4.5⭐️

<b> I’ll start at the beginning. The beginning is, as all beginnings are, soaked in blood and shrouded in darkness. The end will be, too, but we’ll get there together.

My name is Lucy Westenra, and this is my story. </b>

This book was everything that I love in a vampire book. The character development of Lucy was really great and satisfying and I enjoyed getting to know her both as a human and a vampire. The writing in this was spectacular and witty and genuinely just really funny. The female characters were all really strong. There were times where the book did feel never ending, but I still really liked it and where the story ended up and the care taken with these characters and this story.

<b>We’re going to do great and terrible things, together.</b>

What an amazing book. I am in awe of it. I’m sure I’ll be in awe of it for quite some time. The worldbuilding, weaving the story we all know with a new, original story spanning decades, was an absolute thrill to read.

The interpersonal relationships were complex: it was interesting to learn of Lucy’s encounters with others throughout her long life, especially those who should feel sympathy or understanding. It’s a powerful lesson to learn: monsters can be human, too.

For a story about vampires, it’s so deeply human.

Thank you to NetGalley, Kiersten White, and Del Rey for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

Lucy is known as one of Dracula’s first victims. For over 100 years, she has been trying to keep one step ahead of him and his control. It is now 2024 and she discovers Iris, a woman with her own family secrets. They are quickly drawn to each other, but neither knows what the other is grappling with. Will Lucy and Iris find happiness? Will Dracula catch up to her after all this time?

Lucy Undying is a stand-alone supernatural story that pulls many elements of the original Dracula tale into the twenty-first century. I have always loved the original Dracula story and the many variations throughout the years, and I was looking forward to this new addition. Although I enjoyed the story overall, many places had me rolling my eyes as the story felt contrived and predictable. Lucy Undying was a good story, but not one that must be rushed to the top of a TBR list.

Wow, this booked sucked me in from the very first chapter and I could not put it down! Before this, I had never read a Kiersten White book and did not know what to expect, but can now say I’m a fan.

Lucy Undying follows the lives of Lucy, an undying bride of Dracula, and Iris, an heiress trying to escape her heritage and past.
As this book opens, Lucy’s story spills out from two separate timelines, allowing us to follow her journey through her old journal entries from 1890, and from a transcript from her appointment with a therapist in the current day. The way that her past unfolded was beautifully poetic and shows how far Lucy has come in discovering herself, growing into more than she ever was allowed to be, and moving through the many adversities she faced.
We also follow Iris as she moves to London to settle her inherited properties after her mother passed and she became the sole heir of the Goldaming estate. Although, It’s clear from the beginning that something sinister is associated with the Goldaming’s, and Iris wants no part of it.

Lucy and Iris’ story are both heart-wrenching, with parallels of difficult motherly relationships and expectations to be who they are not. Their stories are beautifully intertwined and charged with desire and discovery.

I can’t recommend reading Lucy Undying enough. There are so many wonderful aspects of Lucy’s self-discovery that would be a shame to miss. I think this may even be my favourite read of the year so far.

A big thank you to Sabrina Shen, Random House Publishing Group – Ballantine, and NetGalley for the advance copy. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I was very excited for this release. Vampire Dracula retelling, sold me immediately.

However, this book fell flat. I felt the pacing was slow and dragged. I usually like multiple POVs, but I really didn’t like Iris’ character. I kept wanting to skim most of her parts.

I think what lost me officially was the MLM. I really wanted to love this, but it just wasn’t for me.

Thank you NetGalley and Random House for this eARC.

What are we hoping to see when we look in a mirror?

Neither Lucy Westenra or Iris Goldaming had the pleasure of thinking for themselves what they hoped to see in a mirror while they were growing up, yoked to overbearing and exacting mothers who plucked, prodded, pinched, squeezed, and tried their best to mold their daughters into an ideal meant to uphold the family honor and name.

You can trim all the thorns and burrs off of a person, but you can’t take away their dreams if you don’t know they’re there. Or their nightmares. You can’t see what they think of while alone in bed in the middle of the night or hear the secrets they whisper to animals while on a walk. People will always have their secrets. Lucy and Iris both had their own while growing up. Perfectly polished on the outside, perfectly furious on the inside.

Lucy Undying was not only the best book Kiersten White has written yet (and I’m a big fan), but it was better than I could’ve hoped and nothing like what I thought it would be. White’s novels Hide and Mister Magic fall solidly and comfortably into the world of genre fiction, but there’s something so ethereal, even otherworldly about this book that it feels almost half literary fiction. (I had some passages highlighted but this morning the passages aren’t highlighted anymore so I’m bummed.)

