Author: Tilly Wallace
Genre: Romance, Paranormal, Gothic, Magical Realism
Sidenote: Having the opportunity to start and complete a series in such a short time is awesome. It gives me a feeling of accomplishment.
Book 4: Vanity and Vampyres
Publication date: December 11, 2020
Book description: Being a reveler is such a drain…
Someone is supping upon young noblemen and it’s up to Hannah and Wycliff to investigate. If only they could agree on how the men are being drained of their life’s blood. Is it a Vampyre, known for their impeccable fashion sense, nocturnal roaming, and dislike of rain, who lurks in the shadows of London? Or is some more earthly method at play, like an attack of leeches?
With her best friend’s wedding imminent, Hannah is determined that the event be untouched by murder or mayhem. To ensure a magical fairytale event they must catch the murderer before the big day. Wycliff must seek the assistance of a man who raises his hackles and Hannah struggles with her growing feelings toward her guarded husband.
This pursuit will unearth long-buried secrets that could have fatal consequences for those dearest to Hannah.
Thoughts:
It starts off with a new series of mysterious deaths in the high society circles. A young man descendant of one of the most prominent families dies suddenly. The family doctor initially thinks it is very odd, no sickness can be so fast-acting, and he starts to suspect the death came due to something else. In a world where magic and creatures roam free and where you don't know what myth roams your city, it's a very logical conclusion. After looking into it, the discovery is that the young man has been drained from all his blood. There is no physical wound, the man died in his room at home and there is no trace of the blood anywhere on the premises. With this, the main suspect becomes a Vampire.
Wycliff and Hannah get mixed up with the investigation, she continues to help her husband and at some point, she decides to continue the investigation on her own. She is still a very stubborn woman. As a couple, Wycliff and Hannah need to learn to trust and communicate. We continue to see them pinning after each other and yet they do not share their feelings or the logic they follow to make decisions. The romance is annoying, so I decided to ignore that aspect.
Plot Twist:
The whole thing was part of a vendetta. A few years ago the King fell for a Fae woman, they produced a child together. But of course, the powerful and influential men of the time could not allow the throne to be inherited by such a creature. So they betrayed the King and killed the whole family. The child managed to survive and has been harboring hatred for the men who betrayed his parents. The young men who had been killed were the descendants of the four people men who were responsible for the atrocious crime.
The man has been hiding in plain sight, no one knew of his parentage and he bid his time. He decided to use Fae dolls to attack the young men and bleed them out.
*******End of Spoilers****
Hannah risks her life and she has a very important part in discovering the truth.
Book 5: Sixpence and Selkies
Publication date: April 9, 2021
Book description: A Heart As Lonely as the Ocean...
Hannah and Wycliff arrive at his ancestral estate in Dorset as tragedy strikes the coastal village. A young woman has lost her life to the tempestuous ocean, but only Hannah suspects the woman's death is anything but a horrible accident. As Hannah learns more about life in the close-knit community, she discovers two other women lost their lives to the sea. Or did they?
A rift grows between the young couple, as Wycliff refuses to believe another hand was responsible for the deaths. With her husband consumed by the needs of the long-neglected estate, Hannah is left to her own devices and finds herself walking the same lonely path as the dead women.
Can Hannah and Wycliff heal the chasm in their relationship, or will Hannah succumb to the call of the ocean...?
Thoughts:
Wycliff invites Hannah to visit the family estate he is trying to rescue. The house is in disrepair but he is greatly appreciated by the household servants. Hannah starts to get to know more about her husband. She is surprised to see that the people seem to have such high esteem for Wycliff, he is after all such a stoic and rude man in her initial experience with the guy. She seems to have such a hard time seeing the man as something other than a rude man, even after having spent a few weeks or maybe months and some of them as his wife. The stubbornness of both of them and their lack of interest in getting to know one another continues its annoying.
The romance- is my least favorite part of the whole plot. This book has a bit more pinning and lame attempts to "get to know" one another, and try to get into each other's good side- yet they ignore one another. So example- they have to share a room and a bed, but Wyciff feels that Hannah is ashamed of the state of disrepair of the house- based on what? Nothing, she never made any comment about it. So he starts avoiding their bed and ignoring her- but he is focusing so much of his energy on fixing stuff around the house. Then he sees her mood and of course, that's proof that she hates the fact that his home is depilated. She is very upset that he comes into their room as late as possible and leaves even before she's awake so of course he's trying his hardest to avoid her. Again that part of them having marital problems without trying at all to start their marriage based on trust and communication is irritating as hell.
