I was intrigued by this quirky and snarky, enemies to lovers, slow burn fantasy. It has an assassin versus a healer and I lost myself in their world of intrigue and magic. Some of the world building in the beginning took some time for me to understand, but once I figured out what was going on, it was addicting and I couldn’t put the book down.

Ostric from the Fyren Order of Assassins has a problem. He needs help from Aurienne, a healer, who is a member of his enemy’s order, the Haelens. He has a seith (magic) degenerative disease and his magic abilities are weakening. He goes to see Aurienne in secret to beg for her help. Aurienne desperately needs funding for research to find a cure for a terrible pox that is making their children very sick. Ostric agrees to fund her research if she will help cure him of his disease.

In the beginning of the book, we see Ostric’s life as an assassin and it is pretty morbid. He is involved in espionage and intelligence gathering and thinks there could be an enemy behind the Haelens Pox. He and Aurienne investigate rumors and threats together and begin to learn more about each other.

When Ostric is injured fighting an enemy headed for Aurienne’s stronghold, she takes him to her parent’s home to recover. They are smitten with each other and I loved the scene when they dance together.

Brigitte Knightly has a unique voice and I think we will be seeing good things from her in the future. I can’t wait for book 2 of this duology. This book was addictive and truly irresistible! My grade is 4 and 1/2 stars. My full review will be at All About Romance closer to the release date.

“Suddenly the eye was not satisfied with seeing; suddenly the mouth wished to taste” 
I’d  like to thank NetGalley and Berkley for the opportunity to read an ARC of the irresistible urge to fall for your enemy! 
I was THRILLED when I got the notification of approval. I know that so many people were itching to get their hands on it. But, I unfortunately really struggled to connect with this one. 
The book has a great concept with the magic system and familiars but lacked an exciting plot to keep me truly interested. I found myself oftentimes drifting away to do other things. 
If you’re looking for true enemies to lovers with low stakes and banter then I suggest picking this one up! However, I really wish that there as more to this one. There isn’t even a spark of romance until 68% in and even then it’s more of a one sided edging. 
I would absolutely not recommend this one but I think you have to be in a very specific mood to enjoy it. And unfortunately, it just wasn’t the right one for me. 
Tropes:  enemies to lovers  healer x assassin for hire  banter  unique magic system  low stake fantasy 
Thank you again to NetGalley and Berkeley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Ok, let me start by saying I wanted to love this. But was left feeling very meh. I am newer to the Dramione fan fic world, but have heard a lot of great things about Draco Malfoy and the mortifying ordeal of falling in love.

You can definitely tell this book follows the Dramione vibe - morally grey confident MMC? Check. Intelligent, cunning and sharp healer FMC? Check again. In this universe, they are Aurienne and Osric. Standing on opposites sides of right and wrong, their worlds only collide when Osric needs a healer to save his life. Thus ensues the enemies to lovers trope and all the witty banter.

The issue I take is with lack of depth in the characters - I didn't feel you got much development into either, so it's hard to connect to them and root for them. My bigger issue is with writing - using over complicated vocabulary that constantly makes you stop and have to look up words is frustrating. I think some authors think it conveys intelligence and maturity in writing, but sometimes it reads more like a swap out of words found in a thesaurus.
Following are examples of words used (and not just once) : jejune, daguerreotype, gnu, adamantine, obeisance, repudiation, quixotic, obsequious, opine and etc

OK SO this book was amazing!!! I am probably one of the few people who hasn’t read the original dramione fan fic. These characters didn’t feel like a rewritten Draco and Hermine at all!

The main characters were entirely their own and made so much sense together. As someone who loves banter in a book I found myself laughing out loud during their conversations. Oscric stole my heart with how much he cared for Aurienne (and his dog rescue). Aurienne was so quick witted and I fell in love with her dry humor.

I also loved the medical terminology in this book, as someone who was never interested in the medical field I learned so much! 🫢

I would recommend this book to fans of slow burn romances and quick witted main characters. Beyond excited for book two! I truly didn’t want this book to end 🥰

This book was incredible, containing everything you could possibly want in a fantasy and a romance. It is filled with adventure and yearning, set in a well-developed and interesting world with fully realized characters that you genuinely root for. The mystery in the plot and the character development pulls you in and takes you on a rollercoaster of emotions— laughter, frustration, intrigue, tears, and swooning. It features the staples of many beloved stories but presents them with a unique voice and spin. I cannot recommend this book enough and can't wait to have a copy on my shelf at home and in the library to suggest to all my patrons. I am already highly anticipating book two!!

*Spoiler ahead*—the cliffhanger at the end truly shook me to my core, and I am deeply, deeply unwell. Again, it's an absolutely fantastic book, but also, who should I send my therapy bill to?

