Screaming and crying for book 2!
I loved this one so much, the world building was amazing and the characters were great for a first book, im invested to know where they all go and do!

Thank you to NetGalley and Hodderscape for the ARC. I DNF’d at 25%. This book has an interesting premise and world building. I really thought the lore here was fresh and unique. That being said, the story didn’t really grab me. I felt like Csilla was very meek and bland, especially since she was supposed to have no soul. I’m sure that was supposed to loop back around and mean she was a goddess, but it felt like the plot was carrying her along like a leaf in a stream rather than her making any mark on the book.

4 Stars

This book was great. I was invested in the characters--especially in Ágnes and Csilla, as well as Mihály--and adored the story. The world was immersive and the writing, OH. MY. GOD. The writing! Lush and poetic; I could feel every heartbeat and chilling moment, every small instance of love and grief.
On the other hand, there were some typos in the text and moments where I struggled to understand choices made in the story. But thoese are miniscule points you coule critique.

My favourite quote:

"The helplessness of not being able to care for the person she loved was worse than the loneliness of no care at all."


Thank you to the publisher and author for the E-Arc. The review is entirely my own.

Thank you to NetGalley and Cate Baumer for providing me with this ARC.

The book is beautifly written. The world is beautiful. Where this book falls short is the characters unfortunately.

The premise of this book and the way the church was given so much power felt oddly beautiful, to make something that is seen as perfect, be so not? The story follows 3 POV's all with their own mission and purpose, but where it fell short for me was the fleshing out of them all. I didn't feel what they felt, by the end I didn't even mind if they lived or not, which is not good for me as a reader.

I will read book two, because I think with the proper time and tweaking this duology could be a homerun. One dark window suffered the same issues, and she knocked it out of the park with two twisted crowns. Hoping for the same for Cate!

🍵𝗧𝗲𝗮 𝗧𝗵𝗼𝘂𝗴𝗵𝘁𝘀
This book walked into my brain with bloody communion hands and whispered “you are not ready.” Csilla is not your average chosen one—she’s the Church’s sinless assassin, used like a scalpel on holy rot. And Mihály? The divine golden boy with secrets under his smile and rage wrapped in silk? Yeah. He tore me up.

The way these two circle each other—one soulless, the other drowning in sanctity—it’s sacrilegious tension at its finest. Every chapter is dripping with guilt, divine magic, and the sharp ache of wanting something you’re told you can’t have. It’s church politics with daggers, an Inquisitor ex with a redemption kink, and a murder mystery so twisted I couldn’t tell which prayer was a lie until it bled out. I did not survive this book. I just confessed to it.

💔 Soulless protagonist as weapon
⚖️ Morality quantified by touch
🕵️ Mystery serial killer in sacred city
🤝 Reluctant allies with dangerous deal
🛡️ Inquisitor redemption run
🕳 Faith vs survival choices

4.5 ⭐️
The Faithful dark
This story takes place in a holy walled city where sin and sanctity are revealed through touch, Csilla - a girl born without a soul - is worth little to the Church that raised her. But when a series of murders corrodes the faithful magic that keep the city safe, the Church elders see a use for her she can assassinate their prime suspect, a heretic with divine heritage, without risking the stain of sin.

Content Notes
- Religiously sanctioned torture
- violence (no identity-based or sexual violence)
- animal death
- character death
- alcohol and substance abuse.

„The Faithful dark“ has a beautiful lyrical style of writing,it has gothic dark atmosphere, murder mystery throughout the whole story, Vatican vibes, one of the slowest burn I’ve ever read and yearning.
Honestly, at the beginning it was a little bit hard to get into the book, it took me some time to grasp the plot but when I did I was enthralled by the whole plot.

You get the POV of Csilla, girl without a soul and Ilan, Inquisitor of the Church.
I would recommend this book to someone who wanted a dark, mystic fantasy story with really unique story concept.

