In some ways, it felt like this premise was designed for me in particular. A book has to have pretty bad craft work for me to not enjoy a romance that reminds me a bit of Penny Dreadful so I had a good time overall here! Final Score: 3.5

Content Disclosure: As with all dark romance, I would encourage you to check the content warnings, but I will touch on the books “dubious consent”/ consensual non-consent. I’ll format the review to give you a warning when that is about to come up if you prefer to skip that part!

What Worked Well For Me

Victorian Gothic setting + horror elements + the two leads trying to kill each other and being able to maintain tension throughout the book = a good read for me. This is the type of book that I get to turn my brain off and just enjoy the story, so while I have some critiques I think it’s important to warn you that this was my mindset going into this book. I haven’t calculated my final score yet, but I have a strong feeling personal enjoyment is going to skew the score a bit.

I appreciated the light horror elements and the take on the creature’s lore. While there are some tried and true aspects to the lore, there were enough new/interesting twists that it made the creature feel a bit more fresh, or at least not over played.

Even if this series wasn’t part of the new Dark Romance quest on Pagebound, I would continue on in the series on my own.

Where It Fell Short For Me

The next two paragraphs discuss the “dubious consent”/consensual non-consent (CNC) I debated where to place this in my review because I did like/appreciate the author’s note and the fact the author's note was at the start of the book. I’m paraphrasing, but the author’s note included that in real life BDSM elements should be clearly discussed outside of any scenes/sexual activities, but that those conversations are not necessarily written on the page here. While it’s a small thing, I appreciated the direct callout by the author which gives me more faith/trust in their handling of BDSM elements in books. As a dark romance reader, dub-con/CNC comes up a lot due to the nature of a lot of the premises/plots. I always do my best in any romance book to separate out the fantasy aspect of romance books, even when I don’t have that fantasy personally. However, dub-con/CNC is probably the most difficult one for me to navigate which has led me to DNF some books that have this setup.

To be clear, I have no issue with people having this fantasy in their real life or enjoying it in their fictional stories - that is totally valid. I think my unease comes from many books where the author either unintentionally includes dub-con/CNC in their books or it’s portrayed as just hot without any discussions around safety. I get that consent discussions aren’t the hottest thing to read/write about, but I always appreciate when consent is handled well on the page. So while it wasn’t explicitly talked about on the page, the author’s note, characterization/setup, and that the book didn’t open on dub-con immediately made it so I didn’t DNF this one. TL;DR of this part of the review: If you get icked out by the MMC’s nature in the beginning of the book, you might want to dip out early because his nature gets worse before it gets better.

I always appreciate a competent FMC and in all the ways I would expect Alina to be competent, she is! There is one thing to note with this though which is why it’s under the “where it fell short” heading - there is an element to the plot that relies on miscommunication. It’s not egregious - it makes sense for the characters/situation, but one direct conversation would have spun this in a completely different direction. This can be a deal breaker for me, so even though I rolled with it here, I wanted to note it.

When I’m listening to an audiobook only with strong narrators, I often miss craft hiccups because the narrators’ performances can cover them up and when you add in the fact this was a “turn off my brain and enjoy” book, the fact I caught some continuity errors/potential plot holes isn’t great. Take the plot hole critique with a huge grain of salt because this was a casual listen, but between the miscommunication and other errors - I trust my gut that I didn’t fully miss something.

Audiobook Experience

Both narrators had solid performances here! Their accents/character work landed for me and I felt like they both had good pacing throughout the book. I also didn’t note any technical issues with the audiobook.

One thing I wanted to flag - I avoid graphic audio because I find it overwhelming, so when a sound effect was added early on in the audiobook - I was nervous. However, not only did the sound effect work for me, I actually think it helped elevate my experience with the book. It didn’t feel overpowering or over stimulating and where some audiobooks can use sound effects/music as a bit of a crutch, I don’t feel like that was the case here!

Final Thoughts, Opinions & Recommendations

Dark romance definitely isn’t for everyone and while this one isn’t my favorite dark romance, I definitely enjoyed my time with it and I’m looking forward to continuing the series!

If you like to pair your sexy/smutty books with “smart” books, I highly recommend The Butchering Art: Joseph Lister’s Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine by Lindsey Fitzharris! Not only does it stay on theme with the darker sides of the Victorian world, the book references germ theory directly so this feels like a solid follow up!

You Might Like This If: You like dark romance, enjoy the Victorian Gothic vibe and a romance where the “enemies” don't evaporate when the second feelings show up.

You Might NOT Like This If: There are any elements on the content warnings you don’t vibe with (particularly dub-con/CNC), if any amount of miscommunication-driven conflict drives you up a wall, or potentially not airtight plotting is going to ruin the vibe for you.

My thanks to my local public library for having this audiobook and the sequels available with a very short wait!! GO SUPPORT YOUR LOCAL LIBRARIES!! We are so lucky to have them!!

TL;DR

Would I Recommend it? I’m not screaming from the rooftops about this one, but if the premise sounds interesting and you check the content disclosures, I think it’s worth a shot! Would I Reread it? Probably not. Would I Continue the Series/Read More From This Author? Yes. Spice Level: 4+ Hot & Heavy - Highly explicit, vivid, and detailed descriptions of multiple intimate scenes. The encounters feature explicit language and map out multiple acts, serving as a core driver of the plot and relationship development. (Note: I could argue this as like a 4.5 because of the dub-con/CNC, but a 5 doesn’t feel right to me here)

Star Score Breakdown

Personal Enjoyment: 4.25 Overall Execution: 3.25 Craft & Writing Quality: 3 Characters: 3.5 Plot: 3.25 Final Score: 3.5

this was quite fun, but sometimes it did drag out in my opinion. the characters were wild, but it was very entertaining to follow them. sometimes the story got really deep and it treated heavy subjects, which I appreciated.