The bones of Thanks for the Venom are pretty good, but the book felt too rushed to live up to its full potential. If it was fleshed out more, it could be great instead of just pretty good.

Harley is a great main character with a lot of room to grow and potential for complexity. When the competent, reckless, semi-rebellious and dedicated vampire hunter gets infected with vampire venom, she develops some vampiric traits without turning into a vampire. Soon she discovers that the hunters have dabbled in some ethically questionable experiments to create human-vampire hybrids. She soon ends up thrown into the deep end of vampire politics and stuck in the middle of an impending hunter-vampire war. She goes from a black-and-white vampire hunter whose life is all about hunting to a morally-gray hunter-vampire hybrid who sees the world as very gray, but still tries to fight for what is right in a morally complex world. She begins to see both vampires, humans, and herself as imperfect individuals with good and bad inside them. She sees people who have to make hard choices with few or no good options. She makes some morally gray vampire friends, takes on scary vampire villains, learns to be part of a team, and discovers that there’s more to life than hunting (or romance).

The book’s got a healthy dose of humor and snark. It’s also refreshing to see a story with romance that isn’t the be-all-end-all of the characters’ lives. Harley is aware that her and her love interest cannot and should not be each other's reason to live. There are some nice, simple nuggets of wisdom here and there.

The romance and friendships are a bit stockholm-syndrome-esk at times, but it’s mostly mitigated by her captors being (sort of) captives themselves. Frankly, I think the love interest, Drake, ended up being too unlikeable, but his questionable choices were still understandable and sympathetic even if he wasn’t redeemable in my opinion.

There are plenty of loose ends and unsolved mysteries for a sequel, but the main plotline gets resolved and wrapped up quite nicely.

On the bright side, this book is a quick, fast-paced read. The downside is that the whole story felt rushed, from character development or developing relationships to the plot. The plot and characters’ actions would have carried a lot more weight and emotional resonance if the development of the characters, friendships, and romance wasn’t so rushed. For example, one character risking their life for another doesn’t carry much emotional significance if the development of the characters’ relationship was rushed to the point of stretching credibility that the relationship had even reached the risk-their-lives-for-each-other stage. The ending is not as satisfying as it could be because the climax (and its leadup) felt rushed.

Overall, I enjoyed the story and characters, but wished they were better fleshed out. I this could be a much better book if only the story weren’t so rushed.

Content Warnings: kidnapping, blood, mentions of medical experimentation on minors, violence, mild cursing

I received a free eARC copy of this book via NetGalley. I am writing this review completely honestly and voluntarily.

My Ranking 3 stars

I really liked the story line to this. I just wish there had been more. I loved both the main character and love interest. I just thought there was a lot left unexplained. It could have went so many ways. I just felt like towards the end the author got tired and just tried to wrap it up and be done. I felt like this could have been an awesome book and turned into a series. The characters were so good the whole academy vs bad guys is very big right now and I feel like this could have been a big hit if it was flushed out a little more. I also liked her previous title for this book better than this one. I would definitely recommend this book to vampire lovers.

Thank you to netgalley for giving this ARC, and this doesn’t influence my review. Cool cover, the book had potential and lots of good tropes, but there was no simmering tension between love interests, it was like a medium-fast burn. The tropes give away the plot so read at your own digression:
<spoiler> Tropes: paranormal dark academia, vampires, hidden identity (betrayal), friends to enemies to lovers, one bed </spoiler>

Sorry but I had to DNF it. It’s not my cup of tea and I disn’t like the protagonist or how the story begins, because it was too fast.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for granting me a copy of this book in return for my honest opinions.

I live everything vampires so when I read this books description, I had to give it a go. Am so happy I took the chance

I lived Harley's story. The fact that she is a vampire hunder, is bitten by a vampire and transforms into the very creature she has been taught to hate is an exciting twist on the Buffy theme.

Add that to her having to hide who she has become from her high school friends makes this an exciting and entertaining read.

Lived ever page. Would love to be immortal and being a vampire would be awesome.

Recommend.

I found the story rushed and it left me feeling like I missed half of the story. There is a good start of an idea and series I just felt like this novel needed to be fleshed out more.

This is a really good book it has surprises, twists and turns, romance and fight scenes, kids being used as guinea pigs and even a life lesson or two. I very much enjoyed following Harleys journey. I loved Drake and Felix they were well developed.

I don’t know what I was expecting from this book, but I have to say that the description of this book is exactly what it is: a Buffy/Underworld mashup. Harley is a strong character who proves she’s even stronger when her people sort of turn against her. She meets some interesting friends along the way to finding her new normal. There were a couple plot holes in this, but it is interesting and fun. The book was also written well, and Buffy fans will definitely enjoy this. 3 ½ rounded up to 4. I was provided a complimentary copy which I voluntarily reviewed.

3.75/5 stars! As long as you don't try to make this book more than it is, it is a fun, adventurous, quick read. Per the author, this book is "a Buffy/Underworld Mash-up" and it reads exactly like that. Harley is a vampire hunter who is transformed into the very think she hunts and must keep it a secret while also staying alive. It was entertaining and I like Harley's spunk. I think fans of "Bite of Loyalty" would appreciate the correlations in this book. I would definitely read more books by this author.