Title: A Dowry of Blood

Series: A Dowry of Blood #1

Author: ST Gibson

This is my last love letter to you, though some would call it a confession. . .

Saved from the brink of death by a mysterious stranger, Constanta is transformed from a medieval peasant into a bride fit for an undying king. But when Dracula draws a cunning aristocrat and a starving artist into his web of passion and deceit, Constanta realizes that her beloved is capable of terrible things.

Finding comfort in the arms of her rival consorts, she begins to unravel their husband’s dark secrets. With the lives of everyone she loves on the line, Constanta will have to choose between her own freedom and her love for her husband. But bonds forged by blood can only be broken by death.

‘My saviour. My teacher. My guiding light in the dark.’

Constanta is ‘saved’ and made a vampire when her village in Romania was attacked and she was savagely beaten and left for dead.

This story is the tale of her life and her love letter to ‘him’, her maker.

Constanta
Magdaleine
Alexi
Him.

The writing was beautiful, almost haunting, all the characters, fleshed out, and I fell in love with them, all of them forced and then found family. It was utterly beautiful.

‘We are children of the same rotten family, survivors of the same intimate war.  We will always be lovers, for ever bonded, scross distance and time.’

Top Ten Tuesday is featured by That Artsy Reader Girl. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

Topic: Books on My Spring 2023 To-Read List

My physical tbr is out of control, it’s moved from 1 shelf to 2 so I need to do something about it! These books are on my tbr that I want to read soon!

Song of Silver, Flame Like Night by Amelie Wen Zhao
The Raven Spell by Luanne G Smith
Stars and Smoke by Marie Lu
Cruel Illusions by Margie Fuston
Last Tale of the Flowerbride by Roshani Chokshi

What’s on your list?

Title: Never Never

Author: Colleen Hoover and Tarryn Fisher

Never stop…Never forget…Just remember.

The #1 New York Times bestselling author of It Starts with Us joins forces with the New York Times bestselling author of The Wives. Together, they have created a gripping, twisty, romantic mystery unlike any other.

Charlie Wynwood and Silas Nash have been best friends since they could walk. They’ve been in love since the age of fourteen. But as of this morning…they are complete strangers. Their first kiss, their first fight, the moment they fell in love…every memory has vanished. Now Charlie and Silas must work together to uncover the truth about what happened to them and why.

But the more they learn about the couple they used to be…the more they question why they were ever together to begin with. Forgetting is terrifying, but remembering may be worse.

‘I have no past. I have no past.’
‘Never stop. Never forget.’

Silas and Charlie have lost some of their memories. They know they were a couple so they start to piece back together who they were together and apart.

They find out things weren’t good, there was tons of family drama and they actually weren’t great people!

I guess you could call this a romance mystery? But I actually enjoyed the concept! I had my theories and they were wrong!!!!! I don’t quite know how I feel about actually why things happened though – I need to mull it over!!!!

The epilogue made me think oh no way – wonder if anything will happen there!

The Sunday Post is a blog news meme hosted by Caffeinated Reviewer  It’s a chance to share news, a post to recap the past week on your blog and showcase books and things we have received.

Hi everyone, hope you’ve had a good week?

Snow! We had snow! But the schools were still open and I lost around 10 years off my life (and sanity), trying to drive carefully down the country lanes to get my son there and back!

I had an audiobook kind of week! I listened to 4 audiobooks (I listen at work and I listen at 2.5 speed or it’s too slow for me!!)

---

What I’ve Read

🎧 The Roommate by Rosie Danan
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

🎧 Percy Jackson and the Last Olympian by Rick Riordan
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

🎧 The Adventures of Amina al-Sirafi by SA Chakraborty
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

🎧 Love on the Brain by Ali Hazelwood
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

The Coven by Harper L Woods
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

---

New arrivals

I got my Fairyloot and Illumicrate boxes but will post them next week in case people haven’t got their boxes yet!

---

You might have missed…..

Review – Inside the World of Bridgerton by Catherine Curzon
ARC Review – In the Lives of Puppets by TJ Klune
Review – Witches Guide to Fake Dating a Demon by Sarah Hawley
Review – The Dead Romantics by Ashley Postin

---

What have you read lately?

