The concept of the story is well thought out and intriguing, however, it just got too dark too fast for me. The personification of the devil was just too much for my tolerance. It felt like glorifying the darkness instead of trying to illustrate it as something that can be conquered by light.

(ENGLISH REVIEW BELOW)

Bien que je lise peu de romans historiques, j’aime énormément ceux où il y a une double temporalité. Mais j’aime beaucoup les romans de fantasy. Avec l’histoire de Redd, John et Eleanor, l’autrice réunit ces deux derniers éléments que j’aime et offre une chouette lecture.
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Dans ce roman, l’autrice alterne entre deux temporalités. Nous suivons l’intrigue au présent mais nous avons aussi une vue sur le passé, et plus particulièrement l’époque de la colonisation de Roanoke.
J’ai beaucoup aimé ma lecture et voir les connections entre le passé d’Eleanor et le présent de John et Redd. L’autrice nous plonge dans un bel univers et instaure une ambiance pleine de mystères, où le suspens est présent. J’ai bien aimé aussi l’aspect fantastique avec le côté malédiction.
J’étais curieuse d’arriver jusqu’à la fin de ce premier tome.
Si le rythme du récit était assez lent au début, il s’accélérait doucement au fil des pages et les événements s’enchaînaient. J’aurais peut-être voulu en savoir plus sur les personnages et leurs interactions entre eux.
En bref, c’était une chouette lecture de fantasy historique.

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ENGLISH REVIEW:
Although I read few historical novels, I really like those where there's a double temporality. But I really like fantasy books. With the story of Redd, John and Eleanor, the author brings together these last two elements that I love and offers a great read.
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In this book, the author alternates between two temporalities. We follow the plot in the present but we also have a view of the past, and more particularly the era of the colonization of Roanoke.
I really enjoyed my reading and seeing the connections between Eleanor's past and John and Redd's present. The author immerses us in a beautiful universe and creates an atmosphere full of mysteries, where suspense is present. I also liked the fantastic aspect with the curse side.
I was curious to get to the end of this first volume.
If the pace of the story was quite slow at the beginning, it accelerated slowly over the pages and the events followed one another. I might have wanted to know more about the characters and their interactions with each other.
In short, it was a great historical fantasy read.

This book follows Redd, a young girl who just turned eighteen and finally opens the box that kept appearing every year on her birthday and thus unlocking her destiny.

I have to say that I liked the story of Eleanor, Agnes and John much more than the story of Redd, she felt like a very whiny and annoying character compared to others. I have to admit that by the end I skimmed her chapters as I as getting more and more annoyed with her.

I really enjoyed the story, it felt very unique, raw and unexpected. If Redd was not in this book as much I would have given it 5 starts! But I can see how she can develop as a character in the next book and how she can grow and change into a more mature character.

Overall, I found this book difficult to get in to and to stay with it. I got about 70% through and just could not continue.

I was honestly a bit confused - I don't love shifting points of view when I'm getting acclimated to a new fantasy novel. But after a while I truly began to enjoy the story. It's definitely character driven, which I love.

Thank you to BooksGoSocial and NetGalley for providing a free copy of The Curse That Binds Us in exchange for an honest review.

Full review to follow but this is definitely a positive. The worldbuilding and myth is incredible and the writing style well suited to this. Overall an enjoyable read.

Thank you netgalley and the publisher for my copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Okay, so I hate the cover art.... that being said, I LOVED the book.

I always love historical fiction and fantasy. So, when I read the blurb, I’m instantly in love with it. To sum it with a single sentence, it’s a historical-fantasy-mixed-with-present-time book with dark-evil-magic and scary masks, based on the story of Lost Colony of Roanoke mixed with Tschaggata (scary masked figures) from Switzerland. Just google those two stories and you’ll know the dark vibes this book will give you.

The narrative itself is so engaging. It’s a page-turner from the very start until the very end, down to the Author’s Notes (which I enjoy the most because it tells about the real histories that form the base of the story). Almost all the characters were portrayed so strongly that I can feel connected to each one of them. Like I said before, it’s fascinating for me to know in the Author’s Notes that the most character name here is a real person in the Roanoke’s history.

One thing that seems off for me is the relationship between Redd and Shay (her bestfriend). Other than that, I have no complaints. I really can’t wait to read the sequels.

Yup, I highly enjoyed this novel. The fresh take on the Roanoke mystery, the love story, family connections, demons and devils. I found myself drawn in completely to this story.

There are times I felt things moved slower than I would've liked but I can't deny that even during those moments I was itching to know the outcome.

