This wasn't all so bad but it felt so unrefined. It's readable but not really memorable at all. It's taken me a while to get to "DNF" status but a lack of motivation from my side should be taken into consideration as well. I just think writing style was a little juvenile for the topics, I didn't click with anyone in this book at all. Also I just did not vibe with how some things were handled, and I absolutely loathe the whole "smelling virgins", I disliked most of the side characters and I think the narrative about gender was trying to say something but I never finished so I don't know if it ever did. Overall I think it just needed a little bit polishing and it felt too YA for the topics it dealt with.

The introduction was too long and because of its wordiness that I am no longer sure what I was reading. I tried giving it a fair review by resting from reading it (as I may not be in the right mood) then try to restart reading it but it is really difficult to comprehend.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for granting me free access to the advanced digital copy of this book.

I, unfortunately, had to DNF this one. The concept had me, the queer protagonists had me. But this isn't a writing style that I can vibe with. I couldn't get through this one. I was so hopeful that I would love this, but it just wasn't a book for me. I still want to give it two stars though because I really, really did love the concept. And I think that's worth more than just one.

So uh this might literally be the worst book I’ve ever read. I genuinely don’t even know why I kept reading it except that it was oddly compelling to just watch it get worse and worse and worse. Basically the premise is that a young sorceress named Kami goes on a quest to destroy the Crimson Queen and save her town from monsters, except also the Crimson Queen is into Kami and wants her to come be her wife. And there is just nothing redeeming about any of it. The writing is bad, the plot is uninspiring and takes forever to actually go anywhere, and the way it handles gender and sexuality is just abhorrent. Spoilers from this point on, as it’s necessary to explain just how bad this was.
There were a lot of things about this book I found absolutely disgusting, but probably the most egregious was that Kami MAKES FRIENDS WITH HER ATTEMPTED RAPIST. There’s a dragon in human form named Skye and he decides he needs to have sex with Kami because monsters can smell virgins or something??? And he is going to rape her until other members of the group barge in and stop him. But he doesn’t really face any actual consequences other than a slap on the wrist. Doesn’t get kicked out. Nothing. And then Kami decides that actually he’s lovely and likable and she has to protect him and it’s just. So. Gross.
Next up, we have the Crimson Queen herself. It turns out that she is not a queen at all, but the prince of the family of vampires that Kami’s mother defeated, and he reincarnated himself in the form of a woman? I guess? But he doesn’t seem to identify with womanhood in any way, and I believe there are even a couple of comments about how this form is inferior, he wishes he had his body back, etc. But then he also talks about how he likes being in this form because it makes Kami less threatened by him. So not only is marketing this as a lesbian vampire situation false, it is actively maintaining dangerous narratives about men disguising themselves as women to pursue cis women. It’s awful.
Which of course also brings us to the idea that lesbianism is caused by feeling threatened by men. Almost every single male character in this book is vaguely creepy towards Kami, if not outright threatening. And if I recall correctly there’s an explicit line where she talks about liking women because they’re less threatening. That’s. Not. Why. Lesbians. Exist.
Spoilers end.
So in conclusion, this was just awful. I can forgive poor writing, but I can’t forgive what comes across as an active attempt to mischaracterize queerness and demonize trans women.

ARC read:
DNF. This shouldn't have been published without thorough editing. There's weird sentence structure and terminology used that doesn't flow well. It's taking a lot more focus to read this than it should just because it's hard to follow. Also what's with the weird info dump in chapter 3 and near rape scene in chapter 5?

This book just wasn’t my type of book. And not that the subject was something I don’t love. I love me some queer vampire books. Especially enemies to lovers. However, I could not get past the first 5% of this book. I think it was more telling than showing that just killed it for me. Sometimes I’m able to look past the more telling than showing. Unfortunately, not this time.

