Kingdom of the Two Moons is an ambitious and richly crafted debut novel by Alexandra Thomashoff that introduces us to intriguing characters in a captivating world. With a mixture of first-person and third-person perspectives, the narrative is multilayered and takes awhile to establish itself. Thomashoff’s world-building is remarkable, but the pacing struggles with consistency. It accelerates almost too quickly. The simultaneous introduction of numerous elements becomes overwhelming resulting in confusion around timelines and plot descriptions. Reading newcomers to the fantasy genre may find it easier to follow if repetitive and filler content is eliminated.
Despite these challenges, I thoroughly enjoyed Thomashoff's debut. The conclusion of this debut novel raises high expectations for the sequel, as it leaves us with a compelling cliffhanger.

Wow loved this! 4.5🌟
Thank you to NetGalley & Alexandra for the ARC! A chaotic review ahead:

This was definitely the definition of an epic fantasy with all the elements that you love from your favourite romantasy books including extremely dark MMC(s).

I love how in the dark you’re kept throughout the whole plot. And it felt challenging yet refreshing to constantly unravel the story as Melody is.

Blair gives Manon energy for sure and Melody is definitely one of those developing characters that grows into her strength. I was WAITING for the Melody/ Blair crossover and can’t wait for more of it!

The SLOWEST of slow burns with both MMCs?! We love a love triangle. So much tension and angst with both too. Caryan is very dark and I very much missed a pov from him but hopefully in the next one as I couldn’t get enough off Riven’s!

Also is it possible to have 2 separate love triangles going on?! So much overlap with characters makes for such an interesting and tension building plot!

My only issue was how I felt like the book just ended?! Not really a cliffhanger either just the end? I could’ve devoured another 100 pages. Now I’ll just have to hope that a sequel is coming soon!

I will definitely be recommending this to our readers who enjoy a great plot with some steamy romance ❤️
Also wanted to say that I can’t believe this is Alexandra Thomashoff's debut book. I cannot wait for the next one!

I'm afraid I DFNed this title at 25%.
The narration switch between first person and third person is a big pet peeve of mine and I didn't care about the main characters enough, especially Blair, to overlook this particular problem.
There were also quite a few things that were eerily similar to some other very popular fantasy series.
For those reasons, I chose to spot reading.
I will wait a couple of week before I post on goodreads as to not interfere with the release.

Thank you for the opportunity.

NET GALLERY.
Kingdom of the Two Moons is a richly imagined fantasy with an ambitious world and intriguing characters. While I enjoyed it overall, I had some mixed feelings that kept it from being a full 5-star read.

The world-building is expansive, introducing a variety of magical creatures, angels, fae, elves, sirens, and more, alongside a unique magic system. The glossary at the beginning hints at the depth of this world, which is impressive, but, even as an avid fantasy reader, I found the sheer amount of information a little overwhelming at first. A more gradual introduction to the lore might have helped ease readers in without feeling like they needed to take notes.

The opening of the book was a bit difficult to follow, with shifting timelines and character relationships that weren’t immediately clear. Some of the flashbacks felt repetitive, and I struggled at times to understand the connections between characters. However, once I reached about 20%, I started to feel more grounded in the story and found myself increasingly interested in the characters.

The romance was a highlight, but I feel I needed more. The chemistry between characters wasn’t always as strong as I’d hoped, but the slow-burn tension and well-executed spice made up for it. Caryan was a standout character, his complexity and morally grey nature made him quite compelling, and I especially enjoyed his dynamic with Riven.

By the end, I was completely hooked. Though the beginning felt dense and a little hard to navigate, the story paid off with its emotional depth, dark fantasy elements, and engaging character dynamics. Fans of ACOTAR, Quicksilver, and similar books will likely love this. If you enjoy morally grey MMCs, immersive world-building, and a love triangle with real stakes, this is definitely worth picking up!

I decided to DNF this book at 10%. This book is a 700-page book, and I was so confused by everything going on I just couldn’t continue… knowing this was a fantasy book but having no clear world building in the beginning 10% I just didn’t feel any connecting to the book. I had a harder time with the format of the book since it was an ARC it wasn’t in a published format which kept me confused.

I wasn’t able to connect with the characters and felt that the continuous shift from first to third person did not help my confusion. Knowing I didn’t have the energy to try to figure out everything I was confused in and having pushed the last 5% to see if I got anything from it, when I was still confused and still not connected to the characters, I decided it was in my best interest to stop there.

