I think this is one of the most unique books I have read in a long time. As the story begins, there are a lot of aspects the author doesn't tell the reader. We get to slowly discover the mysterious aspects as the plot develops, making the reading ponder if the MC is making huge mistakes because she (and the reader) have no idea what is happening. I have so much to say but don't want to reveal any spoilers! There is quite a bit of spice, so if you don't like that in your books this is not the book for you.

The overall story was interesting. I liked the different magical beings that get introduced throughout the book.
Harrow was a good female character and I liked who she became by the end of the story.
Raith was fun to read because at times it brought an innocence to a male character who is dark that we don’t get to read much in romance books.

This was a 3.5 book for me. I’m not a big fan of 3rd person but it was fine for this story. The format also bug me while reading. Sometimes it didn’t flow together.

I did feel the ending was rushed. I honestly thought there would have been another book since so much more story could have been told.

I enjoyed reading Sanctuary of the Shadow. I thought the author did a good job of showing the growth of Harrow and Raith. I liked how the author portrayed consent from both sides during the spicy scenes. We don’t see that as often in romance books. The twists with the involvement of the queens was a nice surprise. Overall, I thought it was a good book. I would’ve liked there to have been a bit more world building to setup the queens backstory. I look forward to seeing if Mal gets a book about her journey.

Sanctuary of the Shadow is a sex positive spicy romance set against the backdrop of an elemental fantasy world. If you enjoy reading romance books with well crafted, explicit sexual scenes where the couple's chemistry, story, and connection are the most important part of the book, you will enjoy this book.

While I definitely think there are things to enjoy about this book, overall it wasn't for me. I fell in love with the description and I was hoping for a rich, atmospheric fantasy world that I could lose myself in on every page. SotS is not that kind of book. Yes, it takes place in a fantasy world with a circus, but the romance takes precedence over every other part of the story, leaving the world itself feeling lackluster.

I wanted so much more from this world - more of the experience of being part of the circus, more of the side characters, more importance placed on the larger conflicts in the story. I wanted more focus on the fantasy. I also prefer books with a slow burn romantic build up, and this is more of a love at first sight kind of romance that dives quickly into the spice.

The author does more telling than showing with regard to the plot - there's a lot of detail dumping & exposition dropped on the reader throughout the story because, again, the romance matters more than the world building or the broader conflicts.

If you're looking for a spicy fantasy with smoldering intimate scenes that doesn't require a lot of focus to follow the plot, definitely get yourself a copy of this book. You'll love it.

Thank you to Entangled Publishing and Red Tower Books for providing an ARC of this book for review.

I LOVE this book! It was a little slow to start but by midway it had me captivated and reading quickly to find out what happens. I love the characters, especially Harrow. She has so much going on, layers and layers of backstory to unveil and learning to trust her powers. Great story of light and dark, and spicy!

This was my first fantasy read and so the first few chapters I think were slow for me as I needed to learn about characters, the build, etc. After about Chapter 9-10 things started to make more sense and I really got into the story.

Harrow is the last of the Seers having lost her family and clan due to a Wraith. She is now part of a circus of elementals that are being protected from humans and other hybrids. The circus master, Salizar is told of a captured Wraith and he buys him and brings him back to the circus. Harrow finds him and calls him Raith and they start to form a strong connection and eventually fall in love.

Without giving away any spoilers there are twists and turns and there is some heartbreak, some fighting and violence and then you learn the history behind Harrow and her family and how Wraith became Raith.

DNF at 25% - a great idea, but poor execution.

Being Red Tower’s latest release and compared to Avatar: The Last Airbender, I was super excited to read Sanctuary of the Shadow. Unfortunately, I have a horrible track record with circus books (I’ve either hated or DNF’d every one I’ve ever tried to read), and it seems the Circus Book Curse is real for me.

However, it wasn’t even the circus aspect of this book that I hated - that’s barely in it, in the 25% I read.

The FMC, Harrow, was unbearably dumb. She made the stupidest decisions under the guise of following her intuition/“the Water”. Harrow is an Elemental, who is drawn to water which grants her Seer abilities. The magic system wasn’t too well explained, but it seemed to be that it only existed to enable or justify her making these choices to further the plot along.

The book was also very insta-lovey. Again, because of “the Water”, Harrow is inexplicably drawn to Raith, the circus’s new attraction and a supposed prisoner of Salizar, the circus’s leader. Everyone around Harrow tells her that Raith is a wraith, the being that wiped out all of Harrow’s people, and that he’s extremely dangerous, but she refuses to believe them, forming a ridiculous plot to free him and then run away together. When she is challenged on her trusting him, Harrow admits that if Raith was indeed a wraith, she would kill him no questions asked. I looked at the end of the book to see how things wrapped up, having seen some spoilers for it, and lo and behold, Raith is actually a wraith.

