"Once he was a solitary immortal. A creature out of nightmare. The embodiment of punishment. As humanity grew and spread across the globe, he split apart to keep the balance. Now there are twelve.

Connected but individual, they carry out the duties of Krampus by punishing the wicked. The tears and cries of pain from their victims sustain them."

Ok, so... I know I've read some whacky, less-serious smut and erotic stories before, but this one has a more serious edge to it. Well, as serious as it can for a grown woman calling a man "Daddy" repeatedly. I will never understand the Daddy thing... *shiver* And because all we see for about the first 60-70% of the book is spanking (our protagonist says, "My butt will wear out if you keep spanking me all the time." Even she was tired of pages and pages and pages of just... spanking) it made me think about some of the themes of redemption as well as physical vs. emotional pain. And how sometimes pain can inspire pleasure...?

This book also gave off a lot of Beauty and the Beast vibes. There is a big mansion, a huge library, a beast (who actually transformed into human form so he did not have "large, curled horns, the shaggy fur-covered legs, and of course the hooves" although he DID keep his super duper long tongue...), and plenty of Stockholm Syndrome vibes to feed an entire village. And near the end, of course they fall in love and she wants to stay in his domain... but... like how will that work? How will she handle him bringing home other women and making them sit on dildo chairs and punishing them, etc? Could make for an interesting scorned woman story if you ask me...

So, on to the lusty bits. It was not overly done or in a totally unbelievable way... I mean there were elements of Fifty Shades, sure, but I guess all books like this have those features? I have read so few that I am not sure the consistent tropes within the genre. But the word choice was not cringey and some scenes were steamy. Again, the only thing that irked me and grossed me out was the constant "Daddy" this and "Daddy" that.... *barf*

All in all I would give this 3 stars... and I think that readers who explore this genre and type of story might rate it higher. Krampus will get you if you're naughty... you better watch out!