One of my most anticipated reads for 2024 is now complete and while it was not the absolute desolation i had anticipated, it was a wonderfully atmospheric, intense and dark(ish) fantasy read that I always enjoy. 
Being back on the road with Gabe and Dior was always going to be a treat and I really enjoyed their blossoming relationship and the introduction of some other interesting characters.

While a bit repetitive in parts - the hill Gabe dies on/the fucks he doesnt give/his distaste for religion etc. - there were still so many quotable parts of this that I really really loved. JK has such an incredible way with words that always makes me happy to find something special to take note of.

A big thing about my rating not being a 4 - other than the lack of complete devastation for me - was that i listened to a lot of it on audio book and missed so much! This therefore isnt necessarily a criticism of the book then but instead the narration. Not all books are made for audio and this is one of them. I didnt much like the two voices, thinking they didnt match the characters as well as they could have done. I liked it best when they were speaking Scottish and Irish but others left a little for the imagination.

As ever, hard to talk about sequels if you've not read the others but the revelations I did enjoy were:

Lioness Phoebe being a real girl. I was so here for hte lion/lioness aspect and really enjoyed their relationship. I kept holding on for Astrid not really being dead but this was just as good. I liked that she was more realistic about how to move on from romantic heartbreak and i found this realistic and beautiful. 
I was absolutely devastated when Phoebe's husband was revealed to be the wolf that the Dyvok were stealing blood from in order to be more powerful. I really felt for Gabe as you can tell how much he really liked Phoebe and I wanted them to be a thing if not to get more smut in the last book lol
I was sad when Dior died but more so for Gabe's reaction to it after her calling him Papa more than her actual death since it was kind of made clear from the start that she was going to die. If I had read this rather than listened, i may have been more broken but as it stands, i was kind of robbed of that emotional reaction.
I was annoyed by page 235 namely because others had gassed up Aaron's turning so much that I expected more from the page. When it was simply that he was Dead, it didnt ring that deep.
Now, it may say a lot about my mental state and love of Dark Romances, but i really liked Nikita 
 and thought he was incredibly hot. His treatment of Aaron was wrong on so many levels but when Aaron started telling Baptiste about how he'd been bent like a pretzel by him...i kinda loved it LOL 

Overall, I still enjoyed it but there were very few moments that I didnt see coming or even when I didnt, they werent as impactful. Despite this, I love the writing, i love the world and I love Gabriel. Celene was a great addition but I am still a little annoyed by he antagonism towards Gabe because I dont think its warranted.
Despite clearly being a 'filler' book, its not a bad sequel and I am very interested to get to book 3 with that dope cliffhanger.