I can’t wait to continue this story 🙈

Thank you NetGalley, Cate Baumer, Hodderscape @HodderBooks and @HodderPublicity for providing me with an ARC of this book

4.5 stars. Original and deeply introspective. This novel has so much heart. The three leads (who also are the three POVs) are, in my opinion, all very distinct and well-developed. The world-building is immense but not confusing. The author (and perhaps, the editor as well) worked hard to make the story progress and grow while not getting bogged down in extraneous details. It was largely successful. Cannot wait for book 2.

This book is haunting beautiful. Everything feels like a labrynth of faith and fear. It’s giving The Name of the Rose vibes with Ilan and Csillas deep faiths and then there is Mihaly, touched by an Angel, grieving a lover.

The story is complex and although there are dark academia vibes through the research and experiments this is definitely a journey of discovery for all involved.

I don’t want to give anything away about what happens and complex relations ships of the three main characters who are drawn together.

I loved this book. The city in my head it like Edinburgh with a cathedral instead the castle with Labrynth like streets. This story is about faith, demons, darkness and blind trust. I highly recommend.

Cannot wait for book 2

The Faithful Dark is an interesting, beautifully gothic novel set in a world where God (Asten) and his angels once walked but then abandoned humanity, leaving behind their bloodlines (the Izir) and their faithful. The world appears to be queer-normative and one of the main characters is transgender. The church is dominant and entwined with the secular government, and a fall from grace within the church condemns the fallen to a lifetime of being shunned. Miracles are a given, and war is constant, both against nations that have broken away from the Immaculate Union, and the threat of demons.

Written in third person dual-alternating POV, the POV characters are Csilla and Ilan.

All our protagonist Csilla wants is to belong to the church. A foundling raised within its walls, she longs to be accepted and to give her vows. She works with the sisters of Mercy tending to the people of the sacred city Silgard. Lacking a soul, she is unable to be consecrated and the relics used by the church to suss out the sinful have no effect on her.

Ilan is the Inquisitor for the church, a high-ranking official who heads Judgment and is responsible for punishing those who stray. Ilan is a trans man - his background briefly given - and suffers no stigma. Ilan is desperately working to resolve the unholy murders occurring within the city, with each act eroding both the power of the church and his own authority.

Csilla and Ilan become embroiled by the murders and a charismatic Izir named Mihaly, and the three of them strike up an uneasy alliance to solve them. Their internal motivations are not aligned, and conflicts arise, mostly centering on Mihaly’s plans for Csilla and Ilan’s unease.

The prose is accessible and easy to read, and the pacing was relatively quick. I didn’t feel like I was struggling to get through the book, but also didn’t feel like I was flying through it. The character arcs are relatively well-fleshed out: Csilla loses some of her naivety as she progresses and experiences the world outside of the church, and has a dramatic if somewhat obscurely done reveal at the end; Ilan remains more stagnant but I enjoyed his POV chapters more than Csilla’s - they have a nice murder-mystery procedural feel to them at times.

The story is relatively well-balanced between world-building and plot, and I enjoyed the feel of the world very much. Gothic, crumbling, arcane, with a sense of distrust lurking around the corner. It reminded me of Rachel Gillig’s the Knight and the Moth in terms of the feel of the world and the religious structures. This is not romance driven and I greatly enjoyed its reliance on plot over character drama to advance the storyline. There is some tension but not enough to even term it a romantic subplot.

I did not expect the end and I enjoyed the reveals and twists the author crafted. I am interested to see where the story goes and will definitely read subsequent entries.

This was such an intriguing read. The world is dark, complex, and full of gothic Victorian vibes—where angels and demons exist, sin leaves a mark on your soul, and the Church rules with terrifying power. I loved how far the book took those ideas, really leaning into the darker implications.

The prose is gorgeous and moody, but I’ll be honest, it sometimes confused me more than it clarified. There were moments I wasn’t quite sure what had happened, especially when it came to the magic system or certain scene transitions. For a book that felt so vivid in tone, some scenes felt oddly hard to picture.