This book is marketed as gothic, but I disagree with this move (this was a poor move on the part of the publisher, in my opinion). I have an opinion they wanted to use the term “gothic” because people expect books associated with Dracula to be gothic, but gothic implies isolation and darkness, and there’s very little of that here. If anything, this is a vampiric trip of self-discovery over time: Lucy Undying is not only a title for the book but the overall theme for the book. The Lucy Westenra of Bram Stoker’s Dracula is naught but a footnote in the story: she is dispatched and that’s it. She’s dead and we’re not to think of her again. In this book, Lucy Westenra is dying a little every single day until the day she wakes up in her crypt after being turned and a one of Dracula’s brides says her name. With that seemingly simple act, the bride has given Lucy back her identity and memories from her human life that otherwise would’ve been lost like Dracula’s other brides. Brides of Dracula are supposed to think of him, only him. They are supposed to always wait for him, always long for him. He is supposed to be their entire existence. But Lucy has her name back, and with that she can start fresh and find out who Lucy Westenra really is.

Lucy is Undying because there are three (plus two) Lucys in this book: The Lucy prior to turning inside a journal that Iris finds inside the mansion she’s inherited, the Lucy who’s telling her story post-turning to a psychiatrist, and two others that would be spoilers. Lucy is undying because her story never stops. Her human self dies, but is revived and she is given back her name. She travels the world, meets other people and other vampires, and tells them her name. Her name is repeated. Vampires don’t forget her. And one day Iris Goldaming finds the journal from her teenage years and reminds her of that Lucy too. That Lucy never truly died either. She’s somewhere too. The only thing both Lucys have in common is they always just wanted someone to love them for who they were. For everything they were. Without reservation.

I’d like to say I thought a lot about Iris while thinking overnight about writing this review, but I didn’t. Iris is a great character, and I love her dearly, but she’s not the point of this book and I feel she’s best understood as not only a modern-day Lucy Westenra simulacrum but also as Lucy’s mirror, the one Lucy needs to look into to finally see who she really is after all these years and after all she’s been through. Also, one of the main themes in this book is Lucy’s queer identity, and we need a queer love interest for Lucy to root for. After all, vampires are about desire. After all this time, Lucy deserves to get what she’s always desired most.

I haven’t touched my favorite other themes in this book: f*ck the patriarchy, MLMs are cults that prey on desperate women just like vampires do, the wellness industry is predatory and relies on fear to get you to buy their products, some women don’t want to be or can’t be saved from their choices, and organized religion is a scam.

Did I miss anything? Because I could go on and on about how awesome this book is.

Go read it. Go go go go go go.

I was provided a copy of this title by the publishers and the author. All thoughts, opinions, views, and ideas expressed herein are mine and mine alone. Thank you.

File Under: 5 Star Review/Body Horror/Dark Fantasy/Historical Fantasy/Horromance/Lesbian Romance/LGBTQ Fantasy/LGBTQ Romance/Standalone Novel

Thanks to the publisher for providing this eARC in exchange for this honest review!

Lucy Undying purports to tell the story of "Lucy Westenra" during and after the events of Dracula, as she becomes a vampire and wanders for centuries, having various gothic adventures, meeting other vampire women, and pining for her lost love, Mina. In the present day, it tells the story of Iris, a young woman attempting to flee her ultrarich family and their MLM cult, which might be hiding something more sinister than its Clean Beauty-esque lifestyle branding suggests. While trying to sell things in the old Westenra mansion for quick cash, Iris finds Lucy's old journal and also bumps into the present-day Lucy, now living under an alias. As they fall in love, they realize they may be more connected than they thought.

So there's this tumblr post, by user @marisatomay. It goes "People will claim to be a fan of some thing and then hate all of the themes and motifs and story lines and plot lines and protagonists and antagonists [...] like man I don’t think that you actually like it here." That, to me, sums up this book and everything wrong with it—whether she admits it or not, its author clearly hates the original Dracula, and goes out of her way to assassinate every single character and, essentially, reverse or undo a good deal of the major plot points. It's a reading so paranoid it's been institutionalized right next to Renfield.

A perfect example of this contempt for the source material? Main character Iris is descended from Dracula character Arthur Holmwood/Lord Godalming, but throughout the entire novel, her name is misspelled "Goldaming." Yes, the protagonist's own name is misspelled!! I haven't encountered a flub this embarrassing since the old E.L. James fanfiction where she spelled Bella Swan's name "Swann." I really hope this error gets fixed in the published version, but judging by Everything Else about this book, I doubt it will. Oh, and the recurring Dracula phrase "the blood is the life" is also misquoted repeatedly as "the blood is life," just to really drive home the sheer indifference and inattention to detail.

