Though this was my second time reading this book, 'Pestilence' was my first introduction to the awesome author that is Laura Thalassa. I promptly went on an expedition to read any and everything I could find by her!

"They came to earth—Pestilence, War, Famine, Death—four horsemen riding their screaming steeds, racing to the corners of the world. Four horsemen with the power to destroy all of humanity. They came to earth, and they came to end us all." This main blurb enlightens people of what is to come - this novel is not one for those faint of heart and with stars in their eyes. A dark read, it begins with us meeting the main heroine, Sara, who has drawn the short straw and now has to commit to a grisly task: killing the horseman dubbed Pestilence. Seeing disease and sickness ravage the world, she does not shy away and thinks she is successful when she seemingly easily dispatches him. Of course, it couldn't be that easy to kill a horseman...right? Sara learns why Pestilence is an entity of the apocalypse. However, their forced proximity soon develops into something they both never saw coming - love. And Sara now has an even more impossible task, getting this harbinger of doom to see why Earth may be worth saving.

I love dark romances; sprinkle in some forced proximity and kidnapping and I will happily dance! This is the main theme of the book, as approximately three-quarters of it focuses almost exclusively on Sara as Pestilence's captive. Some will see this and say, how could this be real? It's obviously called fiction for a reason, people! The relationship between the two protagonists went from hate to love, proving the old adage true - they can change with the flip of a coin.

Upon reading this again, I can see one flaw in the plot - I wish that we had gotten some more backstory at the beginning of the apocalypse. We are dropped into the story years after it has developed and this is not my favorite thing. Fantasy novels need more world-building to fully appeal to me.

All in all, this is a solid 4-star for me. While I do wish there had been a little more world-building, the overall plotline was great and the push and pull between Pestilence and Sara was amazing. This is definitely a great pick if you are into dark reads!

*A great many thanks to Netgalley, Laura Thalassa, and Sourcebooks Bloom Books for this ARC. It is important to note that I was under no commitment to provide a positive review, and all opinions are undoubtedly my own.*

I don't know what it is about Laura Thalassa's writing... but it is straight up CRACK.

Between her super immersive world building and ability to create and bring alive these multi-faceted characters I honestly just absolutely love every single thing that she writes.

Sara was a brave, badass FMC who really gave Pestilence a hard time. I loved her audacity and ability to never give up her fighting spirit.

Pestilence... oofffttt he is one delicious spicy death daddy who has the roughest, brash exterior, and the sweetest most loving heart. He owns my soul.

If you enjoy...
- fast paced action packed plot
- enemies to lovers
- forced proximity
- ONLY ONE HORSE (my absolute favourite niche trope)
- 'touch her and I'll kill you' attitude
... definitely pick this one up!

So much to enjoy with this book! The slow descent into feelings is perfect. The struggle of both characters to understand the other is just great! Overall it's paced so well, has good tension and eventually banter. Really enjoyed this book overall!

4/5

This was a great book! It has nice characters that make for an enjoyable story. The plot itself is a bit weak and there is a bit of repetition and the romance is a morally grey one. Overall, it’s not Laura’s best but it is good!

“I am your victor. You see, I came to conquer this land and its people, but instead one of its people conquered me.”

I have so many mixed emotions about this - some parts I disliked and some parts I loved. I didn't like Sara (the Stockholm syndrome-esque romance is not for me), so I would rather talk about Pestilence. For someone who brings death upon the world, I was somewhat satisfied to see him experience humanity and all its emotions. He himself was not as dark and scary as I imagined (minus the gore and well.. the deadly plague). He's also sweet-talking virgin - who would have guessed! So for me, I much more preferred MC's character then our realistic. and for some readers hilarious. FMC.

Anyways, it was entertaining enough. As I have already bought the rest of the books from the series, I will be deep into The Four Horseman world.

Thank you Laura Thalassa, NetGalley and Bloom Books, for providing an eARC in exchange for an honest review! All thoughts are my own and left voluntarily.

This is a complicated book to review for the fact some parts I despised, and others I loved.

What I loved was the ending. It felt satisfying for the journey. I’m usually not one for endings like this but this book executes it well. After a certain point, I got a little attached to the couple (although slightly begrudgingly). Sara was a MC I got get behind. She felt realistic to her circumstances for the most part and she’s unforgettable. She never felt too perfect, but nor did the author make her too imperfect for the purpose of giving her flaws; it felt natural.

Now onto what I didn’t get along with in this book.
Pestilence.
A few moments, I just hated him. It wasn’t even because he’s, well, Pestilence. He just had a few ick moments where I found myself falling out of love with him. I understand what the author was going for with his nature but it just didn’t quite hit with me to be honest. There were plenty of times I wanted to smack him.

This was an entertaining read regardless. I’d have loved to give it four stars but I just can’t do that if the MMC gives me the ick.