That said, the characters really surprised me. I wasn’t sold on Ilan or Csilla at first, but by the end, I genuinely cared about both of them.

Overall, it’s a beautifully written and ambitious book, but a little more clarity would’ve gone a long way.

Csilla wants nothing more than to belong to the Church and to help people heal. Unfortunately, since she has no soul, the church has no real use for her and sends her off to kill on their behalf.. Enter Ilan, who is morally gray in behavior but pursues justice with an iron fist, a holy heretic who may be the chaos agent the church needs to connect with the general public, and a whole hierarchy of old men in the church with too much power. When the demons are let in and people start dying, the unlikely trio has the weight of the city on their shoulders

“You have to let others burn sometimes.”

The Faithful Dark is the first book in the Brilliant Soul duology by Cate Baumer. 

This dark gothic fantasy is set in a holy walled city (think supernatural Vatican) where the touch of a holy relic can reveal how much sin a person is carrying on their soul 😳

Csilla, an orphan born without a soul, has spent her life being overlooked by the Church, until they suddenly order her to assassinate Mihaly; a descendent of the angels who’s accused of preaching heresy and committing a series of murders that threaten the magic holding the city together 💫

Instead, Csilla strikes an uneasy bargain with Mihaly - they work together to find the real killer in order to save the city, and he’ll use his divine powers to give her a soul ✨

Joining them in their quest is Ilan, the Church’s former High Inquisitor, who’s desperate to reclaim his position. Together, the trio navigates twisted secrets, betrayal, and political manipulation, in an attempt to save their city ⛪️

What worked for me:

❤️‍🩹 Compelling characters - all three are unique, flawed in their own way, and experience meaningful growth.

📜Immersive setting - super eerie Victorian era gothic vibes 👌🏻

What didn’t work as well:

🌍Pacing and worldbuilding - at first there was a lot of lore that didn’t seem to be explained fully, and I felt like I was missing context. Somewhere around 40% the story started to become clearer though, and I was invested in getting answers.

🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️Queer rep - the book is marketed as having an all-queer cast, but this didn’t feel fully realised on the page. I would’ve loved to see more depth and visibility to the characters’ identities.

All in all, this was an immersive, morally complex read with strong character arcs. I’ll definitely be picking up the sequel to see where the story goes.

If you’re looking for something dark and gothic, with a touch of Dan Brown’s Angels & Demons, pick this one up when it’s released in February 2026! 📚

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this eARC.

Thank you to the author and publisher for allowing me an e-ARC of this via NetGalley! That has not influenced this review and all opinions are my own.

One of my favourite things about this book was the FMC. She was shy, kind and incredibly caring and I think the author did a great job of making her seem ‘innocent’. I really enjoyed these change of a soft FMC. There is also some slow burn and some slight enemies to lovers, both of which are my favourite tropes. The world building was also really interesting and I found it very easy to imagine the environment.

For me, the pacing was off for the first half of the book as it was really slow and nothing really happened. I personally find it difficult to follow any book that takes a while to develop into plot, however that isn’t a reflection of the authors writing as that’s just my personal preference!! The bones of the story are definitely there, and the actual premise and plot were great, I just think some of the action could’ve been brought forward. But there are also some plot twists which helps to keep us on our feet!!

Rating: 3/5 stars (⭐️⭐️⭐️/⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️)

The author did a fantastic job of crafting a genius world that I couldn't help but dive into. The magic system was well thought out and cared for, and I'm always a sucker for angels and religion used in fantasy settings!
Further, I thought the characters were strongly developed; they felt incredibly real, and helped with getting into this story.
My major issue with this story was the pacing, as it was incredibly slow at first, and took a long time to really get into.
I would recommend to patrons looking for unique, well told, fantasies.