All in all, I feel as those this may be a book that I could listen to and enjoy but I just kept getting too confused by eyeball reading.

Thank you NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.
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🌟🌟/5 —————————

This book felt like it had a lot of potential, and the premise was intriguing, however I have some mixed feelings about it overall.

I really struggled with the POV switching perspectives, and added to the confusion. I also kind of struggled with the short sentences and felt like somehow the story was really drawn out but also choppy and short. I didn’t really connect with the characters, and it felt like a lot of the characters were rips on existing characters in other big series. There’s nothing specific about Melody, our FMC that makes her stand out as particularly memorable or even likeable.

Overall, it’s fine, but it’s nothing super special.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a chance to read and review this ARC.

So the premise of this book had me really excited, but the overall development of the book left me wanting. I don't know why, but creating a like-able female protagonist can be really challenging. They get caught in all the strong stereotypes and wanting a girl to be, well what a girl should be...ugh I found myself forcing to read the book, but it was a challenge.

Big fumble.

Thank you to Alexandra Tomashoff and NetGalley for the e-ARC of this novel.
First, I’ll start with the bad. There were serious formatting and grammatical issues throughout the book. It felt very choppy to read due to sentence fragments and perspective changes. This may not bother all readers, but my brain gets very hung up on correcting the errors as I’m reading, and it was frequent enough to break the immersion for me.
I also had a hard time with the descriptive third person. I love inner monologue and personality shining through in first person writing, but I find it confusing when a book is written in third person, but there are expletives and opinions given in every sentence. For example: “Blair has no idea how she’s going to live without music once she’s back in the fae realms. Oh hells, it will be bad.” It reads like a thought but isn’t written as one, in my opinion.
The sudden shift to first person and back to third for Blair and Riven had me feeling whiplashed.

The good:
The relationships worked for me. If you’re not a fan of the characters dallying outside of the main relationship, take pause, because it does happen with the men. That said, the love triangle worked and furthered the relationship between Melody and Caryan. I’m rarely a fan of triangles, but it felt useful here, and Riven was surprisingly my favorite character.
Caryan and Melody were both nuanced and lovely characters. I genuinely cared about both of them. I struggled to connect with Blair who seemed less fleshed-out and her third person appeared chapters left me feeling dissociated from her.
The world building was commendable for a debut novel and included a glossary. I appreciated this being at the beginning and having some background going in since the world is quite deep and complicated. This was by far my favorite thing about the book and I was impressed by both the creativity and the execution.

I am primarily a contemporary dark romance reader, but I felt this had a strong morally grey man and a competent enough fantasy world to appeal to romantasy and romance readers alike if you can look past the formatting and get to the heart of the story being told.

I truly debated between a two or three star rating here because for me, the technical issues were serious enough to prevent me from loving what was a fantastic premise. I’m going with 2.5 rounded up to 3 stars here solely because I was so impressed by the world building and magic system. I would read the next book.

Half-human Melody has been held captive her whole life, she has never known freedom. She has rare gifts, but they are being drained by a magic harvester. She had little hope of ever escaping until one night when she did.
Melody doesn’t know freedom long; Riven, a young fae, makes her his prisoner. He forces her to enter the court of the Two Moon, ruled by evil Dark Lord Caryan is a fallen angel and masks himself in a reputation of ruthlessness. Melody finds herself drawn to both Riven and Caryan. She finds the foretelling that links her to the destiny of the dominion.
This tale has great potential; however, it needs a little tweeking.1. There is a lot of repetitiveness. 2. The plot is so slow. 3. There was a lot of filler. 4. The romance lacked romance. The two male main characters never showed real romance. 5. There is a lot to take in. While the world building is fantastic it is also complicated. 6. It took a while to understand the relationships.
Things that worked: 1. The author did a great job of world building and giving readers minute details. There is a glossary. The world building is sophisticated and inspired. 2. I so was immersed in this tale that I couldn’t lay it down. I kept think I most chapter. 3. The characters each are multifaceted; they have distinct personalities. The characters are not perfect, there are flaws that make them endearing. 3. The Magic system was uniquely planned. 4. The mythical creatures are well done. The creatures include: angels, elves, witches, demons, oracles, and fauns. The writing style is well done. 5. This tale is told from both first person and third person point of view; it worked.
I struggled with a star rating. There is so much well done and yet there were a few things I thought would improve this tale. I wish I could give a 4.5.
Thank you NetGalley for the ARC in return for a fair, unbiased review.

