God, I had such high hopes for this book. One of my only five-star reads last year was Half a Soul by Olivia Atwater. She does such a fantastic job at regency romances, that I thought her Gothic romance series would be just as well done.

I'm going to start with the things I did not like. First off, the male love interest had a rat tail. I'm sorry, but I could not get over that. I also felt like the romance between the main female character and the main male character was extremely rushed. I do see where she was trying to go with it, as a few scenes were trying to set up the tension between the two

But something was missing. I really feel like she did not give them enough time to get over the enemy stage of enemies to lovers. I needed something more. I needed more tension, I needed it to be more drawn out. Extremely disappointed in it.

When you read the summary of the book, it mentions how the main character is trying to get her young master (Robert) back from the fairies because they kidnapped him. Usually, you would expect something like that to happen within the first hundred pages of the book, but not in this one.

It was almost more than halfway through the book before it actually happened. She did a lot of background, and setting up the story, which I enjoyed for the most part, but I really feel like I'm being kidnapped should've happened sooner.

You also might want to make sure you read her books in the Regency series 1st. I don't necessarily think you lose anything with a plot in this book, but many characters and moments are mentioned in conjunction with the main character. It might help you understand her backstory a lot more.

Now I can talk about the things that were done well. Olivia did a fantastic job at setting up a Gothic literature setting. It felt a lot like Jane Eyre, which, if you think about it, there were a few similarities. The setting was fantastically described. I felt like it was very spooky, and it even made it feel like it should've been raining outside when I was reading it.

The plot itself, if it had been dragged out a little bit more, was interesting. I think she also does a fantastic job at describing PTSD women may have from interactions with men. I do you want to mention if that is a topic that you would rather avoid, there are mentions of things happening throughout the book that I would be careful about.

In the end, it was an enjoyable read, but I was expecting a lot more from it. It could have been a lot longer, and I wish that the romance was a lot more drawn out. Hopefully, her next book in the series is a little different and she does better at setting it up. I do think this would be a nice read for someone wanting to read a Gothic romance, but maybe something that's not very convoluted or complicated.

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