This was a fast paced retelling of America's dark past. The Civil War is always a topic of controversy. How the north freed the slaves. Though they only freed them to weaken the south. It's not like they respected slaves anymore but had no other choice. It was a byproduct of their progression. I found that making our main protagonist/slave holder a vampire highlights how monstrous "masters" were and to me really hit home. I have seen discourse on people not liking Blackwoods approach to this topic and I think they need to look at the bigger picture and her own comments about this being trauma she is working through. I don't think anyone should judge others on how they handle these delicate and painful topics.
I found Jerusalems relationships with a vampire a interesting choice. To me it opened up the conversation on how not all "vampires" were bad but even he had to control himself around her. I think this is parallel to how white people have to actively choose and be aware of how racism works and how deeply it can be ingrained into society and their own perspectives.
I feel if you look deeper into the story there are amazing themes and thought provoking sentiments that are great for a ya audience and should be discussed. It fits this age group by stepping away from true history making it easier to understand but doesn't step away from the true cruelty inacted upon slaves and people of color.
This book was not a five star because I felt the storyline was slightly rushed and could have more fully fledged out. That being said it did not take away from what the author was trying to bring to light in my opinion.

Vampire-hunting former enslaved persons with superhuman powers of one kind or another? Vampires who fall in love with such persons? Set during the American Civil War? Oh hell yes. This is a fantastic and often gory romp in which Jerusalem, a "Saint" who killed most of her former owners before escaping North, and Alexi, a centuries-old Russian vampire traumatized by his making and the one who made them, have a great slow-burn, allies-who-annoy-each-other-to-lovers arc, all while tracking down and finishing off the rest of Jerusalem's former owners, who include--coincidentally--Alexi's maker. While the coincidences are a little too neat, the book is too much fun to complain. Jerusalem has great character development over the course of the book, and while Alexi calling her "my girl" made me grit my teeth, even he improved in likability as the novel progressed. A few of the side characters were a little weak--Julia, in particular--but others--Gael and Odessa--were terrific. Go read it; thank me later.

I loved the premise of historical vampire/vampire hunters with forbidden love interests. What I wasn't prepared for was how it would truly blend in with the time period and it was truly a shock. This is the first work I've read by the author and I must state that I am in no way shape or form able to fully comment on some of the content in this book as it is not a demographic that I am a part of. But let's chug along!

This book may not be for readers who are uncomfortable with racial tension, privilege, and potential slurs. It brings those deep feelings that you might feel uncomfortable with, to the forefront, in a very unabashed and unashamed way. It was mildly refreshing as this book could have easily ghosted over the tension during this time period in favor of making this a purely vampire vs humans book. I believe some of the story and dialogue as it segway'd into different points of view could have been smoother. But regardless, this book was a commendable story of love in the time of history and vampires.

3.5! This was such a wonderful historical fantasy. The idea of vampires during the civil war was so intriguing to me. I really enjoyed Jerusalem, she went through a lot of trauma and came out such a beautifully strong character. Her relationship with Alexi was the part of the book that gave me a bit of a pause. She was really harsh with him which was understandable given what he was and what she has been through but the vibe between them seemed a bit off to me. Otherwise I really enjoyed this story and I loved how everything played out.

When I read the summary of this book I knew I had to read it. I mean, civil war and vampires? Yes, please. Unfortunately, it wasn’t really for me. The idea is so great but the execution fell flat for me.

Thank you NetGalley and Wednesday books for the opportunity to read this e-arc..this is my honest opinion of the book.

The blurb made it more promising to me. It really jumps straight in to the civil war and fighting and strategic planning with a few flash backs thrown in. The characters use modern lingo but seem to try to represent characters of the time at the same time and I find it kind of annoying. The concept is really cool of the Saints that have enhanced abilities against the vampires. But I wasn't really looking for a legit straight all war book.

I would love to write a review for this title just as soon as St. Martin’s Press and Wednesday books decide they want to get off their asses and engage with the very reasonable demands of the marketing boycott and address the racism, islamophobia, and zionism they are enabling....................................................................................

As succinctly stated by the author, The Dangerous Ones is “the journey of a Black girl seeking vengeance, falling in love, and taking her freedom into her own hands” in the fantasy romance trope that incorporates “as much Black Joy as pain….”

The book is set in 1863 during the American Civil War. Prior to discovering that she has Saint powers, Jerusalem was a slave of a vampire family (primarily New Bloods) who owned & abused her. As a Black woman who was formerly enslaved by white vampires, Jerusalem is guarded against vampires of any kind—even the Ancient Vampire Alexei who has joined the Union army alongside Saints to bring down the Confederates. While fighting in the war, Jerusalem’s main goal is to pursue vengeance against her prior vampiric mistress Adelaide & work out her feelings towards Alexei.