At least this time it's a little relevant to the plotline.
So as Hannah is getting to know the people and their view of Wycliff that clashes so much with the one she has experienced so far. She finds out about the recent drowning of a young woman. For no particular reason, she's the only one who thinks the drowning is no accident. Especially once she learns that a few more happened, she starts digging into the past. Wycliff thinks she's determined to think the deaths are more than accidents simply because she hates him and his family's house.
***Start of spoilers***
To cut the story short- there is a siren among the people in town. He is the town preacher. He likes to manipulate young women. Specifically, those who are happy in their life, so he convinces them that their husband, fiance, or whoever the most important male beau is - hates them. If the woman in question is already depressed or has doubts about the feelings of their loved ones, it seems its easier to manipulate. Then he hypnotizes them so they feel like they love him, then guides them towards the cliff and makes them jump to their death. Hence the drowning and suicides were provoked by this man.
***End of spoilers***
Over all the story was simply not for me. It felt very meh, I didn't hate it nor I like it.
Book #6: Hessians and Hellhounds
Publication date: August 6, 2021
Book description: Fire erases all… even the undead....
One of London’s most recognisable Afflicted is erased from the earth in a fiery way. Whispers spread that a hellhound prowls the streets, snatching the lost souls who have escaped the afterworld. Except, Wycliff is doing no such thing—could there possibly be another such creature in London?
While Hannah and Wycliff investigate the unnatural flames, unrest grows on the streets as someone seeks to unmask how the undead women stave off rot. Someone is agitating for all Afflicted to be eradicated, in a conspiracy that will set the common Englishman against the nobles.
To save the Afflicted and stop the uprising, Wycliff must face the void that whispers his name from an inky darkness. He plans to wrest Hannah free of the curse squeezing her heart, assuming they can get out alive…
Thoughts:
This was my least favorite part of the series, so it did not manage to rescue the collections. It was forgettable, we continue to have the same issues- Wycliff and Hannah are not able to communicate, their interactions are poor and they continue to misinterpret whatever the other says or does. The last few examples where their assumption led to more problems, yeah they learned nothing from them.
The thing starts off with unrest once more. The common folks start to get wind of the afflicted- the afflicted are mainly women of high standing. Someone starts to kidnap and kill the afflicted using a blue flame. So of course the witch hunts begins. Who would benefit from unmasking the afflicted, they are after all feeding on the brains of the recently deceased - the sacrifice comes from people of the lower class who are so desperate for money that they accept the money. the family is not really told what they're going to do with the body, they are simply told that is for medical purposes.
A reporter starts to get proof and the panic starts.
This book almost felt like two separate plots put together in the same book and neither were entirely resolved.
I don’t want to give any spoilers, but I was very disappointed by how the wheelchair situation was handled. One: it was based on Egyptian mythology, but then it directly contradicted it, they didn't even come up with a reason why it would work when the Egyptian criteria for soul restoration were not met. And two: it was handled in an insensitive and highly abilist fashion. I simply felt let down by their miracle cure.
***Start of spoilers***
I get that the whole miracle with the shards was ancient magic and creative license to not wholly follow the mythology, but why would the legs return after amputation? They didn’t simply rot, they were intentionally severed. Moreover, the mythology dictates that if something happened to alter the preserved body the soul would not be able to find its way back so either she shouldn’t have been restored or at the very least those legs should not have come back. The whole 'your soul being restored' had absolutely nothing to do with the regrowth of limbs. She is damaged but she did not use magic to restore them at all when she was first affected so why after years was this possible?
I will admit that my love of mythology is likely getting in the way here.
And now to address the second point, obviously, Lady Miles would notice a difference between her two forms when they visited the Duat, but she comments on it multiple times and it focuses negatively on being disabled, valuing able bodies over disabled bodies. And then her disability was erased for a happily ever after? It seems to be giving the wrong message, she never seemed to look down on herself while she was in the wheelchair and seemed to live a life content but then with this, it seems like she is saying that having a disabled body was a curse and the only way to happiness was to have her body restored and suffer no disability otherwise life is not worth it.
***End of Spoilers***
The whole gothic paranormal and mythological creatures and give them your own spin is something I enjoy and would like to find more books related to it. But I don't think this is the style for me. I am not sure I will be going out of my way to read more books by this author anytime soon.
Overall the series I'm going to give it
These books were used for the challenges:
Complete Series
#AYearAThon: Mythology, Fairytales and Retellings
Outside of Comfort zone
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