Title: The Dead Romantics

Author: Ashley Postin

Florence Day is the ghostwriter for one of the most prolific romance authors in the industry, and she has a problem—after a terrible breakup, she no longer believes in love. It’s as good as dead.

When her new editor, a too-handsome mountain of a man, won’t give her an extension on her book deadline, Florence prepares to kiss her career goodbye. But then she gets a phone call she never wanted to receive, and she must return home for the first time in a decade to help her family bury her beloved father.

For ten years, she’s run from the town that never understood her, and even though she misses the sound of a warm Southern night and her eccentric, loving family and their funeral parlor, she can’t bring herself to stay. Even with her father gone, it feels like nothing in this town has changed. And she hates it.

Until she finds a ghost standing at the funeral parlor’s front door, just as broad and infuriatingly handsome as ever, and he’s just as confused about why he’s there as she is.

Romance is most certainly dead… but so is her new editor, and his unfinished business will have her second-guessing everything she’s ever known about love stories.

Loved it!

Florence can see ghosts and, oddly enough, is a ghost writer….but after a relationship break up, has fallen out of love with romance which is making it hard to finish her new book which is overdue!

The young Benji Andor is her new editor and is not happy about a potential missed deadline!

But Florence gets a call and has to go back home to her family where she sees an unexpected ghost!

I’ll say no more about the plot as you need to experience it!

I will say that I loved Florence’s family. They own a funeral parlor and are one of a kind. Beautiful people. And the town’s mayor had a soft spot in my heart!

If you want an uplifting story about hope and love then this is it!

Title: A Witches Guide to Fake Dating a Demon

Author: Sarah Hawley

Mariel Spark knows not to trust a demon, especially one that wants her soul, but what’s a witch to do when he won’t leave her side—and she kind of doesn’t want him to?

Mariel Spark is prophesied to be the most powerful witch seen in centuries of the famed Spark family, but to the displeasure of her mother, she prefers baking to brewing potions and gardening to casting hexes. When a spell to summon flour goes very wrong, Mariel finds herself staring down a demon—one she inadvertently summoned for a soul bargain.

Ozroth the Ruthless is a legend among demons. Powerful and merciless, he drives hard bargains to collect mortal souls. But his reputation has suffered ever since a bargain went awry—if he can strike a bargain with Mariel, he will earn back his deadly reputation. Ozroth can’t leave Mariel’s side until they complete a bargain, which she refuses to do (turns out some humans are attached to their souls).

But the witch is funny. And curvy. And disgustingly yet endearingly cheerful. Becoming awkward roommates quickly escalates when Mariel, terrified to confess the inadvertent summoning to her mother, blurts out that she’s dating Ozroth. As Ozroth and Mariel struggle with their opposing goals and maintaining a fake relationship, real attraction blooms between them. But Ozroth has a limited amount of time to strike the deal, and if Mariel gives up her soul, she’ll lose all her emotions—including love—which will only spell disaster for them both.

Well this was a treat!

Mariel is a witch, a bit of a rubbish witch really but has an infinity with plants. In an attempt to bake she unwittingly summons a demon……

But not just any demon……Ozroth The Ruthless, now disgraced over a tiny mix up with a soul!

He wants her soul, she doesnt want to give it and a Mum moment sets up the fake dating trope…….

This was such a fun read! It was also humorous, beautiful, entertaining, spicy and unique. 

‘Lots of things get old fast, I’m learning. Like the emotional yo‑yo of fake dating a demon who couldn’t seem to decide whether he wanted to kiss her or rip out her eternal soul.’

I know I shouldn’t but I loved Mariel’s Mum! Yes,  she is so self-absorbed and actually cruel but her level of inappropriate was off the scale and I loved that!!!

I see that Calladia is next up in A Demons Guide to Wooing a Witch and I need it! She is hard as nails and will be a tough nut to crack – delish!!

Title: In the Lives of Puppets

Author: TJ Klune

In a strange little home built into the branches of a grove of trees, live three robots–fatherly inventor android Giovanni Lawson, a pleasantly sadistic nurse machine, and a small vacuum desperate for love and attention. Victor Lawson, a human, lives there too. They’re a family, hidden and safe.

