Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Readability: 📖📖📖 - I ended up being annoyed with this book numerous times and wanted to put it down
Feels: 🦋🦋🦋🦋 - so there were some angsty moments that tugged on my heart a bit!
Emotional Depth: 💔💔💔💔
Sexual Tension: ⚡⚡⚡
Romance: 💞💞💞
Sensuality: 💋💋💋 (they were fine….but I think I wanted more emotional pull?? They felt kind of mechanical to me but maybe it was the hate to sex to I still hate you vibe of the book)
Sex Scene Length: 🍑🍑🍑 - most are on the shorter side
Steam Scale (Number of Sex Scenes): 🔥🔥🔥🔥 (might be more I got sloppy with note taking in the latter half)
Humor: Yes, a bit
Perspective: This is first person point of view from both hero and heroine (alternating chapters)
More character focused or plot focused? character
How did the speed of the story feel? fast
When mains are first on page together: pretty soon in
Cliffhanger: No, this ends with a happily ever after for the mains
Epilogue: Not really
Format: voluntarily read an advanced reader copy through NetGalley
Why I chose this book: I was intrigued by the cover on NetGalley
Mains: This is a M/F relationship between a cishet hero and heroine

Should I read in order?
This is Jacquelin’s first of The Boucher’s series.

Basic plot:
Reese loves her job at the vampire blood bank – she gets to listen to music and not deal with people...until her mate walks in and changes her life...

Give this a try if you want:
- contemporary paranormal romance
- vampire hero
- human heroine
- mates
- size difference – he’s taller
- enemies to lovers – they hate each other at first but they are mates
- higher steam – at least 4ish full scenes

Ages:
- heroine is 27, hero turned undead at 31 but is 155 years old now (or so)

First line:
I’d seen a lot of dead people.

My thoughts:
I struggled with this one. I felt really thrown into this book and not in a good way. Did I miss a prequel series? I still didn’t quite get the world building I wanted. I wanted to understand this world more and how vampires were just ‘accepted’ as a part of life? And the writing felt really chaotic. I felt like it was all over the place.

I also have struggled with enemies to lovers lately. It’s usually not my favorite trope anyway unless it’s more light hearted, but I have read sooo many couples that fought the whole book and hated each other so the poor book might not have stood a chance being like the 5th one in a row I read…

I did like parts of this story though – there were emotional scenes and some angsty moments that I appreciated. I like when the mains hurt my heart and that happened a bit here!

Overall though I think I had a touch of disconnect with the writing. I don’t think I’d continue this series but I would try another series by this author!

Few random reading stats for this author
# of books read: This is my first
Average rating from me:
Favorite book: This one by default

Worldbuilding/Hero Notes

- the hero is a vampire and turns the heroine when he finds out she’s his mate.
- once mated, you only drink each other’s blood as it’s made perfectly for you
- you will feel aversion if you touch
- vampires cannot get human infections
- they only have male children

Content warnings: These should be taken as a minimum of what to expect. It’s very possible I have missed some.

- sibling death
- heroine was adopted and had horrible birth parents
Author content warnings? Nothing listed

Locations of kisses/intimate scenes, safe sex aspects, consent, pregnancy/child in the story: There might have been more towards the end, I got lazy with notes

 
Safe sex: 

  Not reall I felt like the first few scenes didn’t really address this but maybe he didn’t come? They talk later in the book about wanting kids later and the heroine mentions she’s on birth control, but it doesn’t work on vampire mates, so she mentions condoms and he says that male vampires can take a pill that prevents contraception. 

 
How’s the consent? 

  It’s okay – they are both agreeing even if the bond is pulling them together and neither really want to be there 

 
Pregnancy/children in story? 

  No children/pregnancy in the story but they talk about possible future children 

 
Chapter 3 – 🔥 sex
Chapter 4 – 🔥 bent over the trunk of the car
Chapter 11 - 🔥 oral for her
Chapter 12 – 🔥 he takes her from behind on the bed, blood play, but it’s pretty short
Chapter 15 – kisses and a brief mention of sex