I sadly DNFed this book. The premise sounded amazing and I thought it would be abook that I would love, but I could not get into the story. I will give it another chance in the future. Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an e-ARC.

Lucy Undying is a gothic fantasy that follows Lucy's escape from Dracula and her own self-discovery through time. I found Lucy Undying to be really intriguing, in terms of the characters and the way the story is written. Lucy was an interesting character and I enjoyed seeing her getting to know and understand herself, including her sexuality, throughout the story.
I really enjoyed the unique narrative with Diary entries, different characters points of views and different timelines that all brought the story together at the end. It kept the book mysterious and interesting throughout to see the relevance coming together.
However, I did find it quite slow paced and struggled to get fully engaged and invested in the story. Unfortunately, I didn't enjoy Lucy Undying as much as I was hoping although I can really see the intogue and appeal, and hope others do too!

Lucy Undying offers a new perspective on the story of Dracula. Divided into three sections, the book alternates between different parts of Lucy’s story. I struggled to get into the character's voice and the writing style, it felt both like it was trying to be historical/gothic but also contemporary, but once I got past that I did enjoy it.

IDK i'm torn on my rating. maybe 2.5, maybe 3.5. I thought it was going to be at least 4 stars for the first 40% but alas.

I didn't mind this! This is an alternate ending to Dracula, which I have not read. I did read the wikipedia synopsis AND watched the movie though, so I kind of got the point. This tells the story of Lucy Westenra, who was not actually killed (twice) and lives to the modern age, hunting Dracula. She meets Iris, reluctant heir to a very questionable vampire-adjacent mlm scheme.

I really liked the first part of this book, which was told from three perspectives: Lucy's diary (recounting Dracula), Lucy recounting her post-human years to a therapist, and Iris. One of my favourite tropes is vampire living through historical events and influencing them in different ways, so I thoroughly enjoyed this. I didn't <i>love</i> Iris' chapters as I found her a bit of an annoying narrator, but the rest I really enjoyed. However when the time all catches up to the present day and the mystery of Iris' family begins to unravel, this book really lost me. I just found it WAAAAAY too long and I was desperate for it to be over. The plot itself was really interesting and I loved what the author did with the original story and how it led to many big reveals, but it just needed to be shorter on the whole for me to really enjoy it.

The writing itself is good, and I quite liked most of the characters, although I found many bits to be cringe/cheesy. Overall I think a worthwhile read in the sapphic vampire genre!

I’m sorry but I couldn’t get past the use of ‘bucket of lust’. I don’t think this has been particularly well written or well edited. I loved the premise but truly hated the execution - it would have been better to make this a generic vampire story instead of a Dracula one because the only similarities the characters seem to share are names.

As someone unfamiliar with the full story of Dracula, but having some knowledge of characters in it, I was really excited to read this and find out more about Lucy, one of the protagonists of this book. I loved the multi-POV and Iris as a character, and was captivated by Lucy’s backstory. I was really pleased to see that this had sapphic representation, as it was a beautiful touch and was written very well. This is the perfect read for the Halloween season and for any fans of vampires, including fans of Carmilla. A beautifully-written retelling of Dracula from the POV of a misunderstood and underrepresented character.

Kiersten White has proven to be very hit-or-miss for me, and unfortunately, this one was a miss.

I enjoy a nice dual-timeline story, but this one was all over the place.
The beginning felt incredibly jarring with basically every page being a new chapter with a new date and location and some jumping between them. I like books that use non-traditional storytelling, but you have to know what you're doing and personally, I don't think the author did.
I also did not enjoy the writing style at all, it was too colloquial and modern for my personal taste.

Sadly, I ended up DNFing as I just couldn't get into the story.

Lucy Undying is an intriguing retelling of Dracula from the point of view of one of his victims. The book is split into three parts and the narrative weaves between them. First is the retelling of Dracula, but from Lucy’s perspective. Of course, the men who lived to tell the tell didn’t get everything quite right, and I think Kiersten White did an excellent job reading between the lines and creating a new story for Lucy.

With Lucy’s father no longer in the picture, she is set to be a very wealthy woman when her mother dies. The suitors crowd round her while her mother ails, and then Dracula enters the picture. Looking back with modern knowledge, it’s kind of horrifying that they perform a blood transfusion on her before they know about blood types. She talks later of the horrible experience, in the sections from her therapist transcripts.

The transcripts make up one of the narratives, the time between when she was last seen in Dracula (her demise in the original book is explained away by a case of mistaken identity) and the modern day. She has had quite a life, searching for the one who made her, but instead finding others like her.