Told in three POVs with well done world building and plot depth. The past and present timelines was an excellent touch, as well as the taste of lingering evil that existed in the background of each character. Speaking of characters, I was equally drawn to Redd and Eleanor. John took a little getting used too but in the end I enjoyed how he meshed with Redd.

You may notice that I'm glossing over a lot of things. This is a book that has little nuances and big reveals that in-depth reviews could ruin. Going in blind and enjoying the ride is the best way to enjoy this one. True rating 4.5/5.

Many thanks to Netgalley and the publisher/author for providing me with an e-copy in exchange for my honest review.

This book was exactly what I wanted it to be! I loved it. I will make sure to check out other books by this author. When I requested this I was just intrigued by the concept of it and I loved how it turned out. This story had a great plot and if you have read this and enjoyed it, This was so much. It was such a great story. I would say give this one a try. I will continue to follow this author. Way to go to this author for not letting me down.

This was very different than anything I'd read before. I didn't feel the romance vibe so much. I felt it was a little flat, but that didn't stop me from wanting to continue on with the story. I am looking forward to reading the next in serious though!

The mystery of the colony, Roanoke, has always been something I've been curious about and applying a fantasy and curse for the reasoning was a thrilling concept that immediately grabbed my attention. While the story provided surprising and fantastical elements such as a locked box that follows you around, masks that seem to be alive, and invisible creatures, the story line moved too slow and the further I got involved the less interested I became. I struggled to enjoy any of the characters and found the movement in time to be confusing and frustrating as I wanted the plot to propel forward. I also felt that the writing was a lot more tell than show and struggled to picture the elements and characters making me feel like more of an outsider than an integrated reader.

Okay I liked it, didn’t love it. The flashbacks didn’t add much for me. I really wanted it to be a bit more mystical or less mystical. It was in the murky weird area.
And they amount they say Aye in the book was kinda lame. Oh well.

I loved the idea of this as soon as I read the synopsis I knew a fantasy based on the story of the lost colony of Roanoke. I loved the suspense in this , as you read on each chapter will leave you wanting to know more about what was happening. The book uses multiple POV which were done really well, the pacing, the characters and world building all of it is perfect. The story itself is unique and well thought out and I loved getting to know each character, this is such an enjoyable read and I can’t wait for the next

Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for a free copy for an honest opinion

I am all about anything to do with the missing Roanoke colony so when I saw that this book was at least partially about that, I had to read it. The story is told from three different POVs. There is Redd and John in the present and Eleanor in the Roanoke colony during the 1500s. All three tie in together but unsurprisingly, Eleanor’s was my favorite. I always prefer historical fiction over contemporary and I felt that Eleanor’s story was more fleshed out.

Unfortunately, while I did like Eleanor, none of the characters really made a long-lasting impression on me. I found them all to be a bit bland, especially Redd and John. They were both pretty standard YA characters. Nothing was really <i>wrong</i> with them, I just couldn’t get invested in their story lines. I think this was partially due to the pacing.

I felt that this book took a little too long to get interesting and then when I was really getting into it, it ended. The ending was a cliff hanger, which is fine, but it was too abrupt. I think it would have been better if the events in the ending would have happened around the 75% point and then the book ended with a bit more confrontation and drama.

As for the story itself, it’s pretty vanilla for a dark fantasy. I found it to walk the line of being dark and creepy but there was nothing extreme. I do think some readers might have an issue with the Devil (Lucifer) being a character. He isn’t portrayed in a good way and he’s not romanticized. He’s evil and a lying trickster but just be aware that he makes an appearance and plays a large role.

While I didn’t absolutely love this story, I am interested enough to read the second one.

What happened to missing colony or Roanoke is something people have been wondering for centuries. The answer: they made a deal with the Devil.

The book starts really slow and I had to stop reading it for a while. The beginning was so boring, I thought I would have to DNF it. However, after some breaks in which I've read other books, I continued.

The author slowly lets us in on what is going on, only giving us snippets at a time. While I usually enjoy the suspense, this time I found it frustrating and rage-inducing. The worst thing of all is that the ending is a cliffhanger. But not just any cliffhanger. Oh, no. There is no real ending. It is almost as if the author wrote a book, decided it was too long and split it in two, publishing it one at a time.

While this topic should be incredibly interesting, I feel like this is one of those books you completely forget about after a while. It is neither amazing, nor atrocious.

Thank you to the publisher and author as well as netgalley for allowing me access to this eARC of this book and allowing me to give feedback and read books in exchange for a review.