So if this book isn't for readers who liked Dracula, who is it for? This was the question that plagued me throughout, and which I have yet to satisfactorily answer for myself. Lesbian separatists who hated the original Dracula but enjoy shallow girlbossification and don't mind glacial pacing, maybe?

It's probably faster if I list the things I did like about this book. The prose was fine. For the most part, I liked Lucy's modern love interest, Iris, and found her voice well-developed and sometimes even funny, especially in the first half of the novel. I liked some of the vampire side characters, like the Doctor and the Lover. And I enjoyed chuckling at the obvious Twilight reference right at the beginning ("adrenaline.") And that's....pretty much it. On the whole, it was a massively bloated diatribe about how much its author loathed Dracula, followed by what felt like an entirely different story about cults, featuring a third act that took longer to wrap up than Return of the King.

My main conclusion? If your reading of Dracula involves assassinating everyone from Van Helsing (here an "old Dutch pervert") to poor Mr. Swales (whose name is dragged through the mud POSTHUMOUSLY no less) to Berserker the wolf (who was a hoax, because I guess we're not allowed to have joy and fun), perhaps you shouldn't waste your energy retelling it. Food for thought.

In the last few years I've gone in pretty deep on Dracula which really enhanced my appreciation of this book! I don't think it would be nearly as enjoyable if you weren't familiar with Dracula (THE ORIGINAL BOOK SPECIFICALLY [or Dracula Daily] not the cultural osmosis Idea of Dracula).

Luckily for me, like I said, I am very familiar with Drac and the gang!! And I enjoyed this very much! I would say there are some parts of the Goldaming Living plotline that maybe don't hold up to too much scientific thought but fortunately I was too invested in the plot to worry about science. And I thought there were some really neat ~twists~ on vampire mythlogy.

Recommended to Dracula enthusiasts and/or cult enthusiasts!!

I just absolutely adored this book.

I love Dracula retellings and I couldn’t wait to read this. This story was written beautifully- there’s multiple timelines/POVs which makes this story so rich and layered. I loved the characters and I loved watching the story unfold.

This is the perfect story to add to your fall TBR.

Thank you Penguin Random House | Del Rey | Random House Worlds for the eARC of Lucy Undying.

Of the three Kiersten White books I have read to date, this one is my favorite and, in my opinion, the most clever, and best written. Although this story features characters representative of those in Dracula, I would not call this a retelling so much as a reimagining. This is the story of Lucy, a young woman turned by Dracula, and her century long quest to figure out who she is and what her role is in the world. If there is such a thing as a vampire coming of age story, Kiersten White has written one. This is also a story about women’s rights, sexual identity, and personal agency – wrapped up in mystery, adventure, revenge, and a love story.

I love a multiple timeline book and this one has three. We hear from pre-vampire Lucy as a 19-year-old girl living in late 1800s London, we hear from Lucy in modern times recounting her life to her therapist, and we hear from Iris, the unwilling heiress to a massive MLM corporation who has inherited Lucy’s childhood home. This book has so many elements of a great fall book – vampires, Dracula, family secrets, a decrepit old house in London, conspiracies, the supernatural, and an old journal.

I really liked this book. Lucy’s journey from young girl to vampire and how that impacted her on a personal level was insightful and fascinating. The side characters were delightful and endearing.

First off, don't let the 112 chapters discourage you...most of them are short, but provide the information you need to continue on. Though slower paced, it picks up halfway through. The author is a genius by taking a side character from "Dracula" and making her the main crush we didn't know we needed. Pushed aside and used by everyone around her before it could be stopped. We see through three different accounts how the actions of these key players shaped the past and still play a part in the present day. At the heart of it all is an evil corporation left to an angel who hopes to burn it all down.

Thank you so much for this arc, it did not disappoint.

I admit that I wasn't the right reader for this- I never read Dracula and I'm not a fan of vampire tales. That said, it's an interesting take on a woman trying to take back herself. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. While it wasn't for me, I'm sure this will be welcomed by White's fans as well as fans of the genre.

gripping, seductive, and lyrically stunning!

lucy undying is a story of a long-fought journey to redemption through reclamation. lucy herself is so beautifully layered whose character is progressively revealed through a clever interwoven web of timelines.
the atmosphere of this book is so cozy & moody and such a good first start to the autumn season! the prose during lucy’s narrative was so powerful and will no doubt leave a lasting impact on its readers.

Thank you so much to the publisher and Netgalley for an e-arc of this novel!

