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Book: “Mistress of Lies” by K. M. Enright
Publishing Info: Orbit, August 2024
Where Did I Get this Book: ARC from the publisher!
Where Can You Get this Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | IndieBound
Book Description: The daughter of a powerful but disgraced Blood Worker, Shan LeClaire has spent her entire life perfecting her blood magic, building her network of spies, and gathering every scrap of power she could. Now, to protect her brother, she assassinates their father and takes her place at the head of the family. And that is only the start of her revenge.
Samuel Hutchinson is a bastard with a terrible gift. When he stumbles upon the first victim of a magical serial killer, he’s drawn into the world of magic and intrigue he’s worked so hard to avoid – and is pulled deeply into the ravenous and bloodthirsty court of the vampire king.
Tasked by the Eternal King to discover the identity of the killer cutting a bloody swath through the city, Samuel, Shan and mysterious Royal Bloodworker Isaac find themselves growing ever closer to each other. But Shan’s plans are treacherous, and as she lures Samuel into her complicated web of desire, treason and vengeance, he must decide if the good of their nation is worth the cost of his soul.
Review: This is another case where I’ll admit that I was initially drawn in by the unique cover art. Even without the book description or the title, it’s pretty easy to understand the general tone of the book with one simple look! And after looking into it further, I found a lot of other elements that typically intrigue me. Morally grey heroines! Spies! Revenge tales!
To start with the pros, I did like some of the original world-building elements of this story, especially its use of vampires. Not only are vampires one of the most popular supernatural beings to pop up in fiction for centuries, but they are having a bit of a resurgence here in 2024, with numerous titles releasing this year focusing on vampires in one way or another. So to introduce a fresh-feeling take on a society in which they exist is worth noting and praising! I really enjoyed learning about this society, with the Blood Workers, blood magic, and the lowly unblooded. If anything, I’d say that the strength of these ideas was let down in the rather lackluster focus that was given to them. For having one of the main characters being unblooded himself, I felt like we were still left with very little insight into the actual lives of these people.
In a similar vein (ha!), I found myself liking the idea of many of these characters more than the characters themselves. For one thing, the story quickly fell into the trap of telling the reader a lot of facts and traits about the characters, but then proceeded to roll out a plot in which the reader never saw any of this in action. The most obvious example is Shan herself. The story opens with an action-packed bang, with Shan finally committing step one of her plan for vengeance. It’s exciting and sets Shan up as an interesting character with much more to come! But, unfortunately, that very first scene is ultimately the peak of her entire arc. We’re told repeatedly that she’s a mastermind, but as the plot bottoms out towards the middle, the reader is left to reconcile what they’ve been told to believe about the character with the reality of Shan’s very poor decision-making throughout.
This is a polyamory romance, as well, which I think requires even more skill from the author to properly set up and convey. Personally, I don’t love polyamory romances, but that’s a “me thing” as far as my own preferences for the types of love stories I enjoy and thus I didn’t factor this into my rating. That said, I do think that, again, the reader is often told that these character have chemistry, rather than showing it in any meaningful way. There seems to be insta-lust every way one looks, and I couldn’t buy any of these characters as truly having deep feelings for one another, in any combination.
Overall, this was a bit of a lackluster reader for me. There was a lot of potential in the world-building, and the entire thing started out on a high note. But as the story continued, the plot began to feel thin on the ground and the character inconsistencies became difficult to ignore. If you’re a bit fan of poplyamory romances, this may be worth checking out (again, as I don’t love this sort of romance novel, I don’t have a lot of comparison to bring in to my evaluation). But as a general fantasy title, I think there have been better vampire novels all around.
Rating 7: An exciting start and a creative world were let down by some lack-luster characterization in its protagonists.
Reader’s Advisory:
“Mistress of Lies” can be found on these Goodreads lists: The Vampire Renaissance and Queer Polyamory.
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