What in the rape culture is that? Love makes men want to rape women? SINCE WHEN? And don't get me started on the whole virginity thing, it makes me want to punch something or maybe even someone. Now this book had some good ideas but the paradox between the concepts this world brought forward and the very archaic ideas was just weird. The romance was okay, nothing crazy. 2 stars

I was honestly thinking about giving this a dnf about 3% of the way through because the writing style was just not doing it for me. I decided not to due to a few reviews I read. However, I am now over 60% and am at the point where I am having a hard time even bringing myself to pick it up. I just don't think it is for me. It did it for me for a little bit between the 13%-48% mark, but since then I have just not felt inclined to even think about it. I have picked it up 2 times in the last 2 days and read MAYBE a page each of those days. I'm juts going to give it up at this point. This book is not bad by any means, it is just not for me. It got very mortal kombat-esque once we hit 48% and it just really isn't doing it for me. I MAY pick up another book from this author in the future, just because this book does have potential to be something I like, but just not right now. Hell, I may just be in a MOOD. I did just have a baby 5 weeks ago lol

Thank you NetGalley and Tethys Night Sky Publishing!
Absolutely obsessed with the cover of this book! I was so excited about the premise of this book! Sapphire vampires and fire sorcerers? Sign me up! There were definitely some elements of this book that I found a bit unexpected. I do recommend forwarding this book there are some difficult topics that I did not expect when starting. I also would love to see more expression into the gender and sexuality of our characters. I think that it could be a really interesting and emotional plot for the next book to see the characters develop and grow from their internalized issues.

I received this book for free for an honest review from netgalley

Wow sexy sapphic for the win! I loved this one. World building was fantastic.

Kami, a novice fire sorceress, never wanted to fight. She already lost her mother, the great fire sorceress Arkemi, to the forces of darkness. While the world sees a fallen hero, Kami is riddled with regret and bitterness—struggling to understand what she died for.

this book was okay. loved vampires and sorcerer dinamics, loved portrayal of the friendship. men are not the best. MC is a bit annoying, but she was okay.

I enjoyed the thought of the mythical elements combined with sapphics and the cover was gorgeous. However, the constant exposition and clunky dialogue made this book very hard to read. A lot of the issues in this book could’ve been solved with some simple proofreading and editing. The misogyny in this book was so unnecessary and just left a bad taste in my mouth.

A really nicely written and well plotted out fantasy sapphic romance. Thoroughly enjoyable! On to part 2!

NetGalley ARC Educator 550974

Content Warning: Rape


This book has a bit of everything. Horror, science fiction, vampires, a sorceresses, and a slow building romance. It follows the familiar vampire story, an unwanted bite and a fight to rid the world of the vampire responsible. The action is quick and will keep you on your toes as the deadline looms. I am looking forward to the next installment of this series.

Note: Some may be put off by the editing or some of the content.

Themes contained within: Friendship, Regret, Fighting against evil

FINALLY an amazing and beautiful sapphic book that will have a special place in my heart along with the amazing adventure this book set us on.

Firstly, thanks to NetGalley for granting me the ARC for this.
 
This book really wasn't for me unfortunately. IMO there should be trigger warnings in this book. The whole point of trigger warnings is to prepare you for the details in the book, you can then make a decision as to whether you want to continue the book. So I will put it out there for any one who does read this, trigger warning - mentions of rape and a rape scene. I don't know about anyone else, but I was personally quite uncomfortable reading it.
 
I also wasn't keen on the writing. The scenes were too repetitious for me. The main character had the same conversation with the same person over and over, for me I was bored. Every time I hoped something else would happen, but nope. 
 
The ending was also disappointing.  If you enjoyed the book, the ending was probably perfect as it sets up for the second book (I assume), but I don't plan on continuing.
 
Some pros: Ideas were good, chapter sizes were amazing.

Be prepared, this gets long. I always say it’s a good thing that a book leaves you with this many thoughts rather than not!

