I felt so many things reading this book.

It truly helped me during this time, one of the worst periods for my mental health. I don’t know if Octavia ever got into spells like this but I just want to thank her from beyond the grave because reading this helped me so much. And I think she was able to help me because of Shori’s personality: her obvious detachment from society, and yet her stout beliefs in ethics, as well as that fierce spirit she imbodies (especially when defending the people she cares for), and in the truth against injustice made me relate to her in ways I didn’t realize until I was finished with this book. I could focus on someone I related to who was able to get justice when all of the life around me has gone to sh*t.

Seeing a young woman come into her own and struggling through the many layers of trauma with losing a version of oneself you don’t even remember, without almost any emotional support was also heartening to me. I have to be honest in that since I was warned and waited many years to read this book & come to terms with the realities of her sexual appetite I just didn’t care that much about that aspect, but Octavia definitely wrote Wright in a way that disturbed me at first. But many years of desensitization of this fact and learning the lore of the Ina and then focusing on the plot improved it immensely. I just wish she hadn’t included those scenes, personally.

Anyways, let me go cry into a corner about how we’ll never see a continuation of this amazing urban fantasy vampire world from Miss Butler, probably my favorite interpretation of modern day vampires I’ve ever read.