What’s even more annoying is that Harrow’s best friend, Mal, points out how crazy her plan is, and how she’s instantly fallen in love with Raith - so it’s clear that the author Aurora Ascher recognises the same, and yet proceeded to write that!

Stupid character decisions and plot aside, I really struggled with Ascher’s writing style. I wasn’t ever immersed in the story. I’ve heard it improves dramatically in the spicy scenes, but I never made it that far into the book.

I’ve loved every single one of Red Tower’s books to date, so to have DNF’d Sanctuary of the Shadowis absolutely devastating to me. I’m chalking this instance up to the Circus Book Curse, but I genuinely thought I’d be able to rate all of their books 5 stars, no questions asked. They’ve quickly become my favourite publisher/imprint, and I’ll still preorder every title of theirs I see (which I already have, of the ones available so far!), but I can’t say this hasn’t (slightly) knocked my confidence in them.

Thank you to Brittany at Entangled Publishing for sending me an eARC, as part of my participation in the Entangled Insiders readalong!

↠ DNF at 25%, 2 stars

I absolutely can't wait for my copy of this book! One it was so freaking amazing ! Good amount of spice + plot ratio it wasn't overwhelming in the slightest. And the actual book with its edges is going to be magnificent

Thank you Entangled for an e-arc of this book. All of these comments are my own.

I was super excited to read this book. Red Tower has been releasing amazing titles here lately.

But, this one fell a bit flat for me. I thought this was going to be a book with a circus theme and it was not. The circus was mentioned maybe 4-5 times and nothing really circus related happened. I also wasn’t a big fan of the writing. It made the characters just seem really immature. The dual pov was nice but it was hard to keep up with who was speaking at the time because they weren’t marked. They mention elemental magic which I think is awesome for stories but there wasn’t much representation for it.

The only thing I really liked was the spice but even then, it seemed like that was the only thing the author really wrote well, so again it was a bit flat for me.

I think maybe if there had been more time spent on this then this book would have been fantastic. There is so much potential in this story but it just felt uneven and I don’t really feel like I read a story. I don’t feel like it really told a story, if that makes sense.

I hate giving less than 3 stars, so this is a generous 3 stars.

This story is quite the ride. We meet our MFC, Harrow, in the circus of elementals. This is her home and a place she can hide who she really is. That is, until HE arrives. Harrow is drawn to him in a way that provokes who she really is. Is he her savior or the catalyst?

4.5 stars ⭐️ This book will take you on a journey and it’s so easy to read that you will be flipping those pages quickly. It definitely has some spice but it’s not the entire book which I enjoy. I’d say 85% plot and 15% spice.

This was a great book. Honestly there were some twists that really did surprise me!! I don’t want to give any spoilers, only to say that Harrow and Raith and so much fun to get to know. It’s got intrigue and adventure. They never say “twin flame,” but I swear that is one of the tropes in this book. Definitely, touch her and un-alive. They’re immediately drawn to each other. This book has 🌶️🌶️🌶️!! Also, I’m betting that any books following this one in this series will follow another couple, and I, for one, am hoping that it will be Ouro and Malaikah.

4⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
3 🌶️🌶️🌶️

Red tower and Entangled Publishing was kind enough to send me a ARC of this book. I had already preordered the book but I’m glad I got to read it early!

I guess we can start with what this book was supposed to be about. The circus 🎪. Was it about a circus? No not really. If you are expecting this book to involve a lot of aspects of circus and circus life you will be disappointed. I personally wasn’t disappointed in that aspect. I do think it could have included more details and time spent but I also didn’t mind that it didn’t spend hundreds of pages on circus life.

The characters themselves were intriguing, fun, and charismatic. I did love Mal more than any other character. And from those I talked to who have read the book as well agree that Mal needs her own book. And I’m hoping there’s another book to this series in their pov. 👀

I did enjoy the main characters as well. Harrows and Raiths relationship was interesting. I liked them individually, Raith is obviously a complicated person, the issues surrounding him though I felt weren’t explored well enough. And Harrow has trauma, but I felt like it was pushed aside and ignored because ✨love✨.

I really don’t like instant love tropes. And that is what this book revolves around. I mean I understand why and the reason for it, I just think the immaturity of both the main characters made it even worse for me while reading.

There were also moments that characters thoughts and feelings were repeated MULTIPLE times in the span of one or two pages. It got a bit annoying.

The ending was upsetting and not in a good way. Pregnancy tropes.. why? Why must authors take an interesting concept and new and I do mean NEW relationship and ruin it by throwing a god damn baby in there. It wasn’t necessary, it was messily done. It did not add any weight or enchanting plot to the story.