To start off with, I’d like to say that this book was not a negative experience for me. There are some things I’m going to be critical about, but I’d like to acknowledge that first and say I’m not trying to be negative for the sake of being negative – I think the book had good bones and I’d like to offer criticisms in the spirit of ways to improve, from my perspective as a reader, because I think this story has potential. Thank you to Netgalley and Tethys Night Sky Publishing for access to the ebook! I'm giving it a 3.5/5 stars.

The premise of the novel is especially interesting to those familiar with vampire romance and books you might describe as bodice rippers. A powerful fire sorceress pitted against an alluring, sarcastic vampire vixen! In addition, when I downloaded the book, there was a content warning on the Netgalley page. Therefore, I wasn’t surprised by any of the content. I’m guessing some of the reviewers who were taken off guard by the content in the book might have gotten access to it before the warning was posted on the website. However, I do not have any problem with that type of content in fiction, so it didn’t bother me to see it in the book; though I am mildly critical of how some of it was handled (which I’ll explain later). I also don’t have a problem with the virginity element as some other readers seem to (after all, if you’ve read vampire fiction, you’ve probably come across this trope before), because to me it’s simply an element that can be handled either well or poorly, and the execution hung somewhere in the middle for me. Kami shows pushback against the sexism in her world, but I think her character needs some strengthening for this to be satisfying. Since this series seems like it might go a dark romance direction, my suggestion 1) would be to add a content page at the start of each book much the way Katee Robert does. While I acknowledge that as a reader you are taking your own risks when you read books for what type of content you might see (after all, an author couldn’t possibly predict everything that may bother someone and think to warn for it) content-warning style pages are becoming increasingly popular – particularly amongst the “monster romance” crowd – and it’s a nice courtesy to offer your readers that shows you’re thinking about them and want them to enjoy themselves and know what they’re getting into.

On to my first criticism. While I was interested in the main character and her relationship with the antagonist, I was at times distracted by some things in the writing style. I wouldn’t say it’s bad, just that it needs refined. Some factors like overly explanatory thoughts from the main character that explain something about the situation, her powers, or the way things in her world works, the lengthy descriptions of people and clothes, the info-dumping about the world setting, etc., feel like things that should have been culled in the first draft. Some phrasing was simply a little awkward, for example: “Kami’s eyes widened as she was shocked by the result.” These are things I think many writers might fall into but improve upon with drafts. Like I said, however, I think this story has good bones and I would love to see a second edition printed (with this beautiful cover!) after a rewrite and deep look-over from an editor worth their salt that will assist with the rewrite process rather than simply catch typos (of which there were also a few, but not enough to bother me). There were also some elements that felt out of place. I could see what the author was trying to do with the semi-modern steampunk influence on a fantasy setting. There are fictional worlds that include those elements that I love (for example, the Rune Factory video game setting, where airships fly over lands full of magic and monsters, or movies like Howl’s Moving Castle). However, I found something lacking in the integration in this novel. It felt like the worldbuilding just wasn’t expanded enough for the inclusion of these tech elements to fully make sense. For example, I feel as though it would have no impact on the book at all if Kami went to shop at a normal “fantasy” general store, if the fences around Alice’s house were simply large and instilled with some sort of magical or rune barrier, and if the mechanical unicorns were regular horses or some sort of fantasy breed. So, my suggestion number 2) would be to work to expand more naturally on the worldbuilding (avoiding info-dumps), and ways to integrate these techy elements in a manner that make them necessary for the story - *or* to remove those elements and make this a full-on fantasy novel. In all honesty, I kind of wasn’t paying attention to those elements, so I personally would probably enjoy this more as a regular old fantasy novel. That is only my personal vibe, though, and I’ll try to keep an open mind for book 2 if things like this continue to be featured. Basically: either remove those elements, or go absolutely all-in!

