Paul Pablo

I really wanted to love this book. I was a huge fan of the original All Souls trilogy, and I think Deborah Harkness is a genuinely talented writer. But this one felt forced — as if it was published simply to squeeze more life (and money) out of the franchise. The story had so much potential. We could have had a rich, compelling novel entirely about Marcus — his life before he was turned, the transformation itself, and his struggles afterward. Those were the most vivid and engaging chapters. Instead, we got a split narrative bogged down by unnecessary scenes at the de Claremont household with Diana, the children, fire drakes, griffins — all of it feeling like filler, shoehorned in just to keep familiar faces on the page. None of it truly served the story. Even some of the character writing felt off. Take Phoebe’s reaction to her father’s illness: as a vampire, she would have always known that her warm-blooded family members would age and die while she remained unchanged. Yet the way it’s written, she acts shocked and distraught as if this reality had never occurred to her. It came across as contrived, almost melodramatic — and moments like that pulled me out of the story entirely. In the end, I found much of the book tedious and disappointing. It did a disservice to the depth and richness of the original trilogy and to the world Harkness built. I truly hope she returns to the immersive, thoughtful storytelling that made the first three books so captivating — because this one, unfortunately, missed the mark.