When I first started reading this book I enjoyed it a lot. And I couldn’t understand why people had rated it so low. After finishing it I now understand. No real twists and turns, instant love trope, pregnancy trope, plots not exactly what the synopsis said it would be, the rushed job of the ending, predictablity.

Still why am I rating this book 4⭐️’s you might ask. Purely vibes. I couldnt stop thinking about the book every time I put it down. I enjoyed the world, I enjoyed the characters. And I would recommend the book still despite its issues. And because I’m honestly excited to read the next book of this series or spin off book. And hopefully the next book is longer, with some interesting twists and turns, and fun and charismatic characters. 🤞🏻

I devoured this book. It started out a bit slowly and a little confusing but once you work out all the different characters it really comes together.
Ascher weaves a tale of heartache, desire, loss of will and struggle with self acceptance so well that it has the strings of your heart tugged so tightly you can only hope and pray that Harrow and Raith get their HEA.
I loved that the story didn't end on a cliffhanger, so it could be read as a standalone, but still left it open for another book focusing on Mal, Harrows best friend.

I received this advance eARC thanks to Entangled Publishing and NetGalley

I was surprised by how much I liked this one. The characters had some really amazing depth to them and it made the interwoven pasts of Harrow and Raith work beautifully.

Harrow has hidden her identity for most of her life, and Raith knows nothing of his. They are perfect compliments of one another, and as they find their way into each other's hearts, the world around them has plans to tear them apart. A centuries old battle of wills amongst sisters will determine their future, and there is nothing fair about it.

Seeing Harrow find herself, and claim herself, was such a powerful message, and the humility Raith falls into headfirst upon learning about his past...you can't help but root for them!

I feel like I'm being nice giving this two stars....I have lots of thoughts about this one.

So to start off, I went into this book completely blind, only know that it was published by Red Tower. I have been enjoying most of their books lately, so I figured this one would probably be good as well. Plus the cover just looks amazing.

I did not like the writing in this book. At all. I actually thought this might be a debut author when I started reading it and about 70% in I looked up to see if they had any other books because I swore it was a debut author based on the writing. They are not a debut author. This is their sixth book. Sixth!!! You would not expect that at all from this writing. I did read an uncorrected proof, so I will keep that in mind with this review, but still. I didn't love the writing. The dialog, the descriptions, and the spice were all just not good.

Next up, I didn't love the characters. I had a hard time connecting to Harrlow and Raith. I just wasn't a huge fan of them or the chemistry between them. It just wasn't believable. I kind of wanted more from both of them, and I just found them lacking. This also bring me back to the spice. I just felt like it was way too soon and that the author was just throwing it into the book so there would be spice. Not my favorite way to have a book in all honestly. I would have rather the author built up the relationship between the character's first rather than jumping right to the spice.

On top of this, the plot was not my favorite. While I was kind of liking it at first, it went downhill, especially with that ending. I mean, two people escaping the circus sounds like it would be intense and interesting, and it was. There was actually some unexpected plot twists too. But the overall plot wasn't my favorite.

This book was written in third person and jumped around with the POV a lot. At times, it was a little hard to keep up with. If it would have been just the two main characters, I would have been fine with that, but this had way too much jumping around for my liking with no indication that it was switching. That being said, I do read a lot of third person books so that has no effect on my rating.

So, you are probably wondering why I even gave this two stars based on my ranting above. And I do have to say that the world itself was interesting. That's really the only reason why it kept me reading. I was just so fascinated with the world that it made me want to learn more about it and how it worked. I will say that the author did a great job with creating a world the way they did. And I will be continuing the series just to see what happens next because of the world itself. Hopefully the next one will be a little better written, or I won't read the ARC just in case it is a fluke and hasn't been edited at all yet.

I absolutely LOVED this book. Straight up was supposed to follow a read along, but devoured it in 2 days because I could not put it down. (sorry entangled)

I am an absolute sucker for the circus trope and this book not only did not disappoint but exceeded my expectations tenfold. The characters are all super different but blended into the story flawlessly.

The writing style is perfection and easy to read, and the pacing is immaculate. The magic system was so cool the all around plot was so unique. Not once was I able to predict what was going to happen which made it all the more fun to read. Am I officially a demon/monster romance girlie?

This was a 10/10 read and I highly recommend it.

Thank you Netgalley, Entangled Publishing, and Red Tower Books for allowing me to read and review this book! All thoughts and opinions are my own.

This is a negative review. If you don't like negative reviews, don't read any further.

I want to say I enjoyed this book but I can not. I normally DNF books I'm not a fan of but I wanted to believe the story would get better, it did not. The story is okay, I guess, but all the hard work and attention went into the over-dramatic sex scenes. I like sex. I like reading about it, but there has to be a story too. The story, the character development, and the world-building is poorly executed and all over the place. The characters were not fleshed out enough for me to care about their welfare. The whole drama with the Queens is kind of stupid. The beginning had promise but the instant Harrow decides to run away with Raith is where everything just went downhill in my opinion.