We take of in an apocalyptic environment where the first horseman has arrived, Pestilence, he’s devishly handsome and everywhere he passes through dies.
Sara won’t let that happen to her and her people so she tries to stop him, witch only ends with her being his captive.

I loved how their relationship evolved and how he saw humans through her, the end hurt soooo much to read but it was all worth it !!!!

If you’ve loved Laura’s previous work, you’ll enjoy this as much. If this is your first book of her, buckle up because this will be a wild ride ✨

The whole premise of this book is fascinating. I love the post-apocalyptic feel and storyline. The twist on the Four Horseman is unique, and while the idea is a Christian one, the book is definitely not Christian in nature. This is dark and seductive twist on the old Revelations story.

The book is a deep dive between fine line of humanity and otherness. Sara is the product of a close family and close friends, and will do everything to save those close to her. Her encounter with Pestilence proves that she is capable of way more than she ever thought possible. The book, while dark, was not as dark as I was expecting and it actually hit me in the feels a few times. Part of me wishes we would have gotten more from Pestilence, but I was happy with what I ended up with!

I definitely recommend this book to anyone interested in post-apocalyptic stories and enemies to lovers romance! I can't wait to read the rest of the series!

A fun ride, I know that this was a second edition of the book. I actually have the first edition. First thing, trigger warnings are important. There was plenty of violence. Plenty of descriptions of sicknesses and coming from the COVID era, Pestilence as a concept himself might be a trigger! Sara, a firefighter, was tasked to kill Pestilence. Little did she know that he couldn't be killed but boy, he could get angry at her because he feels pain. So, he kidnaps her and tortures her. I have to admit, while reading this book, all I could think was that she was suffering from Stockholm syndrome. I also didn't feel that they particularly had much chemistry and I didn't like Pestilence much. I felt like it would have served the author and audience better if we got more insight into his mind and earlier. We were given the feeling he didn't like what he was doing but that was just breezed over. Overall, just ok in my opinion, although there were some fun spots where I liked Pestilence's character growth. Thanks to NetGalley, the author and publisher for an early copy.

Pestilence by Laura Thalassa is a romance set in a post-apocalyptic world after the four horsemen come to earth. Pestilence has been riding through North America spreading the plague and killing everyone in the areas he passes through. Sara Burns is a firefighter whose mission is to kill Pestilence when he rides through her town. After shooting him and attempting to burn the body she learns that is cannot be killed. Pestilence takes Sara as his prisoner but their relationship turns into something other than prisoner and captor. I was not sure how I would feel going into this book because I thought it would be difficult to like a main character with no remorse/humanity and accept his relationship with a human (the very species he's trying to wipe out). I ended up loving this and devouring the whole book in one sitting! It's been a while since I've loved a book enough to do that. From the beginning you can tell that Pestilence does not really love his job and its more than just his will that is making him do this. Don't get me wrong, he does a lot of terrible things on his journey with Sara but he was redeemable in the end. You have to take the book for what it is so you need to be prepared to see Pestilence do bad things. I loved the romance between the characters as well. You can tell they are both conflicted and trying to fight a relationship and I was glad to see that. Its realistic that there would be a struggle between attraction and morals. I will also say this is a more character driven story because you are just following Pestilence and Sara as they travel. I did not mind it because the character development is essential for a story like this. Overall, I think Laura Thalassa did a great job taking something that should be wrong but turned right in the best way! The epilogue gave the perfect small glimpse into Pestilence and Sara's life while also making me very intrigued for the next book!
Thanks to NetGalley and Bloom Books for the ARC in exchange for a review!

Thank you NetGallery for the ARC! I really enjoyed the world building leading up to when Sara and Pestilence actually meet! It gave me a clearer picture of what the book is about. I loved the enemies to lovers trope as well! I do feel like there were pieces missing that could connect a few of the events together more efficiently, but other than that it was definitely a good new read for me!

This one just wasn't for me. The broody love interest was abusive and unrepentant, and there wasn't any kind of real connection between the characters to make me believe they'd fallen in love. Those whole premise of the 4 horsemen coming to earth is interesting, and I enjoyed how the story took the fall of technology, healthcare, cars, etc. into consideration. However, it just felt like there was a huge gap about the why of it all, and I'm not interested enough to read the next 3 books to see if that ever gets resolved.

This book is a great mix of starting to get into spicier reads, but also, in my mind has a great story plot.
Enemies to lovers takes on a different meaning when..... well I don't want to spoil it. But it's intense

The new covers are gorgeous!

1.5 Stars rounded to 2

Well at least this was a quick read. I like some of Laura’s other novels but this just did not hit the mark for me.

What I wanted: A dystopian tale of one of the four horsemen. Some blood, gore, and insight into the motivations of a horseman.

What we got: A thin plot that didn’t make much sense with a romance between two characters who had about as much personality as a brick.

Their relationship could have had potential but really one/both/either of them continuously was injured until a switch flipped and suddenly they were in love. If I had to read one more time how angelic his abs were I might’ve puked.