I loved this book so much! The chemistry between the two took a little while to get going, but I loved the banter! The world building took me a second to figure out, but I can't wait to find out more.aboht the rest of the kingdoms!

Loved this book. Really interesting new world, complex characters & hilarious dialogue.
I can’t wait for the next book in the series, but thank you for introducing me to a new author. I can’t wait to devour her other books.

The amount of times I laughed out loud while reading The Irresistible Urge to Fall For Your Enemy is multitudinous. I truly love Bridgette Knightley’s writing style. For one my vocabulary vastly increased. I was honestly looking up words in the dictionary every chapter. I think my favorite word in this novel was obstreperous.

In addition to her increasing my lexicon, Knightley is also able to write the most natural hilarious banter between her characters. The back and forth between our two main characters, Aurienne & Osric, is so well written. Osric is an unapologetic assassin and the details of his job are increasingly grim & Aurienne is a brilliant, rule following healer who hates everything Osric stands for. You can truly feel their hatred towards each other.

Lately a lot of books are pushing an enemy to lovers angle with just a few chapters of mild dislike and then a sudden case of insta-love. This fortunately is not the case in this novel. The yearning was perfectly executed and I am already anxiously awaiting the sequel.

DMATMOOBIL fans will not be disappointed with this book. While this is not a direct retelling it certainly has all the marks of what made the Dramoine fic so endearing to the fandom. There are of course a few fun references that are woven into the story that brought a smile to my face.

ARC provided by Netgalley & Berkley Publishing Group in exchange for an honest review.

This book was everything I needed and wanted. The humor? Perfection. The writing? Stunning. Brigitte Knightley has this way of weaving words together that makes every sentence feel like pure magic. I laughed, I gasped, I fell completely in love with this story.

If you loved Draco Malfoy and the Mortifying Ordeal of Being in Love, you’re going to eat this up. It has all the Dramione themes we know and love (see: tension, banter, longing) but it also stands completely on its own. The adventure, the stakes, the journey, it’s just all so well done.

And we need to talk about Osric because I swear he walked straight out of the pages and took over my heart. He stole every scene he was in, and if I don’t get more of him in the NEAR future, I will simply perish.

This book was an experience, and I already want to read it all over again. I can’t wait until everyone gets their hands on this because it was simply the best. And also WHEN IS BOOK 2 BRIGITTE??

I really enjoyed this book! The plot kept me hooked, and there’s so much more going on in the background than just the relationships between the characters.

What I loved most was the banter – it was hilarious. The enemies-to-lovers dynamic was perfectly done, they really hate each other in the beginning.

Also, can we talk about Osric? He looks incredibly hot on the cover, and I couldn’t stop picturing him! Lonesome, murderous mmc who has a soft spot for fmc (and he doesn’t like it).

Aurienne is the perfect FMC for enemies-to-lovers plot line —witty, smart, sharp, their dialogues were so fun to read.

The tropes:

•he fell first,
•sloooow burn,
•political intrigue,
•enemies to lovers,
•banter,
•awesome magic system.

I definitely need the second book now!

Writing style: impeccable. Characters: fully fleshed out and perfectly imperfect. Their chemistry: leaps off the PAGE. A perfect enemies-to-lovers romance with its own individual magic system. 10/10. If you loved Emily Wilde’s Encyclopaedia of Faeries, this book is for you! Remind me…when does the second book come out??

Absolutely love loved this book!
Gave me all the dramione vibes and I am here for it !!
This debut as exceeded my expectations and more and I’m truly grateful that I had the opportunity to read it early♥️

Thank you for the chance to read this book early! I didn't know anything about the author's prior fanfiction work and how popular she was. I just saw this and thought it sounded fun! And it was! It was a really fast read and I loved the tension and chemistry between the leads. There was humor (body humor and sexual humor) sprinkled in. If the characters didn't have such strong chemistry, I think some parts could have read slow, but the writing style and characters kept the pacing fast and even, but they really never did. I was interested in the world, the different orders and of course most interested in if the cure would work. The last quarter of the book flew by and when I reached the end, I couldn't believe it was over. I thought I'd have at least a couple chapters left. I WANTED to have a couple chapters left. I will eagerly be anticipating the next book

Ohhhh my gosh this was so good!!

Do not let the cover fool you, it’s definitely got an element of higher fantasy to it that took my brain a moment to wrap around, but once I did I was IN IT. The way this is written will have you laughing at the banter. The writing style is unique and so fun to read I honestly don’t know how to explain it other than it’s a grown up version of HP in writing style.
I’m so glad to see that this author was able to turn her litfic into a masterpiece. I am obsessed.

