Last year, I read the first book in this series, Hunt On Dark Waters. It’s a romantasy with a bisexual witch main character named Evelyn and a telekinetic guy love interest (Bowen). While the writing felt a bit clunky to me, I still had a fun time reading it, and I was especially intrigued by the main character’s ex, Lizzie. Lizzie is a vampire that is chasing Evelyn to get back the family heirlooms she stole. She’s a fierce, terrifying adversary—but she’s also sympathetic, with a softer side she’s determined to repress. So I was happy to see that the sequel would focus on her. Plus, her love interest is a selkie! I love sapphic selkie stories!
So, when I was picking out a beach read, I knew this was the perfect choice. Not only was book one a sexy popcorn read, this series also takes place on the water! In book two, Lizzie is tracking down the ship where the stolen jewels are located while being guided by Maeve, a selkie searching for her missing sealskin—she’s unable to shift without it. Lizzie is judgmental of Maeve’s softness, but she soon finds out that she’s underestimated her. They begin to fall for each other, though Lizzie plans to return to her world as soon as she gets her treasure back.
It’s worth noting that you could definitely skip book one if you just want to read the F/F romance. There is a through line about the revolution that Evelyn, Bowen, and Maeve are all a part of, but you everything you need to know from this volume, and it’s more in the background, not the main driver of the plot.
Like in book one, I didn’t love the writing style. It felt padded, with the same sentiment repeated multiple times in the space of a few pages. Still, I have no regrets packing it in my beach bag. In fact, I ended up finishing it in one day, swapping between the audiobook and physical book.
I was more invested in the romance in this volume—which isn’t surprising, since I’m usually more invested in F/F relationships, but still. Both books flip between the two main characters’ point of view, but I still thought of Evelyn as the main character and Bowen as the love interest in book one, where it felt more balanced in book two. Maeve and Lizzie have an interesting dynamic that shifts as the story progresses, especially after Maeve gets her sealskin back. There’s a touch of enemies-to-lovers, though maybe dislike-to-love is more accurate. And if you enjoy “touch her and die” romances, this one is for you.
As promised, this is a steamy romantasy book with plenty of open door sex scenes. You don’t get the telekinetic sex scenes of book one, but you get vampire bites that cause orgasms instead, so that’s a fair trade.
I appreciate that this series is set in a queernorm world. There are plenty of queer side characters, as well as characters who use they/them pronouns and some who use ze/zem. In fact, when Maeve first sees Lizzie, her narrative uses they/them pronouns until they’re introduced and she learns Lizzie uses she/her pronouns. It’s such a small thing, but I don’t know that I’ve seen it before, especially for cisgender characters.
If you like the idea of a murderous vampire falling for a soft but formidable selkie and learning that she’s not so heartless after all, I recommend this one—even if I feel like you could shave a full 100 pages off of it and not lose much. I will definitely be reading the third and final book in the series, which stars a nonbinary main character.
