This is a 2.5 star review. There are ways to re-tell Dracula. However this is not it. Greek Demi-Gods, Egyptian Gods, magick, time travel, and a planet that depends on quartz for running the electricity? The story had a strong beginning, then faded away. Luca and Kate would be a great story without all the mishmash additions. The smut was good so that is a plus.

Luca (the MMC) is a vampire hunter. He knows a lot about them because he just happens to be a half-vampire. Luca is also very lonely, but all the changes when he meets a witch named Kate (the FMC) and it's love at first sight.

However, Kate and her merry band of magical creatures are just making a pitstop on Earth. With nothing keeping Luca there, he decides to go join Kate and travel to her world, Icarya.

It was a little dizzying how many extra characters were introduced within the first few chapters. Characters like Hercules, a minotaur and a talking rat, I kept thinking "ok, what is this book about?" But like most fantasy books - just go with it.

🌶️🌶️🌶️/ 5

✨ Witches 🔮
✨ Vampires 🦇
✨ Magic 💫
✨ Love at first sight ♥️♥️

I really liked Kate - she was sassy and self assured. I felt like Luca was kind of in the background, just basking in her glow and doing more observing more than anything.

This book had pretty low stakes. It's mostly world building for most of the book as well as building on Kate and Luca's relationship. Even still, there's enough little embers to keep me curious and I'll be reading book 2.

Book 1 will be released in January 2024.

* Thank you to City Owl Press and NetGalley for my eARC in exchange for my honest review *

The book immediately drew me in. The Icaryan world, with its unique magic system and political intrigue, is vividly described and easy to imagine. The characters, especially Kate and Luca, are well-developed and relatable, with their own flaws and struggles.
I enjoyed reading the relationship between Kate and Luca. Their chemistry is palpable, and the tension between them adds an extra layer of excitement to the story. Both Kate and Luca are forced to make difficult decisions and sacrifices for the people they love, and it adds depth to their characters and the overall story. As they fight side-by-side against various threats, their bond only grows stronger, making it impossible for readers not to root for them.
The plot is fast-paced and full of unexpected twists and turns. From assassination plots to long-lost lovers, the story is full of action and suspense. Overall, I really recommend this book for anyone who loves a good fantasy with a touch of romance.

Thank you to the author, City Owl Press, and NetGalley for an ARC copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Rating: 3/5 stars

Read for:
- Spice
- Half-vampire/witchy romance
- World-building

Holy plot, Batman. I went into this book excited, because the description really captured my attention. The characters and the overall lack of satisfaction in the plot and ending, however, is what makes me dock this by 2 stars. The pacing was hard to keep up with, and I felt that the chemistry between the characters went from 0 to 100 way, way too fast.

I was given an arc for this book via NetGalley and City Owl Press. This book will be available 1/23/24.

Y’all! I have read some truly bad books but this one takes the cake. I mean I read Wet Hot Allosaurus Summer for the love of unholy bunnies and I did that in a lark. This book? This a wet hot mess of incoherent plot when there is a plot because all this is is straight up schmexy times. And not even well written schmexy times. I should have DNF’d it. Like it’s not worth my time or yours. But you are the master of your own literary journey so read it if my review make you want to but this book was awful and I want my time back.

When I started reading this I was hopeful. Initially, it seemed mysterious with a touch of classic gothic horror, but all that quickly turned into great disappointment.

The two main characters in this novel are Luca and Kate, both boring and have little personalities. Given that the novel's primary is about the two of them I was impressed by how little chemistry they had. It was the definition of instant love which resulted in me never getting time to root for or connect with them.
Both of them are multiple centuries old, yet dropped everything for each other within 24 hours of meeting... Besides that the two of them never talked with each other about themselves and their life they just thought each other to be hot, which would worked differently had the novel not tried to make them seem infatuated and in love.

Besides their love and connection being nonexistent, the whole novel was chaotic and felt anything but unfinished. There was no actual plotline, too many characters without purpose, and multiple conflicts being introduced but never addressed. There is nothing in the novel that keeps be invested. The only thing it managed to do perfectly was make me frustrated and confused.

The novel contains a heavy amount of smut, but given that included so much other information too, it was hard to figure out if it was written solely to be smutty and therefore purposefully disregarded the rest as unimportant, or if the novel simply never knew what it was supposed to be. Regardless of the intention, if it was meant to be read as pure smut, that could no doubt have been executed better because this made no sense.

Thanks to the publisher City Owl Press for providing me with an advanced reading copy via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Publish date 24.01.2024.

Going into reading this book I knew what I was getting into so I had a good time. There is a lot of spice but since I assumed that ahead of time it was fun. I enjoyed the characters and thought there was chemistry there for sure. I docked two stars for the plot however as it felt really rushed and sometimes pretty confusing. I will read the next book in this series and maybe it will bring things together more

3.5/5 stars