"When Life Gives You Vampires" is a fun romp through a New York City filled with the undead. Lily is a larger lady with a lot of body-image issues (courtesy of her mom) but is nevertheless a feisty and fun, no-nonsense heroine. I loved her!!! After a chance encounter at a bar with a cute (undead) guy named Tristan leaves her forever changed, Lily has to learn how to navigate the 21st century vampire life with help from her bestie Cat, some gently expired blood bank blood, and the aforementioned (and decidedly hot) Tristan. Blood feuds, workplace relationships, body positivity, and parental relationships are all wrapped up in a delicious, fun, smart package. I would love to see Lily and Tristan's story continue- please write a sequel!!

This book started out really funny and interesting to me, but as the book goes on, that interest and fun dwindles bit by bit. The middle part was especially underwhelming and too boring for my taste. Some of the vampire elements in this book are a bit cringe-y and trying-too-hard for me.

I’m not usually a vampire fan, but I really enjoyed this book! Tristian is 😍😍😍😍😍 and Lily’s character was well fleshed out and I really liked her journey to self acceptance. I would love a sequel so we can see more of Evan and Cat! I didn’t like the whole mind thing and I appreciate that Tristian didn’t pretend it was okay when Lily said that she didn’t hear him.

In Gloria Duke’s When Life Gives You Vampires, Lily Baines struggles with accepting her weight, especially with her mother’s constant disapproval and society’s fatphobic habits. However, when she wakes up one day, hungover and confused, she discovers something that her mother would truly be disappointed to know: she’s been turned into a vampire. And her potential love-interest from the previous night, Tristan, is the culprit. But when she confronts him, she discovers that it’s worse than that, because it’s illegal in vampire law to turn people without permission from the vampire council. Now the pair has to fend for their lives, on top of Lily learning to accept her body and new situation in life.

If you want to get out of a reading slump, this book is it. The plot is entertaining enough to keep you reading, but simple and predictable enough that it won’t take too much effort to read.

However, if you’re looking for a book that will keep you guessing and have a mind-blowing, phenomenal ending, look elsewhere.

Beyond that, there’s not much to say about this book. The main character, Lily, was a little frustrating, since she was pretty self-centered and whiny, but she did end up having some fantastic character development. And it was nice to see representation of what society’s body expectations can do to a person, and the fact that the body positivity movement may have helped but still has a long way to go. However, the conflict between the main character and her mother was resolved so abruptly that it seemed pointless to have in the first place. Overall, the story was full of typical characters (the loyal best friend who gets hurt by the main character, the misunderstood and mysterious love interest, the moping main character who realizes in the end that her problems aren’t that huge) and predictable outcomes. A simple read.

Thank you Gloria Duke, Sourcebooks Casablanca, and NetGalley for providing me with a eARC in exchange for an honest review. When Life Gives You Vampires is out October 4 2022, just in time for spooky season!

When Lily, a plus-size woman who has tried every fad diet around, wakes up after a night out hungry she thinks nothing of it until she realizes she isn't hungry for regular food but is in fact craving blood. With the help of her Twilight loving best friend she figures out that during their night out Lily was turned into a vampire, what she doesn't know yet is that she was accidentally turned into a vampire in a world where the turning of vampires is very strictly regulated. When Tristian, the hot vampire that turned her, finds her and lets her know that not only was he going to be in trouble for turning her but that she will also be punished. Let's just say that Lily is not exactly ecstatic that she was turned, but what really throws her for a loop is that she will have the same plus-size body she was turned in for the rest of her days. Will she and Tristan, with the help of unlikely , be able to beat the council that is hell bent on killing them.

As a plus size woman I loved the concept of When Life Gives You Vampires, it was interesting to think about my own thoughts if I was in a never changing body. I loved Lily’s journey with coming to terms with the body she has and in the end coming to love and accept her body. I think that it was also a relatable mindset that she truly believed she wasn't worthy of love due to her poor mindset on her body. I think that one of my only hang ups on the book is that the romance takes place on such a fast and restricted timeline, I wish that the timeline would have been extended a little bit so that the romance could flourish a little more. Overall I thought this was a great read and I hope you pick it up to give it a try!

Small disclaimer: I'm a thin person - so this review can't speak for / replace reviews by fat people who are marginalized and oppressed by fat=phobia in society.

That being said, I really loved this book and I felt like the protagonist's inner monologue was very in line with how I've felt at times during my life (especially when I struggled with accepting my weight and/or appearance). I was also really, really intrigued by the premise: what happens when someone obsessed with weight loss (hello 2010 - 2020 me) cannot ever change their body, or even see it?

I also loved Tristan because he's a romance writer (yay) and reminded me a lot of Edward Cullen, my first love.