So… I wanted to like this book but I couldn’t get into it.
🌾I liked the idea of a vampire twist during the Civil War, but the story itself felt underdeveloped.
🌷While there’s enough context for Jerusalem’s vendetta against Adelaide, there wasn’t enough character development for me to be invested in Jerusalem or Alexei. (I had to check if this was a sequel.🙃 It is not.) Overall, the book was anticlimactic & predictable.
🌺I didn’t feel like there was any romantic chemistry. If the author didn’t repeatedly say that they loved each other, I wouldn’t have known.
🪻This is a YA enemies-to-lovers “romantasy” novel, but the fantasy elements were light & the romance was minor. The banter & convo were juvenile.

Although this book wasn’t for me, on a larger scale, I appreciated the struggle between Jerusalem’s prejudice against all vampires & the softening of her heart to love even one. There may be a temptation to write off an entire race based on past traumatic experiences, but I appreciate the idea of growth & the razing of generalizations.

Overall, I’d give this 2.5 out of 5, but I’ll round up for purposes here. I wanted to like this book and was actually very excited to pick it up, but it was kind of a flop for me.

Thank you NetGalley and Wednesday book for this ARC I’m exhausted for an honest review.

The Dangerous Ones is a heartfelt, achingly hopeful story. It's a refreshing take on the vampire trope, couched in Black trauma of the Civil War. Blackwood beautifully honors the horrors the Black community faced, while exploring identity and belonging through the supernatural aspect of the vampires in the book. The romance, the grief, and the power of Jerusalem's character puts this book high on my list of favorites.

Special thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a free, electronic ARC of this novel received in exchange for an honest review.
Expected publication date: May 14, 2024
“The Dangerous Ones” by Lauren Blackwood is a historical drama, set during the Civil War in the American South, where vampires and mortals with special abilities can be partners or enemies, depending on what side you’re fighting on.
Jerusalem is known as a “Saint”, someone with demi-god like super abilities, including super speed, strength and reflexes. After escaping from the home where she was held captive as a slave, Jerusalem’s only goal is to seek revenge on the family who “owned” her. When she teams up with Alexei, a powerful vampire, she doesn’t expect to get along with him, much less fall in love with him, but both Alexei and Jerusalem seem to have the same goal- fight for the freedom of the Black American people, and seek revenge.
I had high hopes for “The Dangerous Ones”, but the novel fell flat. Although I enjoyed the vampire component, the story made it feel like it was a sequel and I had skipped over the first novel where all the character development took place. Although Blackwood goes back in both Jerusalem and Alexei’s past so we can understand a bit more about what brought them together, I felt like I was simply thrown into the middle of an ongoing story where everyone knew what was going on except me.
The language, too, was off-putting. Not because of the slang used, but the fact that some of the slang was not relevant to the time. For example, Jerusalem uses the term “minute” (as in, “I haven’t done that in a minute”), “hella”, “fancypants” and other modern terms that, to the best of my limited knowledge, would not have been understood during the Civil War era. Jerusalem used to be a slave, so her language use is supposed to reflect that, but she doesn’t use it consistently. When she is speaking, she uses it but when she is narrating and not speaking directly, her slang use comes and goes, which makes it difficult to read and follow.
I liked the Civil War revenge plot, I liked the Underground railway and the quest to free Black slaves and I liked the vampire component (obviously), but somehow, putting them all together did not work. I haven’t read anything else by Blackwood, so I have nothing to compare it to, but I was hopeful that this novel would bring yet another author into my orbit but “Dangerous Ones” did not succeed in this task.

I thought that the Dangerous Ones by Lauren Blackwood was alright- not the best historical fiction book I've ever read, but not the worst. As a fan of Dracula, I enjoyed a couple of the references made throughout the book, as well as how Blackwood was able to brilliantly integrate vampires with the Civil War. I also enjoyed how Blackwood gave the characters their own voices and their own speaking patterns throughout the story, in addition to how Blackwood was able to show some of the social and political struggles of that particular time period. That being said, the main character (Jerusalem) was exactly like every other FMC in any new YA book, which didn't particularly make the character stand out to me. If anything, it made me lose interest in her side of the story about halfway though the book.

On paper, everything about this book is something I would love. However, I just could not get into this book.

The overall premise and writing is wonderful. I think the writing style was what kept me engaged, but the plot left me feeling a bit bored.

I really wanted to like the enemies to lovers romance, but I felt the leads were in two very different places in their life journey that I could not buy their romance.

The side characters were my favorite part. They were much more fleshed out than other fantasy books I read, which is nice.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for a copy of this ARC for review purposes. All opinions are my own.

I wanted to love this book more than I did, (it's like a 3.5 for me). The premise is killer, the characters are cool, and that first chapter is sheer perfection. But, for me personally, it didn't quite all come together.

This book incorporates the "enemies to lovers" trope, but again, in the execution didn't exactly stick the landing. While Alexei is a well rounded character, (which I guess makes sense since he's been alive hundreds of years) Jerusalem seemed pretty emotionally immature (although a bad ass warrior). Even a good way through the book, when it's clear there are deeper feelings between them, Jerusalem is still lapsing into long sections of calling Alexei names and ostensibly hating him. It just didn't seem like an equally developed relationship.

