Special thanks to the author, @macmillan.audio #MacAudio2024 for my advanced listening copy & @WednesdayBooks for my gifted e-ARC‼️

This was an interesting book it had a lot of potential but fell short for me. Jerusalem was a young teen with supernatural abilities who escapes the plantation where she was held captive and teams up with Alexei a couple centuries old vampire stuck in a teenage body to help get revenge for her family and kill those who enslaved her. The premise was quite clever and original with the vampires during the Civil War but the slavery aspects involved threw me for a loop. I think I would’ve loved it more without that being included in the context because it just seemed weird to me. 

For it to be a historical fantasy I also felt the dialogue was very modern. Imagine Buffy the Vampire Slayer mixed with True Blood and the book The American Queen these are the vibes the book was giving.

I wasn’t feeling the chemistry or connection between Jerusalem and Alexei. For the majority of the book she had a lot of anger and aggression towards him kinda felt like she hated him. I do understand why she felt the way she did considering her past encounters with other vampires. But when they began working together her thoughts about him slowly changed. Still wasn’t feeling them together but I liked that Alexei was a good guy. 

Overall, the book was okay not at all what I expected. The author touched on quite a few themes surrounding slavery, the Civil War, death, physical abuse, hate crimes, racial discrimination, and references to sexual abuse. The characters are kinda fascinating in their own way once you understand their backstories. The pacing was up and down but if you’re a lover of vampires, Romantasy, or historical fiction you may like this book.