out of nowhere.

The theme was especially beautiful, and woven in so neatly. I loved how it connected back to the butterflies. I also loved Drew’s journey to overcome revenge against the man he thought killed his father.

It was interesting reading about the Secret Service at that time—it’s a subject I haven’t seen pop up in too many historical fiction books.

At first I didn’t like Belle at all. But her character arc drew me in and kept me guessing until I was able to applaud her in some of the final scenes. I felt like she didn’t get as much closure in the resolution and would have liked to see a bit more of what her world looked like after the fact.

Butterfly Palace may not be a place you’d stay in real life. But within the pages of a book?

Absolutely.