The day Vic salvages and repairs an unfamiliar android labelled “HAP,” he learns of a shared dark past between Hap and Gio-a past spent hunting humans.

When Hap unwittingly alerts robots from Gio’s former life to their whereabouts, the family is no longer hidden and safe. Gio is captured and taken back to his old laboratory in the City of Electric Dreams. So together, the rest of Vic’s assembled family must journey across an unforgiving and otherworldly country to rescue Gio from decommission, or worse, reprogramming.

Along the way to save Gio, amid conflicted feelings of betrayal and affection for Hap, Vic must decide for himself: Can he accept love with strings attached?

‘What do you do if you’ve forgotten all you know?’

So here we have what this author writes superbly….our found family: Gio (Dad), Nurse Ratched (hilarious), Rambo (the vacuum!!) Victor – human and Hap – warrior!

They all live in a house in the woods built high in the trees. All is well until one day bad guys turn up and take Gio away and the rest of the gang go off in search to find him.

They journey through the forest, to a curiosity shop, to the City of Electric Dreams, to the Blue Fairy and to the Benevolent Tower and what they find (and find out) blows their minds!

‘Stick together
Run if we have to
No dallying.
No drilling.
And above all else, be brave.’

This was so sweet! It was heart-achingly beautiful! There were so many quotes I highlighted and I found myself so immersed I could’ve lent in and hugged Victor on many occasions!

Nurse Ratched was my utter favourite though. She is sassy, rude, inappropriate and totally hilarious!

‘Though you seem to be suffering from an intense anxiety disorder . But that is fine. We are all unique. Victor is asexual. Giovanni is old. And I have sociopathic tendencies that manifest themselves in dangerous situations.’

Another hit from this author and I’m finding myself humming ‘heaven, I’m in heaven’ all the time!

Top Ten Tuesday is featured by That Artsy Reader Girl. It was born of a love of lists, a love of books, and a desire to bring bookish friends together.

Topic: Bookish People I’d Like To Meet

~ Will Herondale (Shadowhunters) – just him.
~ Elspeth and the Nightmare – One Dark Window
~ Darlington (Ninth House) for his mind and face!
~ Nicky (The Extraordinaires) – he needs to be my bestie!
~ Andrew Minyard – I mean who doesn’t want a psycho in their life?!

~ Jay Kristoff – I need a release date for EotV 2!
~ Cassandra Clare to beg for more Shadowhunters!
~ Brandon Sanderson – he is a genius, would love to hear his story ideas.
~ TJ Klune – again to hear his story ideas and to arrange a deal for more Nicky!
~ Holly Black – more begging I’m afraid, more Jude and Cardan and maybe some baby Jardans!

Who would you have picked?

Title: Inside the World of Bridgerton

Author: Catherine Curzon

In Inside the World of Bridgerton, author and Regency period expert Catherine Curzon explores the historical inspirations behind the hit series, and illuminates the fascinating details of real life in Regency high society.

Examining a range of key topics, this revealing guide covers everything from the class structure of the era and the crucial role played by marriage to the stunning fashion, culture and social events of the time that have enchanted audiences and history fanatics for centuries. With further chapters dedicated to sex, race, the media and more, this is a window into the real history that has helped make Bridgerton into such a global phenomenon.

Offering insightful advice on what to – and what not to – wear, how to see and be seen, the reality of ‘coming out’ into the public arena, and decoding the real-life scandal sheets on which the beloved TV show is largely based, Inside the World of Bridgerton highlights how the real ladies and gentlemen of Regency England lived and loved.

Dearest Reader,

In this book you will find all you want to know about the Regency period from social occasions to fashion to absolute barmy medical practices and……gossip of the Ton!

I knew from Bridgerton that they loved their gossip but it’s fully laid out in here! I was mesmerised by their way of life!

I thought I would love to live in these times, I imagined sitting round reading but their days were actually packed, peacocking around and being a woman was perilous….not for an introvert like me it seems!

Anyway, I’m off to promenade and hopefully not get any miasmas!!! IYKYK!