I adored this. The slow progression in the relationship between the characters was masterfully done; the culture was interesting and the worldbuilding excellent. This isn’t yet published, and I’m already looking for information on the sequel. I wish it were longer and the story arc completed, because I don’t want to wait for more of these two!

This book has truly taken a piece of my heart. One of the most well rounded books I’ve read in some time. The story was fun, engaging and well thought out. The author did an amazing job with the world building and magic system. And the character development was on point. I loved both the MMC and FMC so much and miss them already.
An amazing slow burn that represents growth through trials, women in STEM, he falls first, top notch banter and witty humor.
This is an absolute must read. I cannot wait to continue to live in this world that Brigette Knightley has created.

thank you Netgalley and the Berkley Publishing Group for providing me with this eArc in exchange for an honest review!

alright alright we're just going to start off by saying that the humor in this book is everything to me. they're cheeky, they're witty. she's soooo unimpressed with him while he's always saying something to get a reaction out of her. UGH. quality banter. and the fantasy was fantasy-ing. OH THAT WAS FUN. I CAN'T WAIT FOR BOOK 2.

full RTC when as we get closer to its release date: July 8, 2025

As a Dramione girlie, as soon as I heard the news that Brigitte was going to be traditionally published I was so excited and really hoped to get an arc for her new book. Thank you Berkeley for his arc, I really really appreciate it!
I loved the book. Brigitte’s way of writing humor is unmatched. Aurienne and Osric’s banter was something I was living for as well as their slowburn romance. I was wondering how Aurienne was going to fall for Oscric and the way it happened was beautifully done. I truly is an enemies, to reluctant allies to slowly having feelings for each other. I cannot wait for the next book. The two main characters are very different but still felt as if I knew them myself.
The world building was a bit jarring but as any other fantasy book, I got used to it. Again, I had an incredible time and can’t wait for this book to come out.

This being a debut novel… thank you god for Brigette Knightley. From the world building to the plot and characters, this was flawless. The writing style was so good and both Osric and Aurienne were so complex and real (and they were idiots too). The banter and the chemistry was on point; never in the book did any of their interactions feel like they were pushed or out of character. The way you can see how they slowly start to develop feelings and care and trust for each other through the things they go through and adventures they do together, it’s just everything to me and I can’t wait to see how all of this develops even more in book 2 (which we’ll be praying it comes out soon because if I have to wait a long time for it, I will simply die).

“Aurienne sought Mordaunt’s gaze to see how much longer he wished to keep up the pretence of the dance, but his eyes were on their joined hands. Their star-crossed tācn pressed against each other’s. Their Orders were in their veins, as inescapable as their own blood.” This is so sick, Brigette you are insane I can't handle this. As someone who read the fanfic back then, I can say that I went with a lot of expectations for this book, and this was all I wanted and more. It was such a original and fun novel and I can't wait to read all of the other books Brigette Knightley will put out in the future, because she just became one of my favourite authors.

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Berkley | Ace for the ARC in exchange for an honest review!

Thank you to Berkley Publishing and NetGalley for providing me with this ARC! All opinions below are my own.

⭐️2.5 rounded down.

I’d like to first note that while going into this book, I had no prior knowledge about any Dramoine fanfictions.

With that being said, unfortunately this book wasn’t really for me. The fact it was enemies to lovers wasn’t an issue, and I actually found the pacing in that aspect to be fairly good. My issue comes more-so with the actual prose and initial presentation of both characters. The way it is written is extravagant, but unfortunately that also leads to clunky sentences that were needlessly difficult to get through. Many of the sentences which represent a characters thoughts or add on to characters actions simply don’t come across as funny or charming like they’re supposed to. This is why the first half of the book led me to feeling as if both Osric and Aurienne were equally insufferable in a story which, while largely character driven, failed to drive me to like either of them until far later than it should have.

Much of the vocabulary unique to the book is just thrown at you all at once in the midst of other, similar, incredibly real words. Very very tedious- I don’t mind annotating vocabulary and expanding my daily vernacular, but at times it felt a teeny bit silly and quite a bit overwhelming.

I don’t regret not DNF’ing the book, as the second half feels a lot less clunky and difficult to get through. I, however, do feel like it’s an issue that you even have to get to the second half for it to feel less insufferably haughty verbiage wise. The ending feels like it somewhat just drags out to a sequel, but it isn’t really that aggravating all things considered.

Over all, unfortunately this wasn’t really for me. Regardless of that, though, understand my thoughts won’t resonate with everyone who stumbles upon this review and I encourage anyone even slightly interested to at least give it a try.