Romance: 3/5 
Quest: 4/5
Spicy scale: 5/5
 
If you liked the first book, you'll like this one too. I'm a bit less enamored with Brie and Felix then I am with Cin and Fallon, but they're still a great couple to follow for 150+ pages. 

I love it when heroines are badasses in their own way, and that's absolutely Brie. How her love of steamy monster romances ends up saving her might be my favorite scene of the whole book. 

 

Felix seemed like a total sweetheart. The fact that he's under the influence of a love potion for the (almost) entirety of the book is the biggest downside of the book I think. Since everything revolved around his need to be near Brie, his love for her, his need for her, it didn't really leave him much room to be a multidimensional character, which I missed.

There's a plot trucking in the background, tying in nicely with the events of the first book (giving us some more information about Myva). But we don't get involved with it till the very end since Brie is only a simple cheese girl and Felix's only goal in this book is to make her his. I hope we'll be adventuring a bit more in the next book.

And the spice is again on point. Both characters clearly have the hots for each other. And with Brie being an avid reader of monster erotica, she's down for a lot of freaky stuff (she even gets to play with tentacles, lucky girl). 

We also get to see everyone from the previous book. Cin is Brie's best friend (and the only one who has experience with a demon), Fallon is the one the most busy with the side plot, and Dante ends up as Felix's go-to fixer. Some of my favorite lines were from Cin and Fallon, I honestly would love to have another book focus on them. 

All in all, it is a good book, and I enjoyed it very much. I can't wait for the next installment. So many possibilities, and all of them seem so good! Do we follow Dante on his quest to find a mate? Or do we go with Usha on a pirate quest with the Lamia I-Forgot-His-Name? Or will it be Holly' and Priscilla's turn? Or maybe we'll get to see some Orc action (it is mentioned how they sometimes take a mate as a group, opening up the door for some why-choose/polyam romance). 

first of all…

that was so much!! definitely not as gorey or action packed as the first installment in this series but we had a good a share of both anyway.

the love potion aspect really made me hesitant though. there truly was no way to tell if she was his mate or if it was his love potion drunk eyes telling him that. he was utterly devoted to her, of course, but he was also manic so i took all his thoughts with a grain of salt.

brie was lovely. her commitment issues really spoke to my heart. its hard to trust someone with your heart after others barely want to deal with your mind. im glad she realized felix wasn’t going to be like that. even without the love potion, i think he would’ve acted much of the same with/about her really. they were good together.

a talking flying sword? SIGN ME UP!!

i also give this 🌶🌶🌶 out of 5. i wish there was a little more smut.

CW: mild gore, kidnapping, women in peril

⭐ Tropes ⭐

- Fated mates
- Marriage of convenience
- Shifter romance

🌈 Representation 🌈
- Bi MMC
- Black heroine and side characters 

🌶️ Spice 🌶️
- 🍑 Play
- Tentacles
- Light bondage

Romances which are deemed to have any comedic element are rarely genuinely laugh out loud funny. This may be an exception. The banter between the MCs was amazing, and even the side characters made me laugh (special shout-out to Alexis the talking sword 🙏)

Here we have a fated mates situation, blurred due to a love potion gone wrong. Are they fated mates, or is it the love potion? Brie and Felix had excellent chemistry, further amplified by the fated mates/love potion situation. It allowed for the reluctance of the heroine to come to terms with her own feelings and become vulnerable and genuinely fond of the hero, causing the conflict of "does he love me or is it the potion", as opposed to the usual miscommunication trope which just seems to be EVERYWHERE at the moment. 

Underneath the romance, we have the fantasy plot playing out, with demons, dragons, kidnapping and magic playing out. We had the suspense of the whole kidnappng storyline playing out and how it progressed without completing overwhelming the romantic development. They ran side by side one another and complimented each other perfectly. 

I'd also like to take a moment to show my appreciation for the genius that is managing to include tentacle smût in a werewolf romance. It sounds like it shouldn't work, but it really did 😂 

Literally the only thing I can find fault in was the epilogue. Now, I enjoyed the epilogue in that it has some foreshadowing for the next book in the series, HOWEVER, I like my epilogues to be seeing a little smidge into the future with the couple who the book has been based around. While there was a very brief glimpse of that, I don't really feel like I got enough closure in the HEA. That's just personal preference though.

I am LOVING this series and I'm astonished to see the authors writing skills progress so quickly! I absolutely love the world the author has created and the characters in it.

I do wish the books were longer though, I feel with about 200 pages I'm just not getting enough. 

I hope in the next book the author publishes will be Dantes story!