Thank you to NetGalley, the author Alexandra Thomashoff, and the publisher for giving me this ARC and for allowing me to read this book early. This book is the start of an ongoing series. At first, the novel was slow and there was a good amount of world building. I liked the main characters and the way they all ended up being involved in one another's life. The plot was solid but I kept the rating at a three stars because some times I felt like it was a lot of information dumping rather than a smooth process. Melody is beautifully written and I know she is only going to continue to grow.

Now, let's talk about the romance. This is a love triangle romance plot that follows out two main men Caryan and Riven. I haven't always traditionally gravitated towards that trope but this year I have forced myself to get out of my comfort zone. The romance wasn't my favorite and honestly it wasn't even the love triangle that got me. Our two men would consistently go to other women and kiss them, etc. For some people that might be 100% okay, for me I was a little turned off by it. I felt like I had. a stronger pull to one of the characters but could never really tell if I should trust my gut. Regardless, there were so many scenes that made me blush and helped push the story along.

One last thing, the writing style was very different than some of the other fantasy romance books I have read in the past. It was detailed and strong, allowing for the reader to follow along. There is a lot of switching between a first person perspective and a third person perspective. I didn't mind too much because it didn't mess up the flow, but if that is an issue for you I might stray away from this novel.

Would definitely recommend this book to a romance fantasy lover that loves a love triangle between a half-fae girl and some magical men.

Overall, this book was fantastic. While I did find it difficult to read at times and had to take breaks, that didn’t take away from my enjoyment.

I was mesmerized by how the author was able to create entirely new worlds and make me feel like I was actually there. The level of detail in this book is incredible, and it’s clear that the author put a lot of effort into crafting an immersive experience for the reader.

The more I read, the more I wanted to keep reading. The storyline was captivating, and I really liked how it shifted between different characters' perspectives—especially Blair’s before her aunt’s death. This added so much depth to the story and made it easier to understand. I also appreciated seeing Riven and Caryan as slaves and comparing their past to their present. That contrast made their character development even more compelling.

I would highly recommend this book to anyone who loves reading fantasy. In fact, I’d say this is probably my second favorite series after ACOTAR, which is saying a lot.

It did take me a while to fully get into—about two weeks—but once I hit the 250-page mark, I was completely hooked. When I wasn’t reading, I was thinking about when I’d have time to pick it up again.

The only thing that frustrated me was the cliffhanger ending. It was so good that I wish I could read the next book right now! I have a feeling I’m going to be in a book hangover because nothing else will compare.

On page 179, I noticed that the word in is repeated twice by accident.

2 stars!

I was really looking forward to reading this book, however I found too many similarities with other very popular fantasy & romantasy books out there already.

Had great potential, however I couldn’t get past the similarities & the style in which the book was written!

Thank you net galley & the author for giving me the chance to read this book!

As soon as I read the synopsis on this book, I knew I needed to read it! I had so many of my favorite things all wrapped up in one book!

The story evolves in multiple points of view, with Melody being in first person and everyone else in third. This took some getting used to, but once I settled into the pace of each character it wasn’t so bad. My only complaint is we never got the one POV I wanted the most, Caryan’s! Im guessing there is a reason we don’t have his yet, but I’m keeping my fingers crossed for book 2!

As far as the story, it’s richly woven and brings the world of the fae to life. The lore has depth, and the past is something that is ever shifting. About the time Melody learns something, there is something else that comes to light and creates confusion. Who is telling the truth, and who is manipulating it? Further, what are the motivations for keeping her in the dark?

The last 100 pages were a ride and shed a lot of light on some major veins of the story! I am very curious to see where this goes and am especially looking forward to where some folks are headed, what Caryan will do next and just how sassy Aris is going to be!

There were too many blatant similarities to TOG, ACOTAR, CC and Fourth Wing for me to enjoy this.

High Lord of Darkness = High Lord of the Night Court
Violet Eyes
Like calls to like
I do not yield
To whatever end
Wing Leader
It’s been my honor
Witch coven leader wearing a red cape, riding a wyvern with her 33 = Manon and the 13
Iron tipped whip used for punishment
Blair with red hair in the club bathroom = same scene from CC with Bryce Quinlan

These are just a few of so many comparisons. If you haven’t read SJM or Rebeca Yarros then you may love this.