This is a new adult fantasy book, I have never read anything from Katie Hayoz before so I was interested and I was not disappointed. I liked the writing style of this book and I loved the stye so much I will be looking into the backlog of books from this author and order some offline as it is beautiful and it connected well with me.

Loved the characters, was a very Enjoyable read, fun story line, lots happening to keep you gripped to the story wanting to know more but I felt like I had already read this or something very similar to it but was still a very enjoyable read

Firstly, I would love to comment on the storyline, the author Katie Hayoz's writing, and world-building.

In finishing the novel, I learned that it was loosely based or inspired by an actual occurrence that happened years back. I believe that the author's way to creatively turn a historical mystery into a killer dark fantasy with such a twist and turn of events, that I was constantly entranced by both the writing style and in the unveiling of events, was wonderfully and so eloquently done. Thus, I would say the first book I have read by this author did not disappoint.

I am not one for such dark novels, and I would classify this novel as a dark, sinister, and mysterious fantasy, which I only found out as I read further into the novel. However, it is a book that kept me latching onto every word. Therefore, if you can't stomach gruesome storylines, evil, murder, kidnapping and so much more then this novel may be a bit much for you. It almost was for me though the storyline kept me going.

Every character had a distinct personality, point of view, and battled with their demons in different ways. There is the storytelling of Eleanor in the past. There are also present time points of view from both Redd and John. Even though there are multiple POVs it is an easy-to-follow type read. The overall story was told in a very well-paced manner and that I can appreciate.


The story is mainly focused on Redd who lives with her mother and there’s nothing normal about either of them. Redd can taste emotions and her anger does things, horrible things. Yet she doesn’t know why. Her mom is very secretive and shares little about her past. They are a family of two, according to her mom, who constantly flee every year on Redd's birthday to a different neighborhood as they run away from this box that always appears on Redd's birthday. All Redd knows is to never open the box she gets sent every year on her birthday and to trust no one. However, on her 18th birthday, she does exactly that and opens the box, and soon enough, a sexy, mysterious tourist, John Smith comes into town. Is his presence a blessing or a curse, will John finally have answers to all her questions, can she even trust John?

John Smith is from a village called Eden. It sounds like a wonderful place, filled with hope, peace, beauty, and abundance, however, there is a sinister evil that lurks in Eden, something terrible that one must do to be able to keep living peacefully in Eden. A sacrifice of sorts to the land. A life to save the lives of others.

Then there is Eleanor, her story is told in the past, her life's story is what started the curse, in her issues with her family, her marriage, dealing with deception, anger, and frustration, she makes a deal with the Devil. Ain't no other thing scarier than that. Her actions are the driving force of the novel. You as a reader want to emphasize with her but can you know what she did?

Read the book and find out. It’s worth it! It is a book in my opinion that centers around morals mainly. Choosing to do the right thing and how evil just begets more evil, having regrets, feeling guilty, anger towards others, sacrifice and so much more.

This book has so many elements that you as the reader try to grasp in a way that keeps you on your toes as the mystery of Redd's family history and the history of Eden gradually unravels. It ended on such a cliffhanger so I am anxiously waiting for what happens in book 2.

Thank you, NetGalley and the author for allowing me to read this novel.

Thank you to NetGalley for a copy of this ARC. These are my honest thoughts.

I originally DNF'd this book at 30% simply because I didn't realise just how dark of a read this would be, and it was a little too much for my taste. Even when I did give up on this book, I could admit the writing and weaving of the historical aspect of this world was done so impeccably well. I just was unable to relax into this world as a reader. I have since slowly taken my time to complete this book and look into the mystery around Roanoke Island, and I have come away from reading this in awe at Katie Hayoz' attempt of creating a world where everything makes sense in the narrative of what we know about the mysteries of the colony.

Whilst it is still too dark for me to truly have enjoyed it, the author's attention to detail and fleshing out three very distinct characters, especially through the story telling of Eleanor in the past, was executed so well. You can see the effort Hayoz has gone to with each character. This story is told from multiple POVs, yet it's never confusing, which I truly appreciated. The curse, along with the evilness in this book, was paced well and the storyline interesting enough, even if it made me uncomfortable a few times (down to this genre, not the author). I loved learning more about the Dare family line and the mask itself. I also found John's village intriguing, to have such a place exist that heralds over evil and demonic acts and yet is darker than what you ever expected of Eden to begin with.

It's unfortunate that I was unable to enjoy this as much as I had hoped to when I read the synopsis, but I can still appreciate a well written attempt at offering a plausible answer to the mysteries that happened on Roanoke Island.