Another thing I’d like to touch on is immersion. At times, the way the characters behaved felt as though they needed to be fleshed out. Some of the modern lingo like “legit,” “dollars,” or even this longer quote, “The attire of their world was a melting pot between gothic steampunk, Victorian, and modern eras. A dress like hers was by no means viewed as antiquated." (Chapter 3) pulled me out of the reading and felt out of place. At times, certain characters spoke in such a casual, modern way it kind of made me laugh, such as the Mayor’s dogged cursing. Making the dialogue more unique to each individual and giving them some oomph behind their characters would be my suggestion 3). Give us a reason *why* an aggressive character is acting the way they are, some depth and reasoning. They can feel a bit like a background NPC otherwise, rather than a vivid cast.

(Some spoilers in this paragraph). Now then, the part of the story I enjoyed the most was Kami and Aradia’s relationship. Who isn’t a sucker for enemies-to-lovers? They were genuinely so engaging, and it was entertaining to watch them verbally and physically spar and pit themselves against each other. Their chemistry and sexual tension were titillating, and I always love a good fire and ice motif. They were set up to be the central point of interest in the series – which is also why I was mildly frustrated with the way some of the second act of the novel unfolded. The book is portrayed as a sapphic romance story, so it was frustrating to see so much of Kami’s focus devoted to Skye, who is not only a man, but a man that needs to deal with his internalized sexism and tried to perpetuate violence against Kami herself. That isn’t to say a romance between a character like Kami and Skye couldn’t be written well, but this book just didn’t feel like the setting for it, and the way their relationship escalated felt unrealistic. I consider myself able to suspend my disbelief for a lot when I read fantasy romances, but characterization still needs to make sense for me within its own context. I saw no reason for Kami and Skye to go from animosity to catching feelings for each other because they held hands during a battle. I didn’t see the internal growth from Skye to make evident that he had changed from the man who tried to force himself on Kami to a proper comrade. Nor did I see any characterization to make sense why Kami was so aggrieved over deceiving Skye that she needed to weep over it. Like I said, I’m not necessarily against a romance between characters where consent has been contested; I’ve read bodice rippers and dubious consent before; however, in this case, all this plot line really accomplished was frustrating me because it was detracting from Kami and Aradia, who didn’t feel as though they got enough “screen time”. The build-up at the end felt like it pulled the rug out from under me. Instead of their grand confrontation, we got Kami chasing down Skye and Aradia sort of just...vanishing. I was expecting a showdown full of tension to top off the first volume, to cement them as rivals, one that left me shivering for more to happen between those two. Unfortunately, it let me down a bit. It also felt like Kami got stuck in a feedback loop at some point. She would meet Aradia, let her in, then curse and spit at her and demand she leave without hearing what she was saying, without anything new to spice it up. It got the slightest bit tedious, and I wished there was more internal dialogue given to Kami thinking over her evident desire for the other woman and struggling with her morality and wants. Now, I realize this paragraph may sound harsh, but I share this in hopes that the second volume will deliver on all the hopes I and other readers have. Aradia and Kami were compelling enough that I’ll be reading the second book, and I really hope their story improves and gets even more complicated and compelling! I’m also not against Kami having a secondary possible love interest to add even more tension – but I really wish it were Alice, not Skye. That would have been far more interesting! The childhood best friend versus the villain – that would keep me guessing constantly. I’m hoping Alice shows up in book 2. The book teased at an attraction between Kami and Alice, but didn’t really go anywhere with it.

On the note of Aradia (another slight spoiler in this paragraph), I was really interested when I found out that she was a man in her previous life. I feel like this could possibly be really fun trans/nonbinary representation. I was a little suspicious when she kept speaking as though being a man were her “true self,” and having a woman’s form was merely a disguise or deception. I’m really hoping Aradia stays Aradia in book 2, and she doesn’t simply transition into being the ice prince and never goes back, leaving her “womanhood disguise” behind. I would love for this romance to keep that sapphic element, as I feel like it would almost be sort of deceptive if it doesn’t, given the marketing. I would love to see Kami go on a self-realizing journey in book 2, learn to unlock her full power, accept herself, overcome her internalized lesbophobia and realize she can love and be loved by a woman and that she can, most importantly in a spicy romance series, desire and be desired by a woman.

