Charlotte Kersten

Year published: 2018

Category: Romantasy

Summary: One human. One immortal. Will their alliance save the kingdom, or will their forbidden love be a death sentence?

When Cassia seeks out a Hesperine, he could end her mortal life in a heartbeat. But she has no fear of his magic or his fangs. She knows the real monster is the human king, her father. If he finds out she’s bargaining with his enemy, he’ll send her to the executioner.

As a Hesperine diplomat, Lio must negotiate with mortals who hate him. Cassia is different, but politics aren’t why she captivates the gentle immortal. He wants more than her blood, and if he can’t resist the temptation, he’ll provoke the war he’s trying to prevent.

Blood and Ash fans will love this slow-burn, steamy romance with classic fantasy worldbuilding. Follow fated mates Cassia and Lio through their epic love story for a guaranteed series HEA.

My thoughts: 
I read this for my romantasy bingo square for r/fantasy and I remain firm in my belief that, while I adore very certain fantasy romances, I am extremely picky about what truly clicks romance-wise and most books that are popular under the “romantasy” label right now may just not be for me. This was a better fit for me than some of the other romantasies I’ve read, but it still left me underwhelmed.

There is absolutely care and thought put into the writing itself, and I enjoyed parts of the peaceful, beneficent vampire lore. Things really, really came into place for me emotionally during the part of the book where Cassia told Lio about her older sister’s death and how the Hesperines saved her – this was very moving to me, and I thought the romance and writing both really shone. Generally speaking, my favorite parts were everything related to Cassia, Solia, their relationship, and their rebellion. Also the giant dog with stinky paws!! Finally, you KNOW I love a love interest who is just a big old sweetie pie, and Lio is pretty much eternally (ha ha) kind, sweet, earnest and supportive.

Unfortunately, other parts were rougher. I was disappointed by how much of the growing romance was just Lio infodumping facts about his world to Cassia with a few smaller gestures thrown in. Due to Lio’s support, Cassia undergoes a very significant empowerment arc very quickly, then there is a lot of smut, and then they’re magical vampire soulmates at the end. It was all way too quick, and I didn’t feel that Cassia’s growth was super believable in the way my favorite healing arcs of this kind are.

The plot is somewhat uneven throughout, and while the pieces do come together ultimately, there are some moments of dubious convenience such as Cassia justifying the decision to spy on her father by herself and doing so just in time to hear him infodump his entire evil plan and motivations. There are a lot of Hesperine side characters who only appear a few times with little characterization but who have complicated relationship/family dynamics, and I struggled to keep them straight. If I do continue with the series, I know that I will remember nothing about any of them. All in all, I didn’t hate my time with this by any means but didn’t absolutely love it the way I was hoping to either.

Now, DID I choose it as my romantasy square because I’d heard good things about the smutty blood-drinking scenes and I was hoping to rekindle the magic of my Baldur’s Gate 3 playthrough???????????? Don’t worry about it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Anyways the smut was pretty good in this. Ok bye