I will give props for the gore. It gave what you would expect from a book called Pestilence and I appreciated that!

I devoured this book in a day!

The superb storytelling drew this reader in and had me spell bound til the last page. I was also so morally convicted that Pestilence is mass murdering North America with the plague. But the slow burn love story had me cheering for them. I felt so awful for rooting for them, as he murders children and old people.

I think this is a portion of the reason many reviewers do not like this story as the plague and its victims are written in graphic detail. So, readers beware.

But I love a good villain smut story. The story is a slow burn, and the relationship feels so genuine.

I can’t wait to get my hand on the second book in this series in a couple of months!

Pestilence by Laura Thalassa follows Sara, a firefighter who has been chosen to fight Pestilence, one of the four horseman of the Apocalypse, in this dystopian fantasy romance. The world is ravaged by plagues and humanity is barely hanging on. After a failed assassination attempt, Sara is stuck with Pestilence as a punishment so she sees first hand his power. As the story goes on, the relationship between the two slowly goes from enemies to maybe something else entirely.

I have been wanting to read this book awhile so when I saw that it was getting a traditional release, it seemed like the perfect time to pick it up. While I enjoyed the experience of reading this as I always enjoy a dystopian novel, I did have a weird disconnect from Sara as a character. I just could not fathom being attracted to someone that is literally killing people all around you. I understand this is an enemies to lovers story so they have to really be enemies to begin with for it to work but this was a lot.

That being said, I did enjoy the rest of the book. I liked Pestilence and his lack of understanding about humans. The side characters we met along the way really helped round out some character development and the writing was really engaging. I saw some reviews that said a lot of parts were repetitive and I can see that to an extent but I think it was more about seeing the main characters in similar situations to show how much they had changed.

I would recommend this to anyone who wants a fantasy romance that is unique and feels high stakes. I can definitely see myself reading more of this series.

I compared the newer 2023 copy with the 2018 original version (almost word for word) to see how the two compare and I am actually pretty impressed. Where the older book was already captivating, this newer script is actually smoother.

Certain words were changed to modernize them while others were cut out altogether. Some capitalized, some italicized, and a couple of sentences and paragraphs were cut out near the end (they were completely unnecessary). While no major changes or new chapters were added, I do admit that the story as a whole reads better than the original.

Pestilence is still just as brutal in the beginning and we do get a true enemies to lovers story that ends up melting your heart in the absolute best way. And I still love Sara - the rough and caring firefighter who knows when to pick her battles, but also isn’t willing to compromise on her core values.

I adored being able to travel the Southern Canadian and Pacific Northwest terrain with them again. Even though I knew what was coming, the rewrites smoothed out some of the blunter transitions and I felt like I was experiencing the book through fresh eyes. Definitely worth it!

Well, shit. Did I I think I would spend my entire weekend reading this book. No. Did I? Yes. I loved it so much, I only put it down because I had to go to my friend’s birthday brunch. I also left early so I could veg out on the couch and finish this book. I loved the long set up to the Pestilence and Sara’s romance. It wasn’t too fast and insta-lovey and it had just the right amount of tension. Also, the wonderful sexy time. The author writes a pretty good steamy scene. She just got herself a new fan. I’m so excited that the rest of the series is available to read. Looks like I won’t be getting anything done this week.

This book has been on my TBR for over a year (the indie published version) and I'm so glad I finally got around to it because I enjoyed it so much. This book was so different than what I expected (probably because I refuse to read synopses for absolutely no reason). I thought this would be set in a historical fantasy world where a tavern wench/fair maiden just happens to get kidnapped by a hot shirtless horseman and eventually there's one bed, etc, etc. I did not expect this to be a contemporary fantasy where Pestilence is the Harbinger of the Apocalypse, and Sara (the main character) tries to murder him and gets taken prisoner and etc, etc. Even then, I didn't expect this book to be as emotional, sweet, and contemplative as it was (quite literally gave me an existential crisis at 7 am). Pestilence literally has no social skills whatsoever, so when he tries to start showing his affection it doesn't translate very well to a very confused Sara (this was the best part of the book I love this specific brand of miscommunication). I thought their love story was very well paced, had just the right amount of sad, and had a conflict that made sense and didn't use anything like meaningless miscommunication that could've been easily avoided. It's also worth mentioning that the amount of hurt/comfort scenes in this book very much contributed to the high rating. I wish the epilogue was a little bit more clear on some things (we see a glimpse of their life together 5 years later and allude to having children but never really confirm or deny). The epilogue's only real purpose was to set up the next book, which I always hate in a romance because I want a cute fluffy domestic slice of life, not "war is coming"

This was so good! Based on the 4 horsemen. I ate this book up!!! I can't wait for the next three in the series!!
I just reviewed Pestilence by Laura Thalassa. #NetGalley
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