This started out promising, but it was just not for me. The characters fell flat, and I was bored.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for the eARC.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me an ARC of this book for an honest review. All opinions are my own.

I saw in the description that this novel was compared to Jay Kristoff's Empire of the Vampire. This had me really excited as I had just finished that novel and adored it. Unfortunately, this book was by far the less enjoyable of the two.

While the concept was amazing (particularly the idea of strengths of blood and the different classes being allowed certain bloods to consume. And the Blood Market?? Amazing), the execution suffered from too many storylines all told in first person. This could have been excused if the characters' voices were distinct enough, but they lacked those unique qualities and all melded together in my brain. This was not helped by some of the cringeworthy dialogue and vast quantities of info-dumping that plagued each character.

SPOILER HERE: The big reveal of the real deal with the Grays also fell really flat because Saxe felt like a caricature of a villain, which immediately made him suspicious. I suspected his involvement the entire time, and was not pleased to have guessed that so early on. END SPOILER.

All in all, a fantastic idea and some shining pieces in there, but just a little clunky in the outcome. I will not be continuing with the series because I did not really enjoy my trudge through this first entry.

I really wanted to like this book. Vampires and Werewolves have always been a favorite genre. It started off promising and I liked the character, Sam, but it wasn't enough. Most of the characters were boring or too over the top. And the endless, room descriptions.... This book had so much potential and an intense edit would maybe save it, but the bulk of it was boring. I'm being generous with three stars - for the parts I liked and for what it could have been.

Thank you to St Martin's Press for providing an eARC of this book. All opinions are my own.

Such an exciting and well written story! The characters were intriguing and the plot kept my attention the entire book. Definately would recommend to friends and fellow readers.

Thank you to SMP and NetGalley for a chance to read and review Lightfall by Ed Crocker!

I think this had a lot of promise, but overall it was just kind of hard to follow along with. There were massive sections of info dumping that didn’t feel smooth within the story. It was more like a character mentions something and then the book says “Oh hey, here’s the history of the thing I just mentioned.” The history and world building could have been incorporated better.

I also didn’t live that there were so many POVs. It’s definitely a personal preference. It’s rare for me to like more than two POVs in a book.

I love the idea behind this book, but it just needed a little tweaking with the flow of it.

Sadly, I was unable to finish this book.

It started off with promise - it's marketed as "for fans Empire of the Vampire" (one of my all time favorites), and the world was intriguing! I loved the concept of a vampire city, the different sorcerer/magick types, and the kinds of blood having different strengths - there was a hierarchy of blood, with the higher tiers granting better abilities (like seeing in the dark). It was so cool!

Unfortunately, my enjoyment was violently derailed rather quickly, when the FMC and her friend referred to each other by name CONSTANTLY. Every. Single. Sentence. NO ONE TALKS LIKE THAT!! It drove me absolutely bat shit crazy within a matter of pages, ripping me out of the story every time it happened, until that was all I could focus on and I ended up rage quitting. I highlighted them for a while, until it got to be too much, and you should see my highlights. They said each other's name every time they addressed the other person. It was ridiculous. I read an eARC, so I'm hoping this issue will be fixed in final publication.

Despite that, I still attempted to continue the story one more time, because of the strong start and interesting world. Then I got to the chapter through Sage’s point of view. It was long, boring, and pretentious AF, and it single-handedly obliterated any interest I had left in the book, so I gave up entirely.

Maybe one day I'll try to push past those issues via audio, because the narrator sounded great in the sample I listened to, and I really was interested in the world.

This book kept its melancholy feel from start to finish and I ate it up like my favorite meal. This book unforgivingly explored grief and memory. A truly cosmic read with a great deal of depth that keeps you within this thin veil of unknown where loss means a great deal.

This was an eerie book that definitely sticks with you.

Ed Crocker’s 'Lightfall' is a luminous yet harrowing exploration of grief, memory, and the thin veil between reality and the unknown. With haunting prose and an atmosphere steeped in melancholy, the novel weaves a tale that is both intimate and cosmic, pulling readers into a world where loss reshapes everything. Equal parts eerie and poetic, 'Lightfall' lingers like a half-remembered dream. Unsettling, beautiful, and impossible to forget.

I thought this was very good and I will have to add this to the shop shelves. Thank you for the chance for us to review.

Thank to the publisher and Netgalley for the chance to read Lightfall.

I am sure there is an audience for this story but it just was not me at this moment in time. I found myself frequently getting distracted while reading as I just was not very engaged in the story or any of the characters. This also made it really challenging to keep track of all the different characters and their points of view. It frequently felt like there was a lot of bouncing around but not much going on.

There was some interesting lore with vampires and werewolves, but I just wanted more tension or action I suppose.

This was an interesting take on the vampire lore that I don't think I've come across before. Different blood that grants the vampires a few different abilities and more. The mystery of why the mortals are gone is also interesting. I liked the development of Sam, from maid to someone more involved and strong. A few of the side characters kept my attention. The ending leaves enough mystery and interest for me to want to read the next book.

