I’m going to do a series review, which I’ll get to in a moment, because I really liked this series and only reviewing this book won’t do it justice. This story is more of a serial than a normal series. Each book doesn’t have a full story with a goal and resolution. Rather, they all link together to make one big story. I’ve given this one a 3.5-star rating on the caveat that it is only the very beginning of a story. I wasn’t super hooked until Book 3 (the first few are pretty short), but this was a decent start with believable enough characters and a bit of a mystery about why Lucas is so different from other humans that made me interested enough to keep going.

Now for my spoiler-free series review:

To get the negatives out of the way first…

– The pacing felt a little strange. It didn’t feel slow, and yet, the story took place over the course of less than a week. When I think about it, it seems like an awful lot happened, including the formation of deep relationships, in such a short period of time.

– This wasn’t something that bothered me, but I feel like I should mention there were minor editing issues. The occasional typo, but also the occasional continuity error. Like a character learning some information, and then later learning it again and being shocked, as if it were the first time.

Now for why I liked this series so much!

– I thought Konstantin would be a vampire alpha jerk, but he was very much the opposite. He was compassionate and good and really valued and cared for the vampires in his little found family.

– I liked a lot of the characters. Some were good people. Some were just plain interesting. Some were a bit of both.

– There were all sorts of complex relationships among these vampires—especially between Konstantin, the Nomad, Arsene, and Marius—and I loved it. Relationships that were familial and/or decidedly not familial, but also with rifts between them. Relationships that had love, devotion, and longing but also pain, betrayal, and jealousy. I especially loved the exploration of Konstantin’s feelings toward both his sire and his adoptive sire, and how hurt he was by the father figures in his vampiric life.

– There was an interesting vampire society structure and dynamic, with the houses and sires and relationships among them. It was a bit weird the way they called the ones they turned their children and “nursed” them but also treated them as lovers, but I can accept some weirdness in paranormal books.

– The romance was fast—less than a week, and they were already in love, willing to kill for each other, and wanting to be together for eternity—but sweet. They really cared for each other and tried to do right by each other.

– There was sexy blood drinking! (And also sexy sex. But, to be honest, I still think the hottest scene was between Marius and Arsene in Book 3, which was neither sex nor the typical sexy blood drinking.)

– I liked the acknowledgement of the feelings of abuse/assault victims. How having the people you thought cared about you choose to look the other way is a form of betrayal. How that can hurt just as much, if not more than, the actual act of abuse/assault.

– There was a very sweet found family element.

– There was also drama, action, secrets, vampires, witches, magic, and other interesting things going on, but I won’t get into detail about those because spoilers.

Overall this was a great series with romance, drama, action, secrets, betrayal, complex relationships, found family, magic, and sexy vampires!

*Rating: 3.5 Stars // Read Date: 2020 // Format: eBook*