This one absolutely hit; a breathtaking fantasy that shredded me emotionally. Selene wakes up after ten years of captivity, winged and broken, thrust back into a homeland that feels like a stranger’s. Then there’s Callan- an entire world built across a sea of starlight, and he’s the ultimate found-family anchor in the storm of her trauma.

The slow-burn romance is tender and devastating, the found family vibes are chef’s kiss, and the world-building is stunning in both pain and beauty. And that cliffhanger? I was NOT prepared- I literally audibly gasped in public.

Thank-you to NetGalleyUK and publisher, Hodder & Stoughton, for an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

The Faithful Dark was billed as "Angels, demons, serial killers in a fantasy Vatican" and that's a pretty accurate summary of the starting point. We have three main characters who are introduced pretty early on as the soulless orphan taken in by the church, desperate to belong, but never allowed to be virtue of her lack of soul; the semi-angel con-conformist who is healing the people while preaching heresy and possibly responsible for many of them abandoning the church; and the sort of main-inquisitor who is flogging people to make them holy again or something. (It's also casually mentioned in the opening pages that said inquisitor is trans, before never being mentioned again. I can't decide whether it's cool that it's a non-issue, or irritating that it's used as a bit of queer baiting that has no bearing on the plot).

So far, so good. Flawed characters, but each quite likable in their own way.

And then the plot is something like...
- There's a holy city. Everybody in the city is pretty holy.
- There's special glass that can tell you what shape somebody's soul is in.
- There's some kind of high priest. He's referred to as the Incarnate, but he's actually just the one who can hear the main god's voice. (Does the author not know what incarnate means?) He's off at some kind of holy war and everybody is quite grumpy that he's not coming back sooner.
- Bad stuff is going down, and the church think it's because of the heretic angel.
- They send soulless girl off to kill the angel.
- Shenanigans ensue.

So far, so good. I liked the set up. I liked the atmosphere. I even liked the variety of characters.

However...

Lots of the world building just wasn't fleshed out. I enjoy being dropped in at the deep end with fantasy worlds rather than having every little bit of exposition spelled out for me, but I was a considerable chunk of the way into the book when I turned to my husband and said "... I don't know what's going on right now."

It's never really explained:
- What it means that the city is holy. (Given there are definitely still people sinning inside it).
- How this city fits in with the rest of the world and the war that's being fought.
- What this seal (that is failing) is there for and what will happen if/when it dies
- What the heresy that this angel is preaching is

So you're left with this weird situation where the angel is sort of redeemable because the heresy isn't that bad, but then 5 minutes ago the church was trying to murder him because he was so dangerous. Meanwhile you've got a weird kind of shallow half-love story going on, with some borderline necromancy stuff. And a power struggle that never really goes anywhere, other than introducing tension. There are a couple of plot twists that really aren't plot twists because the foreshadowing is written in capital letters so it's pretty clear who the bad guys are going to be.

Overall, I finished this book feeling frustrated. It felt a bit like having a tour from a really excellent tour guide who described everything beautifully and pointed out intricate details... but fundamentally they were showing you around an unfinished house where some of the walls hadn't been built yet. Cate Beaumer clearly has a lovely way with words, but it wasn't enough to get me past the gaps in the plot.

4.5-star review for The Faithful Dark by Cate Baumer

The Faithful Dark is a gorgeously written gothic fantasy that sinks its teeth into themes of faith, corruption, and redemption. Cate Baumer builds a vivid, eerie world full of sanctified magic and dangerous secrets, where the line between holy and horrific blurs at every turn. Csilla, a soulless girl raised by a ruthless Church, is a sharp and compelling lead. Her mission to assassinate a divine heretic takes an unexpected turn as he offers her something she’s never had: a chance at a soul and a life of her own.
The slow-burn tension between Csilla and the heretic is everything a romantasy reader could want, layered with yearning, mistrust, and the promise of something more. Their uneasy alliance adds emotional weight to the central mystery, which is both suspenseful and satisfyingly twisty. Ilan, the driven Inquisitor, is another standout, adding a dangerous edge to the tangled web of power and truth. Every character feels morally complex, shaped by a city that values obedience over compassion.
Baumer’s prose is lyrical without ever slowing the pace, and the lore of this miracle-bound city is both rich and unsettling. The themes of worth, sin, and self-determination are explored with care, and the story never shies away from asking hard questions about who gets to define faith and justice.