I guess, I wanted a bit more world building in this book (because of the cool premise). I wanted to know what it felt like to BE a saint. I wanted to know why Alexei decided to come fight in America. I wanted to see Alexei and Jerusalem come to fall in love, rather than be dropped into the story later on after they've known each other for awhile. I wanted Alexei to learn more about racism and not just sainthood, mooning over Jerusalem's coolness.

All of these are editorial quibbles, of course. The book simply zigged, where I would have preferred it zagged. But the bones of the story are all good. Cool concept for the underground railroad, solid metaphor about slave owners being literal vampires and great descriptions of the smoky air down south that allows vamps to walk by day. Overall, it made for a highly memorable read.

Thank you to the author and NetGalley for granting me the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

A historical fiction that is in the era of the Civil War, with some fantasy and romance. It had vampires who were fighting with the confederates and humans with Godlike strength and endurance called saints fighting for the union. Jerusalem is a saint. She was on the run after killing her master and ends up in the union army fighting for freedom and revenge. She needs Alexei, vampire, to help her achieve it.

A fast paced, action packed read that was really good. It was well written with great characters. If you like historical fiction, fantasy and romance with vampires, you will love this read.

This was a well written and unique read. This book had an interesting storyline and is told through dual points of view. I loved the concept of this one. I did however, struggle to get into it at first and it took a bit before it had my full attention, but that could be because historical fiction isn’t a genre that I read often. Dangerous Ones did have some great characters, and if you are looking for a young adult historical fantasy romance, you may want to give this one a try.

This was a very interesting concept, vampires fighting with the Confederate army and being a driving force of upholding slavery. And on the flip side, humans known as Saints, with extraordinary powers, fighting to defeat the evil. I had some issues with the modern dialogue used in this book, so much that it took me out of the story too much. I didn’t feel the connection between the two main characters, Jerusalem and Alexei. Again, this may have been due to the modern phrasing. How many times did Jerusalem call Alexei a dumb ass? Too many. Overall it was a pretty good story, and I think the attended audience of YA (I’d pinpoint ages 15-18) would enjoy it though.

I loved this book! The combination of vampires and Saints, the intrigue of past choices coming back into the present situation, the culture that has grown up around the vampires, the Underground Railroad... it's so fascinating.

Ever since Within These Wicked Walls, I've had Lauren Blackwood on my list as a must-read new author, and I was beyond excited for The Dangerous Ones. It sounded like everything I ever wanted to read: vampires, a historical setting, and a strong FMC with a compelling forbidden love story.

Unfortunately, this book didn't quite grip me like WTWW did, for a number of reasons.

But first, the stuff I loved:
Jerusalem's POV grabbed me by the throat from the first line and didn't let me go until the last. She was strong, bold, brave, and sassy, and I loved her voice=y first person narration. Although Jerusalem's backstory was often ugly and difficult to stomach (many thanks to Blackwood for including trigger warnings at the start!), I felt Blackwood balanced the trauma everything Jer endured with the joy of her budding relationship and the inner strength she possessed. In particular, I loved the banter between Jer and love interest Alexei.

I felt Blackwood handled the blend of Civil War history/fighting for freedom and the speculative element of vampires very well; it reminded me of H. G. Parry's Declaration of the Rights of Magicians duology in that regard. The worldbuilding was stellar and the ending was so immensely satisfying.

But for me, I think the biggest issue was I just did not love Alexei's narration. Since he is the MMC, we're in his head for an approximate half of the book, and those were the parts I wished to skim. While I think Blackwood did an excellent job of tying both MCs back to the villain, I simply did not feel Alexei's motivations on the visceral level that I did Jerusalem's, and I kept wondering why exactly she was attracted to him. I got why he was attracted to her--she's a spear wielding badass and a five-foot-nothing bundle of sass--but he felt...bland in comparison. I also had some issues with the pacing and with the giant chapters, where Jerusalem and Alexei switch POVs numerous times. It may just be a particular critique of mine, but I wish each chapter had kept to one character throughout until the next chapter, rather than switch within.

I think fans of romantasy and vampires will definitely eat this up, especially the "he falls first" and "eternal pining" coming from Alexei's chapters, but it just wasn't my favorite Lauren Blackwood novel.

Many thanks to NetGalley, St. Martin's Press/Wednesday Books, and Lauren Blackwood for gifting me this e-ARC in exchange for my honest review!

Definitely going to have to read more books from this author because I truly feel there are slightly better books from them then this one. I truly did like this book, maybe not love but it was an okay book after leaving a MASSIVE reading slump. I do feel that certain things took me out the book an back to reality with a confused face, but it wasn't horrible.

What a unique take on the Civil War! Anyone who loves Twilight knows that Jasper was also in the Civil War, so if you were intrigued by that storyline, this book is absolutely for you. Plus it has the added bonus of actually being about the slaves and Black people's freedom, and honestly, the relationship between Jerusalem and Alexei was so god damn wholesome and inspiring. This is also incredibly relevant to the times now unfortunately, and the author did a 10/10 job of mixing in the fantasy with the real world applications.