Risen as something new and hunted by old powers, he must protect the girl he loves from the war his nature has started.
- Score
- 77.7
- Spice
- 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️Sweet
- POV
- multi
- Ending
- HEA / HFN
Tropes
Content warnings
Curated signals, not an exhaustive guarantee.
If you liked this, read
What readers think
Readers consistently praise Ahdieh's atmospheric, sensory prose and the richly drawn setting of 19th-century New Orleans, which elevates the series above standard YA paranormal. Bastien's vampire transformation arc draws strong investment. The chief criticism is structural: the book juggles roughly six POVs, many of which lack distinctive voices, and the memory-loss subplot stretched thin for many readers. The love triangle with Michael is widely considered unconvincing — critics note it generates little tension and is easy to predict. Despite pacing issues in the first third, most reviewers found the second half's escalating reveals compelling enough to finish in one or two sittings.
Read it if
- · Readers who loved the gothic New Orleans atmosphere of The Beautiful and want more worldbuilding
- · Fans of vampire mythology with a historical multicultural setting rather than a high-fantasy world
- · Those who enjoy star-crossed romance with lush, prose-forward storytelling
Skip it if
- · You need a tight, single-POV narrative — the six-perspective structure frustrates many readers
- · You want high spice; the romance stays firmly closed-door throughout
- · Love triangles are an automatic pass for you
If you liked this
- · For fans of Stephanie Garber's Caraval — same lush atmosphere and romantic yearning in a vividly drawn historical setting
- · Like Daughter of Smoke and Bone but set in New Orleans with vampires instead of chimaera
- · For fans of The Beautiful (book 1) who want expanded mythology and darker stakes
- · Like Interview with the Vampire in tone — gothic, lyrical, obsessed with beauty and damnation — but written for a YA audience
In this series
Part of The Beautiful — read in order:
Full series profile & spice/trope breakdown →Which dark romantasy heroine are you? Five choices in a forest that wants you dead.
Take the quiz →