The writing is definitely contemporary and colloquial - the MC lives in New York, is in her early 20s (I think) and it can get a little grating. I didn't love the end sequence monologue, because it felt too sex-and-the-city, but in a bad way.

I do also think that some of the interactions with Cat should be different - I don't know that "thin, beautiful people have problems too" is really the right thing to say to someone? It kind of makes it seem like a lot of Lily's anxieties were just in her head when in reality, society does horrible things to fat people. Overall, I think Lily does a good job of confronting the conflicting nature of body positivity, in that it's not really easy to just turn on, but I don't think recognizing how inner fat phobia harms thin people around you is a thing? It would have been nice for Cat to maybe recognize or acknowledge fat phobia in some other way.

That being said, I'm giving this a solid 4.5/5. It's like Twilight but for adults and isn't that fun?!!

The title and premise of this book sounded so cute and promising...like a fun romcom. However, the story felt flat and campy. The Main character was not likable to me at all and not a writing style I connected with. Cute concept but forced story.

Thank you to Sourcebooks Casablanca and NetGalley for allowing me to read and review this digital ARC

I initially chose to read this book because it looked fun and the cover had a plus size main character on the front, which has been my favorite type of romance book lately. I didn’t go into it without a lot of expectations because I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, but I hoped for a book that was fun and didn’t focus on size to drive the plot just because the MC herself was plus sized.

While I did get a little bummed when I read the initial author’s note warning of possible triggering themes with fat phobia and a “journey to body positivity” (I really just wish that plus size people can exist in literature without their weight being a plot device), I will say that the twist of her being a vampire made some of the elements of the MC’s struggles with her weight quirky and funny.

If you’re up for a campy, Buffy-like rom com (that doesn’t take itself too seriously) with big bads, one liners & an angst filled romance, then this is definitely the book for you! It was a fun quick read, and the pacing was solid.

The only thing that could’ve been a deal breaker for me was the use of the word “obvi”…. it was not only over used but it seemed like the author was trying too hard to make her character seem young. And I think it did the opposite. :/


Possible TW/CW: fat phobia, diet culture, weight loss, misogyny, absentee parent

*Thanks to NetGalley & SourceBooks Casablanca for the ARC to review!*

This was a fun, quick read, but overall it was just fine.
The vampire story is cute and fun, and I think it’s successful. The body positivity part not so much.

Congratulations Ms Duke on such a fun and delightful first novel!
Our heroine is a decidedly relatable main character- she’s a bit sqidgy, fluffy… whatever your preferred term is. Lily loves her mom who tries oh-so-hard to motivate her daughter to lose weight with goal clothes that are a smidgen too small (don’t we all have a bit of that mom inside of us?), Lily loves her BFF Cat, and Lily loves being a journalist. Enter Hot Subway Man and everything gets turned upside down!
I loved the body positivity and the realistic journey to self acceptance. Definitely a book for the crowd that cut their teeth (so to speak) on the Twilight phenomenon from nearly two decades ago.

Thank you to Netgalley and Sourcebooks for providing me with an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

I really love this book. It's my first time reading something like this. I found the plot so unique. I'm looking forward to read more books of the author

My cold, undead body goes even colder. “I’m sorry. Did you just say ‘death’?”
“Yes.”
“Death?”
“Yes.”
“Death?”

This scene was so hilarious 💀. There were so many scenes I found funny. And I really liked Tristan.

“Insult you?” I ask, horrified. Cat shrugs. “Not insult, exactly, but… I don’t know. You act like just because I’m thin, my life should be perfect.”

This was one of the scene I'm glad it was written. I absolutely loved that her best friend 'Cat' told her how she feels. I understand how lily felt about her but somewhere she started to insecure others and I'm so happy how author wrote this scene.

As a plus size girl I understand her all insecurities. I too used to push away everyone like her. Just the difference is I don't share my insecurities with anyone. I love the development of herself. And I absolutely love her best friend, she was so supportive and always with Lily.

One thing I didn't love that was the miscommunication between Lily and Tristan. I feel like they argued so much in the book. And I really hate miscommunication trope. I wished they have solved their problems like an adult. I love the 80% of book but in the last 20% they both were immature

Overall it's a really good book and I would definitely recommend.

A fast read. This books delves right intro he story, literally on the first page she becomes a vampire! Fun fast read!

When I was approved to read this eARC I was so stoked. This book stars a plus-size MC who gets turned into a vampire and heads down the path towards body-positivity in the body she has been destined to be in forever-more.

The MC is a plus-sized journalist so the majority of this book is written as a hot take and I really enjoyed that aspect of the book! The fact that this book was based in NYC and we got to explore the city at night (because, vampires, duh) was another feature that I really loved.