Overall, I feel positive coming out of this reading because there were things I enjoyed. I really want to see more of Kami and Aradia. I fell in love with Aradia instantly and “Why don’t you go on and set this whole place on fire. I’ll lie here and burn with it” is going to live rent-free in my head. Some of her lines are simply iconic. I LOVE love-interests like Aradia. I enjoy slow-burn enemies-to-lovers romances, and this story has the potential to deliver bigtime. There were things that could be improved and hopefully will be as the world expands in the second book, such as finer points of writing style and characterization; I’m definitely not saying you can’t include male characters in a story like this, but I’m also hoping the women get more focus and more character growth. So, I’m keeping my fingers crossed for the rest of the series and maybe that this book will be revisited in the future!

First of all thank you to NetGalley and Keri Moore for my copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I will start by saying, I don't think this book is awful. The ideas and concepts are great, however the execution and writing let it down. The narrative was not a consistent seamless voice and lacked the use of literary devices and advanced language to tell the story; in my opinion if a book is in the fantasy or romantasy genre, some advanced language and scene painting really helps the reader to connect to the world building. It felt like it needed another draft.

I loved that it featured a vampire who had the ability to shift genders, this could have bee explored even more. I also loved that it featured a sorceress with fire magic; I would have loved to have read a section of her really exploring the feeling of her peer in detail, "the fire coursing through her veins like a river of molten..." - that kind of thing.
The world created by Moore had some good elements: the mindless servants, the hunters etc, great, I just wanted more depth and building. There were lots of ideas thrown together at once and it felt as though the author couldn't quite decide on one overarching storyline.
There was a lot of focus on the romance, however, I don't feel like the romance developed at all. I was expecting a sapphic romance with maybe some spice or even just a scene that felt seductive. There were scenes that I felt could have been expanded and built up more tension between the characters.

Lastly, the rape and virginity themes felt very outdated and archaic. There definitely should have been trigger warnings due to the way it is handled. I feel this could definitely trigger someone who finds these things difficult to read about. Furthermore, I found the male characters in general very triggering, especially Skye, he is so creepy and it felt as if we were meant to forgive him for his creepiness. To be honest it felt like Kami was being victim blamed, like it was her fault he tried to force himself on her.

I'm so sorry I couldn't be more positive, as I really wanted to like the book and always want to support authors, but unfortunately it just wasn't how I thought it was going to be. I was so excited for a sapphic romantasy read with vampires and I genuinely think with some edits and changes, this could be a really fun book!

I had high hopes for this book, given its exciting premise. The idea of exploring sapphic witches and vampires intrigued me, especially with the opportunity to transform tropes typically reserved for cis-hetero pairings into a sapphic narrative. Unfortunately, the book fell short of my expectations. I was disappointed that the execution didn't match the promising concept. Additionally, I was taken aback by a scene that could potentially be triggering, which lacked any prior trigger warnings.

On a positive note, the writing style is approachable, making the book an easy read, and its concise length allows for a single-sitting read-through. I appreciated the morally ambiguous nature of the characters, a facet I particularly enjoy in stories.

However, the worldbuilding felt a bit overloaded with information, making it somewhat burdensome to navigate. This aspect could benefit from further refinement.
I want to extend my gratitude to Netgalley and the Publisher for providing me with a complimentary copy for review purposes.

I'm going easy and giving this a 3 star. I loved the concept of a vampire and sorcerer rivals sapphic falling in love. How could I not be intrigued. The cover is also perfection! My main issue is that for a sapphic book there was a whole lot to terrible men in it. Get them out of here. It didn't further the plot for me. I just hated it. Needs to be a trigger warning in this! There was a big info dump on the world which was necessary although difficult to get through. I thought the book as a whole could have been edited down better. The ending left me genuinely interested to see how the rest of the series is going to go.