There was potential for the story to be good. The story-telling fell flat for me. With it being written in third person might have been a bad decision too. The constant switching of povs gave me slight whiplash. I think the only positive that came out of this story is Harrow's friend Maliakah. There's going to be a spin-off book featuring Mal as the lead. I appreciated her chapters even though she was also poorly executed, too. I hope the author will do her story right in the next book.

The romance was not enjoyable. With the amount of attention the spicier scenes got you would think they'd be darn good.

Harrow and Raith instantly fall in love with each other within a matter of five days. I understand instant attraction or desire but love? Maybe the trope isn't for me, sometimes authors can execute it well but for this fantasy romance it didn't work.

The writing came across as juvenile. I kept thinking the characters were in their late teens and not decades old Elementals with experience.

Ahhh... overall I don't think I can recommend anyone to waste their time on this book. I wish I just DNF'd instead of pushing through. It would have saved me the frustration and disappointment.

Harrow has been living and working in the Elemental circus for years, hiding as a human to protect her true identity as the last remaining Seer. Her family and the rest of the Seers were killed off by wraiths controlled by Queen Furie long ago. One day, Harrow feels a pull toward a specific tent at the circus, and finds that Salizar, the circus owner, has a creature trapped in a cage. Harrow is furious and wants to free the creature who has no memory of who or what he is. Regardless, Harrow chooses to protect him, and together they start uncovering the dark secrets of his past.

I think this book has the potential to be really good, but it missed the mark a bit for me. I absolutely loved Harrow and Mal’s friendship as well as the opportunity characters were given to grow from past wrongs. The spice was spicy and Harrow and Raith seemed to have a really strong bond that transcended pretty much everything.

I wanted to learn more about the circus and I also was hoping for a more in depth exploration of the Elementals. I feel like that was kind of brushed over and not explained well. The pacing was a bit off, and the writing style felt like it changed drastically at different parts of the book. Some parts were repetitive, there were some plot holes, and there were also parts that were well written. I think overall I just have mixed feelings about this book. I’ll probably still pick up the next book to see what happens next.

Thank you to Entangled and Red Tower for the ARC!

Edit: After thinking about this more, I have a lot more feedback. This book discusses enslaving of wraiths and the systematic genocide of Seers without any content warnings or in depth discussion of the topics. Additionally both of these topics were glossed over in the book like everything was fine, and neither of those occurrences are okay. More time should have been spent on how Raith broke free of the Furies vow when he spared Harrow, how he rediscovered who he was. There wasn't any healing that occurred for either Raith or Harrow. They just love each other and that's enough to overcome both slavery and genocide? Absolutely not.

Harrow has found sanctuary in the circus as a place to hide her true abilities after her entire clan was slain when she was a child. She was content with her place until a stranger is brought in to be the newest attraction. He has no memory, and no idea what he is. The only clue to his identity - the unique and deadly powers he possesses. However, something in this stranger calls to Harrow, and she’ll stop at nothing to learn both his secrets and hers that she’s locked away.
✨
✨
Ascher has written a heart wrenching tale when choice is taken away and loss is all you’ve known. I’ll start by saying I LOVED the first half of the book. The heartbreak Harrow has endured is enough to crush anyone’s spirit, but she hasn’t let the loss break her. On the other end of the spectrum, we have the MMC who has no recollection of who or what he is let alone anything from his past. The two are inexplicably drawn together especially when Harrow is convinced this stranger can’t be what everyone thinks he is. I was all in on this part of the storyline — figuring out who the mysterious stranger really is. However, after his identity is discovered, I felt the story fell flat. It felt like a struggle between wanting to be a character driven book and a political conflict driven book, with both suffering. The ending unfortunately felt anticlimactic. However, this may be because I tend to read series that end in cliffhangers. There are also some really heavy themes tackled in this book that I wish were further developed. I will say, though, I loved Mal’s character throughout the entire story, and I can’t wait for her to have her own book.

The title of this book piqued my interest and the cover is pretty amazing. We start out in Salizars's Incredible Elemental Circus, a safe haven for lost souls. Harrow has been with the circus since she was 10 yrs old. She is a fortune teller, a pretty good one. She's been trying desperately to hide from and forget her past. Harrow is stubborn, caring, loyal and very intuitive. We then meet a man dying in the desert, he has no memory of how he got there or his life before waking up with the hot sun burning his skin. He's strong, smart, blood thirsty and full of rage. When Harrow meets the man, she's instantly drawn to him. He similarly feels a need to be close to her. What does it all mean? There were a lot of things to unravel in this book. So many emotions, it kept me on my toes and hungry for more information. I am excited to see what happens in the next book.