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read The Faithful Dark in exchange for my honest review. This is a dark gem of a book that will stay with you long after the final page, perfect for fans of Ava Reid and Leigh Bardugo.

I have found another new favourite in The Faithful Dark. It is a wonderfully atmospheric, gothic fantasy with a murder mystery and engrossing characters.

In a holy city where touch reveals sin, Csilla is born without a soul and is seen as worthless to the Church. They order her to assassinate a heretic with divine magic they believe threatens the city’s magic and is murdering its citizens. Then the heretic offers her a deal; help him find the actual murderer and he will give her a soul. Joining them is a fallen High Inquisitor that will do anything to retain their position. Together, they hunt a murderer whose trail leads to secrets that could destroy their city and the faith that keeps them safe.

This is a dual-POV from Csilla and Ilan’s perspectives, but Mihaly is such a big part of their stories, all are multifaceted and engaging characters. Csilla and Ilan have such distinct voices throughout the book, and I loved how flawed they all are. The character development they go through is outstanding. Csilla is naive and kind, and her faith runs deep, no matter what others do to her. Ilan is intimidating in his righteousness, and has to confront his beliefs. Mihaly is charming, selfish, and lost in grief. His actions are questionable even though you know why he does what he does. I absolutely love a slow burn and Cate Baumer does not disappoint. The pining and yearning is superb, I could not get enough!

World-building is such a massive part of books for me, and when it’s done this well I just want to live between the pages. The Faithful Dark is set in a fantasy Vatican where the Church is the ruler and faith is an everyday part of life. I never felt overwhelmed with the information being fed to me as I read, and the lore behind how their world was formed was compelling. There’s angels, demons, saints, and a religion that may or may not be corrupt. The concept of having souls darken with sin and the only ways to banish the corruption is by pain or coin was so fascinating. I really enjoy murder mysteries in a fantasy setting and this one was so intriguing.

This is a suspenseful book that reflects religious politics, and what it means to see yourself as worthy no matter what others do or say. You don’t need to burn yourself on a pyre to please others. The pacing may be a bit slow to start with, but I didn’t have any trouble with it. I’m so sad I have to wait so long to read the conclusion to this wonderful book.

Rating 3.5 stars!

Thank you NetGalley and Hodder & Stoughton for the ARC.

There were a lot of strong aspects to this book, and I'd really like to focus on them to start. Cate Baumer writes very well. Her lyrical, atmospheric prose is a joy to read, and she explains her concepts so thoroughly that I deeply understand what she is creating. This is a welcome shift from a lot of fantasy writers concocting complex magic and worlds and just throwing the reader in and hoping they'll figure it out. I enjoy actually LEARNING the systems. I loved the explanation on souls by Ilan, specifically. Csilla was a wonderful, different character. She, again, was a welcome change from a lot of current FMCs. There is nothing wrong with badass women who can throat punch a hulk of an enemy with their fists or words. However, Csilla was pure-hearted, real, innocent, and strong in her own right.

My main reason for rating this somewhat lower was the pacing and the confusing genre/plot. It felt too slow, and I really wanted things to pick up sooner than they did, and I wished the plot were more fleshed out.

I'm sorry to say this didn't really work for me. I originally requested this novel because of the queer representation (ace, trans masc and bisexual) and I will say I did enjoy those elements of it. I really do think we need more queer books and authors in the fantasy space. Where I lost the thread of this book was really down to pacing. It was a very slow start and I just didn't end up feeling very emotionally invested in the characters.