I'd say a soft four stars

NOT A BAD START.

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I thought this got off to a really good beginning. I was intrigued, and surprised to find that this was actually an urban fantasy (which now that I’ve gone back to read the summary, I can see that, but I’m a go in blind type). ANYWAYS. As someone who usually doesn’t like urban settings, I thought this worked pretty well. I liked the dystopian dynamics of a world post monsters and how things were divided with all of the political machinations.

Kierse was a good FMC. I liked her personality and her watching her figure out where she wanted to place her loyalties. The romance kind of grew on me? I thought it went a bit fast for the plot and that we didn’t get much of Graves character until later in the story. There’s still some world building and magic system aspects that I would love to have a deeper explanations of. The middle lost me for a bit, and the last quarter things picked up again. There were some good twists that had me side eying the sequel.

I loved the audiobook and definitely have plans to continue the series.

Overall audience notes:
- Urban fantasy romance
- Language: moderate-high
- Romance: 2-3 open door
- Violence: high
- Content Warnings: abusive ex-mentor (recounted, abusive father (recounted), non-consenual drugging, blood/gore depiction (mild)