Copy provided for honest review
In this story, we meet Wade and Kerrian. Wade is an omega shifter in an extremely religious family where both being a shifter and being gay are unforgivable sins. As such, his family kicks him out. Kerrian is the Alpha of a mysterious estate/land called Malasin. Nothing grows there and Kerrian is at the center of an infamous and lethal curse. Everyone who visits Malasin never lives long and Wade, after stumbling along trying to find Rada, a safe haven, is the next unlucky soul to be drawn into the dark cursed Malasin. He plans to eventually leave, but something keeps drawing him deeper into the world. Is it Kerrian, or is it Malasin? Both are equally dangerous, but only one will actually kill him.
So this story. It started out fine we see Wade roaming the desert after being left without family, friends, or a home. Shifters in the story, for the most part are cursed, terrible, and sinful creatures. For as along as he could remember he's been taking shifter suppressants, but after being kicked out he stops taking them, hoping to make it to a place where he'll be safe. When we get to him meeting Kerrian, we get the hot attraction between the two, but it also starts the mystery and intrigue. Wade shows up even after being warned about the curse. We get more personality than a clear understanding of the plot in the beginning. Being a shifter and gay is bad enough for Wade, but being an omega is worse. Wade is a very mellow character, but with a strong and feisty personality. Kerrian is a brooding, cryptic alpha with baggage too terrible for Wade to understand.
Wade, when he stays at Kerrian's place has to sleep in the basement and only come out when he's let out in the morning. It's a hard thing to do with all the screaming. As the length and duration of Wade's stay rolls through weird things start happening. He hears little about the curse he's been told about. When something happens and he's forced to leave, he ends up coming back. When he returns is when we see more of the crux of the curse in the story. It's a lot of angst, but no real drama. There's very little romance in this, mostly magic, and mystical intrigue.
The pacing is very slow the only thing that really kept me interested was the whole curse business because we don't get a lot of detail about it up front. I don't particularly like the the stays in the same place. I think that's what did it for me for this book negatively. It all happens in Malasin, but considering the place is desolate with no real descriptive appeal aside from the fact it epitomizes death rather drastically, there's nothing captivating about the location as far as the imagination goes. However, considering the whole thing with the curse, the way Malasin looks is pretty critical.
The characters were very one-dimensional in my opinion. Wade, Kerrian, Laney, Wade's parents and best friends are all rather forgettable characters. We get sporadic mentions of Wade's parents. They play an important role, but their characters are only mentioned and they only show up towards the end of the book. Laney is the grumpy old witch loyal to Kerrian, but outside of that nothing particularly special either.
Overall the writing was pretty good it was a captivating story, but it wasn't something I could say I was highly impressed by. I think it was just because I've never read a story this dark and mysterious before. I really liked that aspect about it. Everything else though was pretty straightforward and anticlimactic, but compared to others this was a good read. I feel like this will be a take it or leave it for some people, but definitely one of a kind. There are no half stars, but I would give this a 3.5-5 stars.