The third narrative is in the modern day and told from Iris’s point of view. She says from the start that her mother ran a creepy blood cult, although the specifics don’t come out until later. If you’re familiar with Dracula, you might recognize her surname (although the spelling is changed slightly, maybe to stress the gold part, or maybe it’s just an error that never got picked up).

It was quite obvious who Elle was, but I was still interested to know how it all fit together. The pacing was a bit odd though, almost the opposite of a saggy middle. There’s a point where it’s all wrapping up, but it was at about 70%. The rest felt like it could have been a prologue. It was heavy with exposition, and had quite boring sections from Dracula’s perspective. I’m sure some of the necessary parts to discovering the secret behind the multi-level marketing blood cult could have been fed in throughout the story.

I did also learn about another weird autoimmune condition I’ve never heard of before. Cold agglutinin disease is a real disease, albeit with nothing to do with vampirism.

This is my third Kiersten White novel, and I just adore the way that she crafts her worlds. They always add so much dimension to the story and help the characters grow and adapt. I really enjoyed ‘Lucy Undying’, with its gothic atmosphere and its vampiric core. Each POV was fresh and engaging, and White was able to make it as dark as it was full of love and desire. A really fun and modern twist on the ‘Dracula’ story! If you watched Castlevania and wanted more of a romance between the female vampires, I’m sure you’ll enjoy this. 4.25/5!

This book was deliciously sapphic and a beautiful retelling. I adored Iris and Lucy and was so moved by the way the author adds to Lucy’s story. Every female character was empowering in the way they overcame the abuse the world subjected them to.
I have to say that if I had not been listening to the audiobook, I might have struggled with the pacing of the book, which would have made me give up on it because Lucy’s storyline didn’t fully grab me until later in the book; even though retrospectively, I’m glad we went through all this with her part of the narration because it was essential to see her grow, I admit I was a bit bored with her tale at times. Iris, now, captured my attention from the start.
I was so glad I stuck with it because it was such a beautiful and deserving story.

Unfortunately this one didn't really work for me, and it was mainly down to the multiple povs and timelines which left me feeling very pushed out of the storylines, all the time. It's all a bit of a jumble, Add in the complete character assassination of several rather classic Dracula characters (Van Helsing in particular springs to mind) and I just couldn't get behind the story.

I particularly didn't like Iris's story, which is set in a modern day, where she meets a rather glamorous and seemingly immortal woman who just so happens to be Lucy (not a spoiler, it's really obvious). And for some reason she's running away from a weird multilevel marketing cult type situation. It was just bizarre. And not in a good way.

Not for me. I wanted more of the historical elements, less of the weird time jumps and even weirder modern day plot.

Not my usual pick but a Dracula novel will always pique my interest, quite enjoyed it! Lucy undying was a great spooky read to get you in the mood for Halloween!

***originally got this as an ARC from Netgalley***

BUT I ENJOYED IT SO MUCH I FINISHED IT AS A PHYSICAL AND FINISHED COPY!!!!!!!

this was so much fun to read! though it did get kinda long at the end, like i just wanted it to finish, but gosh this was so much fun!! and so refreshing!!!!
the chapters are short and go through different POVs and different time periods. they weren’t janky at all or the flow didn’t feel weird, but it was really fun to read the different POVs and learn about the characters. this was very much character driven and i really enjoyed it. iris is kinda funny but i really really enjoyed reading lucy’s and the client transcripts the most. they were so much fun to read about.
ANYWAY EVERYONE READ THIS BOOK BC GOSH WHAT A FUN READ

Lucy Undying is a solid 4 stars from me!

Imagine: sapphic vampires taking over a Dracula retelling. That’s exactly what this book aims for. I think it did quite well but just barely missed the mark for 5 stars.

To be frank, the biggest mistake this author made was the way the romance was written. Lucy and Iris pair well together. I just wish this had taken itself as seriously as it did in the beginning. It didn’t. The gothic themes were overshadowed by the juvenile style of romance between two consenting adults. It wasn’t the pet names. It was just Iris mostly. To be frank, I think if Iris has been written to be older or more adult in character, I wouldn’t have been grating my teeth every time I started a new chapter with her in it. I would’ve enjoyed their love more.

Otherwise, I think Lucy is a spectacular character. She reminded of the MC from Interview With A Vampire. She had so much time to grow. Lucy lived such an interesting life before and after death. The way the plot unfolded was just genius. I didn’t watch the twists until they were revealed for the most part.

