Celine was on track to have a good life, and then she was forced to flee her home country of France. Now, she lives in New Orleans at a convent that is supposed to eventually set her up with a good husband. Celine simply wants to be able to enjoy the city’s vibrant nightlife and ignore the guilt that weighs on her. When members of the convent begin to come up brutally murdered, Celine can’t seem to keep herself from trying to solve the case. It doesn’t help that she keeps running into Bastien, the handsome boy who trouble seems to constantly follow.
I tried to read this book 2 times before I was finally able to get through it. Compared to Ahdieh’s other books, this one felt much slower-paced. For me, it doesn’t matter how amazing a book is, I always struggle with slower-paced ones. Nevertheless, I was determined to get through this one and forced myself to read it over the course of 2-3 days. Once I got my mind used to the pacing, I was able to enjoy the great story that this book had to tell.
Celine was a very strong main character. She had been through a lot but she never kept her eyes off her goals. Even when she had to flee her home country and move to a completely new continent, she did not give up hope. She was still trying to sell her dresses and make new friends as soon as she arrived in New Orleans. This book held a strong theme of female friendship and I constantly rooted for Pippa and Celine to grow closer to one another. This isn’t a romance novel where the female characters are just extras who get thrown to the side as soon as the romance starts to kick in.
Speaking of romance, this romance novel is a very slow burn. I felt tension throughout the novel, but I didn’t feel like I got into the romance of it until it got close to the end. I feel like the real test will be the next installment of the series which I am mentally preparing myself to get through. I feel a possible love triangle brewing, but I am holding out hope that it won’t totally wreck the story for me.
Another thing that I didn’t really feel until the end of the story was the vampire/paranormal part of the book. I came in thinking I would be thrown into a paranormal universe, but the main paranormal thing occurring at the start were the random grisly murders. This book felt more like a murder mystery for most of the novel before things really started to pick up and get crazy about halfway through.
Overall, I feel like I came into this story expecting the wrong thing. I was expecting vampire romance, I got a murder mystery that is building to be something different in book 2. I can’t wait to see what the rest of the series has in store.
I would recommend this book to anyone looking for a new YA paranormal thriller.
Overall Rating: 3.5 out of 5 books.