As someone who teaches and loves gothic horror and horror classics, this new take on a classic character in Dracula was appealing to me. Unfortunately, the writing skewed a bit younger in terms of characterization and dialogue than I was expecting. It didn't work for me as a reader, but I can see it working for younger audiences bridging the gap between YA and adult novels. For example, the repetitive use of "my angel" was pretty distracting for me. I also found the different timelines to take me out of the story and distract from the overall plot. I wanted the description and atmosphere to be a bit more gothic in nature and it was not -- which is fine, it just didn't work for me.

I did not like this book. I hate that I did not like this book, but MAN I did not like this book. For one thing, it's a bit convoluted and bloated due to the way we are trying to follow so many POV chapters, and they aren't juggled very well and make the pacing lag. I also REALLY had a hard time with how Lucy was such a 'special chosen one' trope, not only being 'not like other vampires', but also Forrest Gumping her way through European history (when it was revealed that she was responsible for the end of WWI I could have torn my hair out). But the biggest issue I had was that in an effort to bolster Lucy up, White felt a need to demonize every other character from DRACULA, going beyond a perfectly reasonable 'powerful and privileged men during this time period did pretty questionable to awful things' argument and instead making basically all the heroes mustache twirling villains. Including Mina. And THAT is unforgivable to me.

That said, I love the idea of a Utah based predatory MLM that may have something to do with vampires. No notes on that plot line, absolutely perfect.

lucy westenra was one of dracula’s first victims. she’s spent all of her immortal life trying to escape from his clutches and discover who she really is. in twenty-first century london, she meets another woman trying to outrun her past.

iris’s family has built a health empire based on a sinister secret. when she inherits a house in london, she finds a journal belonging to a girl named lucy, who she quickly becomes captivated by.

unfortunately, i have not yet read the original dracula. i say unfortunately for two reasons: 1) i am unable to make comparisons between this book and that one; 2) i don’t think, after reading this, i’ll like the original as much. i can, however, say with confidence that i love when retellings tell the story of a woman who was pushed aside in the original. i loved getting to know lucy, both the modern-day version and the version from her journal. she went through a lot, but i loved reading about how she found herself.

i also think the writing style worked very well for this book. like classic gothic novels (at least, the ones i have read), it was slow-paced, character-driven, and the writing was a bit...eerie? i’ve read two other books by kiersten white and the writing style in those was a bit different, so i applaud her for being able to switch it up a bit to tell this story.

overall, this was an interesting book, and i’d recommend it to anyone who enjoys dracula/dracula retellings.

Review posted on StoryGraph and Goodreads on 9/5/24. Review will be posted to Amazon on release date.

Holy wow. What happens if you mix Interview With A Vampire with Bram Stroker’s Dracula and make it queer? You get this book! This book was suspenseful, funny, dark, action-packed, and very reflective. Lucy Westenra finally gets to be her own hero that fights back after her death to reclaim her identity and desires. I really enjoyed the way that we got to see old journal entries from Lucy, Iris’s story in current time, and the therapy transcripts telling us about Lucy after becoming a vampire. This story had a whole swath of characters that I enjoyed and found myself delighted to see pop up again in different parts of the story. Overall I had a good time for this but found that there were a few sections that didn’t give the story what it needed and slowed it down. Add this one to your fall TBR for a good time.

I'm so sad because I had SUCH high hopes for this one. I've read Kiersten White before and have loved her writing, but the writing in this one let me down immensely. I haven't read a book from Kiersten White since reading And I Darken many years ago, but I loved that book so much.

I appreciated the three different POV's in here, but I had a really hard time keeping them all straight in my head. I feel like the author had the same problem juggling them all when she wrote them. I can appreciate a slowly-paced story as much as the next person, but this one drug so much that I skimmed a good bit of it. If I hadn't have skimmed, I most likely wouldn't have finished it.

The characters were excruciatingly boring and the plot was almost non-existent. The organization of the chapters felt mismatched and sloppy which made me feel disconnected as the reader. I'm giving it 2 stars because, honestly, the vibes were there. It's the execution that needs some work.

Thank you to NetGalley and Del Rey for providing me with a free ebook in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley and Random House Publishing for this opportunity to read rate and review this arc which is available 9/10/24!

WOW. WOW. I mean holy mother of Pearl but this might be one of my favs this year. This a sapphic vampire romance set in the world of Bram Stoker’s Dracula. It is filled with taking back her power, her autonomy and finding love in Irish when Lucy didn’t think she deserved to be loved as a monster. There is suspense and moments of true angst. I bloody loved it.

Dark, beautiful, and delicious. This book has got to be one of my favorite vampire elements of all time. Could not recommend this more!