Overall, I think a 4 out of 5 is fair and sufficient for this. I may not have liked Iris a ton personality wise but she wasn’t a bad character. For her pitfalls, Lucy herself compensated well.

This beautifully written gothic fantasy features seamless multiple timelines and POVs, with a strong focus on women and their relationships, both positive and toxic. While the big reveals were predictable, the humor, romance, and feminist reimagining of Dracula’s story made for a highly enjoyable, fresh take on sapphic vampires and modernized classic characters

This book offers a very unique and interesting look at the characters in 'Dracula'. Even to someone like me, not very familiar with the original novel, this appeared to take the events and characters of that and make it a unique examination. The strengths of the book were the character relationships and their growth. I found Lucy's young days and where she ended up interesting, but found Elle's even more compelling. Their relationship, although very intense from the get-go, was sweet and passionate. I was intrigued by Lucy's journal entries, but the book largely bored me with the recountings she shared with the therapist. I also think the third act was too long and veered away from what the story was about up to that point too much. I felt like the story was ready to be finished and then we got a whole second wind. I think making it a bit tighter would benefit the book. Overall I would recommend if you want a passionate sapphic romance or are a Dracula retellings fan.

Thank you to Netgalley for the ARC, all thoughts are my own.

Okay look, for a modern and gloriously queer reimagining of the classic Dracula in which Lucy survives and embarks on her own journey of love and self-discovery, Lucy Undying took an unforgivably long time to suck me in. Much like its classic source material, it's a painfully slow yet inexplicably enthralling story that just sucks you dry in all the best and worst ways.

Now, I very much agree with Kiersten White that Lucy is canonically queer and that the women in the classic story were done awfully dirty. And for the most part, I actually love how she reimagined this story, especially because it somehow simultaneously feels like a love letter and a scathing diss track about the classic. Plus, I am just a sucker for the gothic atmosphere and the emotionally evocative prose, which is exactly why I could not stop turning the pages despite some of my quibbles.

The way that Lucy’s story unfolds throughout the original journals, the therapy sessions, and the modern timeline in Iris’ perspective was quite brilliantly done, and I really liked her development and powerful journey of healing that we get to witness. However, there was just a certain ‘je ne sais quoi’ missing in the storytelling that kept me from ever getting fully invested, and I thought especially the first 40-50% lacked some serious direction and tension.

Moreover, I personally bounced off the occasional chapters that we get from Dracula’s point of view, not because they were written in the controversial second person perspective, but just because I feel like he didn’t deserve to get that pagetime. In general, I think Lucy Undying is already needlessly long and overstays its welcome, and those extra moments with him just drained me.

All that said, I think the second half was much stronger than the first half, and I was quite impressed with how Iris and Lucy’s stories interweaved and unravelled. Even though I wasn’t immediately sold on Iris’ quirkiness and her intense family drama, I did appreciate how White tackled themes of bodily autonomy, legacy, toxic family dynamics, hurtful beauty standards, and chronic illness through that plot thread. Also, there were some glorious FUCK YOU moments in the big showdown at the end of this story, which I was all here for.

Ultimately, Lucy Undying ended up being just aggressively fine for me, though I definitely think it is a story that deserved to be told. And hey, it’s feminist and queer and full of beautiful prose, so I’d still definitely recommend it if the premise sounds even slightly intriguing to you.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House UK for providing me with an eARC in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

I was really enjoying this until the halfway mark, and then things started to get a bit... bland for me. Which is a shame because the story had a lot of promise.

Lucy Undying had some really interesting premises and with that wonderful cover it was impossible to resist but I must say that the reading didn't go as I hoped.

The author has many difficulties in managing three points of view and in the end the one that is really interesting is that of Lucy in the past. The narrative often gets lost in chatter and digressions that lengthen a story that could easily have been resolved in fewer pages with a more pressing pace and that would keep you glued to the pages.

But between banal, immature and sloppy characters, and a story that progresses piecemeal, unfortunately I never really felt involved in reading.
And it's a shame because there are really some interesting and even original ideas and ideas! I appreciated the twisting of Mina's character and everything that revolves around her figure. But unfortunately these acute insights are lost in a glass of water.

2.75⭐ Thanks to Netgalley and publishing house for the e-ARC

It started out pretty good but at 42% it went downhill for me 😭😭im not sure what was the main factor that threw me off cause the writing was pretty good and i liked how the book started but i don’t know i think i lost interest at some point

Thanks to the publisher for the arc