MEH. This was a DNF at 43% for me. I kept telling myself that it had to get better, but it wasn't so I finally decided to move on to another book. Many of the character names were silly, I needed a good map to try and figure out where things were because it didn't really make sense to me the way it was written, and the story was dragging. I don't understand all the hype behind this book.

Thank you to NetGalley & the publisher for allowing me access to an early release in exchange for an honest review!

I had higher hopes for this one than it delivered on honestly. The description had me thinking this would be a little more rich than what I got. It's hard to explain but it's not that the novel is poorly written, it's just that it's a little boring. It was trying to be something it's not, and I didn't vibe with it or any of the characters.

It felt a little like it was trying to be Dune with werewolves and vampires, which worked about as well as you're probably thinking. There was a hint of romance somewhere in there, but I couldn't have cared less about whatever was going on with that one. At it's core this is a dry sci-fi ,with bland characters set in a world of vampires and warewolves that could have been replaced with any type of fantasy character and not changed the world or plot much at all.

Overall it was very mid and it put me in a reading slump. This was just not for me but I stuck it out to the end.

Thanks to SMP and Netgalley for the arc.

This was heavy on social commentary and I wasn't really expecting that. In a vampire society where blood is tied to class, the rich and powerful vamps get the strong blood, while the poor vamps get the weak blood.

This book was different than what I was expecting. It was very heavy on social commentary (which isn't a bad thing), but I don't feel like it was marketed like that.
There was also a lack of depth in the development of characters and world building that I think would have elevated this book and taken it from 'okay' to 'great.'

I had high hopes for this book. I was wanting a really good book to get back into the Vampire/Werewolf world that I could be obsessed with and this went in the other direction for me.

I wasn't enthralled with this world and just found myself skimming.

I enjoyed the read enough to finish it, but was surprised I didn’t like it more from reading the premise of the book. When I heard it was compared to Empire of the Vampire I got even more excited, but it just fell flat for me. Maybe that was an unfair comparison and put me in a different mindset than I should have been while reading it. I just wasn’t invested in the characters and story like I want to me in the fantasies I read.

Ed Crocker wrote vampires like I’ve never read them before. Lightfall had a mystique about it that might just have me continuing the series.

In the last vampire city of First Light, the vampire class system is harsh. Sam is a maid in the palace and has always longed for something more— she discovers the only clue to a high profile murder and quickly gets roped into an underground rebel spy group. Our teams grows to 6— two sorcerers who can’t do magic, a vampire countess rich in secrets and her rogue friend, and a werewolf assassin. As they slowly begin to unravel the mystery, it becomes clear they are stumbling upon something much larger.

The world had an almost scifi-quality about it. It was a city years after the tragedy hit, things sucked (literally and figuratively), and it was quite dark and atmospheric. I enjoyed learning about the world, even though I was confused for a while. By the time I got the hang of things, the book ended!

I enjoyed the way that the fantasy characters interacted in a refreshingly new way. Specifically, Crocker’s take on sorcerers (different types, including some with no magic, all born as adults???) and vampires (types of blood=strength, abilities, and immortality) were all very interesting. Also no mortals! He had multiple POVs that helped unlock more lore, but I wish it was more limited as some of his characters’ POV felt similar to one another (but not all! That’s why I wish it was slightly more limited).

Considering this is his debut, I’d be interested to see what Crocker writes next. I was engaged and I really enjoyed the creativity—I feel like I’ve been reading a lot of the same types of fantasy lately, and this was a welcome change!

Thank you St. Martin’s Press and Netgalley for an advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

Ed Crocker’s Lightfall is a beautifully imagined fantasy with a compelling premise and stunning world-building. The richly crafted landscapes, intricate magic system, and grand sense of adventure immediately draw you in. However, while the setting is immersive, I found it difficult to connect with the characters on an emotional level. Their struggles and relationships felt somewhat distant, making it hard to fully invest in their journey. That said, the foundation Crocker has built is strong, and I’m hopeful that the remaining books in the trilogy will deepen the character development and deliver an even more engaging story.

*A free eARC copy of Lightfall was provided by the publisher in return for a fair and unbiased review*

Lightfall by Ed Crocker is the first book in Crocker's new The Everlands Trilogy and I found it to be an enjoyable start to this story. Lightfall takes place in a world filled with vampires, werewolves and sorcerers where much of the magic is driven by the consumption of different types of blood. The novel contains multiple POV's from the different races that become more interconnected as the novel progresses. Most of the plot is driven by the fallout from the murder of the son of the ruling vampire lord in the city of Lightfall.

While the novel did have a bit of a slower start, by the time things got going I was fully sucked into the story and its conclusion I am eagerly left waiting for the second volume of this trilogy to release.

Many of the blurbs recommend Lightfall to fans of Empire of the Vampire and The Justice of Kings. I have only read the Empire of the Vampire books, but I could see fans of that series finding enjoyment with Lightfall even though this book is nowhere near as dark as the EotV books.

Overall I recommend this book to fans of fantasy and dark vampire stories and give Lightfall a rating of 4 out of 5 stars.