In the thrilling conclusion of the duology set in the world of the New York Times bestselling Serpent & Dove series by Shelby Mahurin, a vampire and the woman who tried to kill him prove that true love can conquer anything, even Death. Perfect for fans of Sarah J. Mass.
Célie’s life is over. She took her final breath trying to save the people she loves—including the powerful and enigmatic vampire king, Michal, who refused to let her go. When Célie wakes, she cannot walk in the sun; she can hear her friends’ heartbeats and she craves their blood. Michal has cursed her to the eternal existence of a vampire.
But Célie isn’t the only dead roaming the earth. Her sister, Filippa, has returned as a shadow of her former self, and other revenants are rising from their graves intent on revenge. The fragile balance between life and death has broken, awakening an even darker force—and he is coming for Célie, ready to claim her as his Bride. With the fate of their world at stake, Célie and Michal must set aside their searing attraction to mend the veil and right the balance, once and for all.
I received this ARC from the publisher in exchange for an honest and voluntary review. I was in no way compensated for this review.
Shelby Mahurin brings a thrilling conclusion to The Scarlet Veil duology with The Shadow Bride and it is the very definition of epic conclusion! This read was so intense, so captivating that it was simply unputdownable!
Celie's life has changed forever. She died and was brought back as a vampire by the one vampire she thought she could trust, Michal. Being a vampire is hard, Celie struggles to control the cravings for blood and everything is just new to her. It's like she has to learn to "live" all over again, except now she's not really living anymore. Lou, Reid, Coco, and Beau are trying to help her through this new transition, as is Odessa.
It's not long before strange things start happening, stranger than usual. The dead are rising, and it's not vampires this time. It's revenants and they are coming for Celie and her friends by default. The why behind it all becomes clear much sooner than I anticipated, but with yet another 600+ page book, I figured there would be lots of surprising discoveries along the way and Shelby holds nothing back with this one.
Death has come calling for Celie, and this is Death personified. He has marked Celie as one of his Shadow Brides and he needs her for some nefarious purpose. Adding to her struggles with vamprism, Celie has no choice but to return to Requiem with Michal.
This book was sooo deliciously good! It was intense, it was mysterious, it was dark and beautiful! It was everything, just like its predecessor! I've been waiting for another YA vampire book series to take my breath away and Mahurin has done just that with this duology! It was everything one could hope for in a vampire read and that it took place in the Serpent & Dove world was the icing on the cake!
I positively loved how the romance continued to develop between Celie and Michal. Obviously, this was bound to happen with them despite everything they went through in the first book. And it was spicy! Mind you, this is still considered a YA book even with Celie being 19 years old, so don't expect the level of spice you'd get from an adult romance! Things are still relatively tame in this one all things considered, but I'd still call it spicy for its target age level.
This book was heavy with secrets and it was mind-blowing! I swear my heart had to have skipped a beat at least twice because of the turmoil Mahurin put her characters through and in turn me, by proxy! Lol. This book will leave you utterly breathless with all its twists and turns. The end results were even more startling!
I positively loved the epilogue to this one! Just when I thought things were wrapping up too quickly, we get this nice slow down for yet another goodbye! I can always hope it's not a forever goodbye, as we thought that once too when Gods & Monsters ended. Nothing is ever written in stone as I feel like there's still a good amount of characters we can follow around for a time or two...or three! Who knows at this point!
The ending to this one was absolutely perfect! I'll admit parts of it felt a little too clean, and maybe a little too perfect, but it's a minimal feeling at that. I'm always a little hard-pressed to believe the kind of situation that we had take place in this one. So that's more of a me thing, there's really no way I can encounter this situation and not have these feelings regardless of the author writing it. But as I said, it's a minimal issue to have with a book!
All in all, The Shadow Bride was a mesmerizing and spectacular conclusion to the duology! It was pretty much everything I was hoping for, albeit with the little annoyance, but it can be forgiven after everything else being so wonderful! This was by far one of the best reads of my year so far!
Overall Rating 5/5 stars
