This was a very unique reading experience for me. Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed it. The story is deeply rooted in Jewish folklore, religion, and mysticism. It's very dark but has an air of hopefulness to it somehow. The story is crafted beautifully, and you can tell the author put a lot of thought and care into it. We are literally thrown into the story as if it's a sequel after a coup, a bloody civil war, and Dimitri's exile. It's a bit jarring at first, but I got caught up very quickly. It was interesting getting the three POVs of Dimitri, Vasily, and Alexey. Not often do we get an insiders look into the villain of the story, so that held some intrigue for me. All in all, the portrayal of abuse, the lasting effects of that abuse, and healing from that were very believable and real. My only issue is that the majority of the sex scenes involved said abuser, which felt uncomfortable for me. I fully understand the TWs, but I don't fully understand to what end those scenes were necessary for the story to be told somehwhat explicitly instead of alluded to. That could be a me thing. Just be aware of any triggers before jumping into this story. All that to say, I really loved this story. It's intense, emotional, dark, and mysterious. There's a bit of romance as well, which was a nice touch. This was unexpected for me, but I'm so glad I read it.