Unfortunately, I personally wouldn’t recommend this to anyone with body image issues. I was not a fan of the unhealthy dieting references and the amount of body/emotion shaming that was pretty much the underlying focal point of this book. The positive reinforcement didn’t really come off as reinforcing but instead presented itself as victim blaming.

I am extremely grateful to @netgalley for giving me this book as an eARC in exchange for my honest review. This book is available to purchase on October 4, 2022.

When Life Gives You Vampires just didn’t do it for me.

For the first little bit I was on board. It was campy, didn’t seem like it took itself too seriously, made me laugh, stuck to traditional vampire lore pretty well.

But then I realized that it wasn’t really tongue in cheek on purpose. It’s a little more overdramatic than satirical.

Tristan had great building blocks for a MMC, but he just had no depth. Lily is completely blind to anyone around her except herself. And, the target was to be a book with a strong, plus-sized FMC. But if I’m being honest, that didn’t hit.

Lily spends all of her time making degrading comments about herself. Not a single instance of positivity. And while I know from personal experience how long of a journey that can be, I think a stronger, healthier book would be one with an MC that exhibits positive actions regarding their body image.

There are also a lot of Twilight references here, which is usually a hard no for me.

Campy, cheesy, instalove, spicy, vampire romance with a plus sized heroine. That is the perfect way to summarize what this book entails. It’s a great and straightforward story that is ideal for the Halloween season.

I personally would have liked to see a deeper bond between Tristian and Lily and for Lily to come to terms on her own that her body is great, she doesn’t need a man to tell her. She has a lot of internalized issues with thin people and her own issues with her plus size body, and she does have a tendency to treat others poorly who are slimmer than her. Fortunately she corrects that behavior before it does lasting damage to her friendships. This is a debut novel so it’ll be great to see how the author expands her abilities to other stories.

Sadly, I didn't make it past the first few pages of this book as the voice of the main character just wasn't for me.

This is a decent book all around...not absolutely mind blowing, but definitely enjoyable and extremely representative for a person like myself- a plus size woman who literally breathes body positivity until it comes to herself. It makes no sense, but that's society for you, making me love and celebrate and see the beauty in others- including their size, not in spite of it- but I cannot afford myself that same mentality. Reading this book from Lily's perspective (as the whole book feels like one stream of consciousness) made the hypocrisy even more evident. If you have a complicated relationship with your body, this may be a read you should pick up, as you may learn exactly what Lily needed to learn, and as I needed to learn. Your body is just a casing, and everything inside is what makes you who you are, it's what makes you lovable. You do not need to keep people at arms length out of fear of rejection: that just sets you up to have no one, and to hurt others. A lot of lessons were learned reading this book.

The downsides come with the short length of the novel. While that makes it a fast read, it also makes it miss some parts that could've improved the story as a whole. The relationship between Lily and Tristan feels rushed, vampire lore/world building is kind of weak, and there are some open strings at the end of the novel that don't feel like an opening to a sequel, just an incomplete story. Hell, there were times where Lily said "I caught them up" or "I told them about" instead of actually including the dialogue.....and it happened a lot. The relationship with her mother is one I appreciate, as the ideal is so relatable- we love our mothers but boy can they be a LOT- but the resolution is a bit rushed too. The spice feels like it's skimming the surface, not a reason to pick up the book, if that's what you're looking for.

So overall, a good read, but a little rough around the edges. It's quirky- maybe a bit in a try-to-hard way- but still has a wonderful message come the end. Also....vampires, so that's fun.

I adored this book. she works nights and meets a vamp. They slowly fall in love. He is romance writer and she is having body issues. I loved the play on words and the enjoyed the sexy times. I enjoyed this romance and hope to see Cat's book with the slayer.

When Life Gives You Vampires follows Lily who wakes up hungover and a vampire. The only problem is when she went to sleep she was a human. So Lily now has to figure out exactly what happened. Tristen didn't mean to turn Lily into a vampire but mistakes happen. But it is against vampire law to make other vampires. So now they are in a bit of a pickle. So not only does Lily have to learn to be a vampire she also has to learn to survive. 

This book was so freaking cute. I was hooked from the very first page. One of the things I really liked about this book was that the main character was on a journey of self love. And she eventually learned to love her body. Another thing I really liked about this book was that it made fun of itself. It knew it was a vampire book and did not shy away from making jokes about it throughout the book. I also loved Lily and Tristen's relationship. This would be a really good book to read during spooky season. Thank you so much NetGalley, Sourcebooks, and Gloria Duke for this ARC.

This book was really cute and lighthearted, and I really enjoyed reading it! It was funny as hell and I recommend!