Rating-
1.75/5 stars
(Rounded down)

Genre-
Fantasy

Age Rating For It-
16 or 17+ because there is definitely violence and abuse and things like that and also there are some more explicit romance scenes too.

Thoughts/Would I Recommend This?-
This book had such big potential, but I felt it took that potential and threw it in the trash and lit it on fire and let it burn if I’m being honest. That may seem a little harsh, but it was literally so slow and took me forever to get through. I am a pretty fast reader, and I actually read like 7 books in between reading this because it was just so slow at times that I’d have to take a break from it and read something else. Which usually doesn’t happen to me while I’m reading books because I like to start a book and then keep reading it till I finish it, but I just could not do that with this one. I also typically really enjoy multiple pov’s but I just kind of disliked it so much in this book if I’m being honest. So all in all, I kind of dislike this book so much and the only reason it gets a 1.75 star is because I liked the world and some of the characters. I honestly would not recommend this book to read, though.

(Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an early copy of this book in exchange for an honest review)

This book has such potential. This is one of those books I'll have to come back and finish at some point, but at this point I can't continue. The beginning is slow and difficult in places. I can normally read more and then understand/make connections from the beginning. The characters seem interesting, but I need them to make moves quicker. So perhaps this is just too slow a pace for where I'm at in life right now.

The book is written as Multi POV with Melody in first person, Blair Alaric in 3rd person, I'm not a fan of multiple POV but that's preference. The story still gets across.

Its written in short choppy sentences, which is not my kind of read and feels more like a conversation being had. It feels like theres a lot of time being spent on explaining things which needn't been explained or have been explained already.

Blair is this badass witch, hunting down Lyrian and Melody to kill Lyrian and hand over Melody to her Queen.

Melody was raised by Lyrian and is being used as a pawn to 'find people' for him to drain of their magical essence, using her magical abilities. Melody is crafty and uses his love for her to her advantage and pushes boundaries against him.

MMCs: Caryan is a dark fallen angel and Riven his second in command. The love triangle none of knew we needed.

Would recommend the book as the world building was brilliant and the magical lore, characters and magical system were worth the slow building at the beginning of the book. Take your time with it and eventually you'll be thrown into an unforgettable world.

Thank you to NetGalley and Alexandra Thomashoff for the e-arc. I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

I want to start off by saying that this book had so much promise. As a huge lover of so many books that fall under that romantasy category, I was excited to jump into this new world.
But right from the get go it just felt off.

First, my copy of the arc had so many page breaks that it felt super choppy to read, I’m assuming this was just due to the download format but either way it was a struggle.
What didn’t help was the excessive details that did nothing to move the story along and instead felt like someone was trying to reach a word count by adding info dump after info dump. Don’t get me wrong, the world building was decent but it just didn’t flow into the story very well.
There was a lot of repetitive phrases and just repeating sentences overall when characters would try to explain something.
Unfortunately, the hardest part for me was the romance. I’m simply not a fan of love triangles and frankly the MMCs pissed me off. There seemed to be no true commitment or feelings and there was a true lack of tension which left many of their intimate moments feeling lacklustre. That and I can’t stand pet names that include little girl, especially considering these men are hundreds of years older, it’s just icky.

Overall, I really wanted to love this book but it just fell flat with the slow pacing, overused phrases, and general lack of interest in the romance.

Thank you Netgalley and the author for having the opportunity to read and review this book.
These are my honest thoughts and opinion for this book.
I realy enjoyed this book. It has a lot of potential. The only thing that I had difficulties was switching from 1st to 3rd person point of view.
It made me go back and read chapters and paragraphs again to make sure I understood what happened with that character.
I've seen some reviews mentioning the similarities with other books, but that didn't bothered me at all.
I love love triangle and I loved Riven. He is a great character.
Some of the things and the way the female main character did left me confused at times, but overall it was understandable given her circumstances.
The main male character Caryan is a bit questionable given the fact how badly he treated the female main character. I couldn't excuse him at times. He is not the typical swoon worthy character that you would normally read in a book and I am curious to see what will happen next and how he will evolve.
The world building was great and well written.
In summary I would give this book 3.5 stars 🌟
And i am looking forward to see what will happen in the next book.