What is that supposed to mean? Those are the words Lucas Daniels hears before stumbling through the brass doors of the elegant Club Dyavol, a club that seems to appear out of nowhere. The club is his last hope of getting a job to escape his predatory stepfather’s home.
Who would dare enter a vampire’s sanctuary uninvited?
Count Konstantin “the Wolf” Volk may be weakened by a curse, but he is still a primal predator. And when he sees a young man venture into his club, bypassing all of his magical and physical protections, more than just his curiosity is aroused.
Is there more to this meeting than simple chance?
NOTE: THIS NOVELLA SERIES HAS CLIFFHANGERS! EVERY BOOK WILL END ON ONE. THAT'S MY NATURAL WRITING STYLE. IF YOU DO NOT LIKE CLIFFHANGERS, WAIT UNTIL THE WHOLE SERIES IS PUBLISHED TO READ. THANKS FOR THE SUPPORT!
X. Aratare writes gay paranormal romance with witches, vampires, magic, and mystery. Though some books may venture into dark territory, they will all have happy endings.
Authors and audio producers take note: Ethan Holtan has TALENT! TALENT! TALENT! His performance is like listening to a full cast audiobook! He gives each character a distinctive voice and personality. Get rid of the robots and hire this HUMAN!
The vampire/witch plotline here is really rather interesting, and I’m eager to find out more about what is going on and what will happen in the future. Nothing about any of it appears to be particularly mind-blowing, but it kept me entertained and intrigued well-enough, so I count it as a win.
The characters seem likable and interesting, and they already have a pleasant dynamic going on.
Lucas and Konstantin have a decent amount of chemistry, and I especially love the possessiveness already beginning to come from Konstantin. However, there is more than just romance that connects these two, namely something paranormal, and I’m intrigued to find out what exactly it is.
'The Vampire's Club' series: Book One - 3.5 stars Book Two - 3.5 stars
This short and mysterious vampire story leapt off the pages with the STUNNING NARRATION by Ethan Holtman!! I need more books by him—his voice is pure gold!!
The premise: A 21 year old wanders into a private club for vampires—a club he should not be able to see nor enter.
Who or what is he? And what are the mysterious feelings and voices he follows? I won’t say more so as not to ruin the story.
I LOVED THIS serial and can’t wait for the next one!
Now wait a whole damn minute now...who is Ethan Holman because mans got the gift. I legit was not expecting greatness and yet 🥳 I love when I find a new fave.
I'm hooked and see great things for this series. Thank goodness the series is complete else I would have lost my damn mind! Straight on to the next book
Entertaining start to a interconnected series around a mm vampire/human(?) couple.
Is it breathtakingly amazing? No, and would be difficult to pull off an entire world building, as well as character and relationship development in only 74 pages. But it has potential, and listening to a new (to me) narrator with a lot of potential, too, totally made it worthwhile.
Said narrator is called Ethan Holtan and he’s a man of many voices (and accents). His narration alone makes me pick up the sequel right after this one, because the book does end in a cliffhanger of sorts: Lucas, the human (?), stumbles upon a vampire club while looking for a job. And Konstantin, the reclusive owner of said club, takes interest in him because of… reasons 😬
Any further development (and as I said, there’s a lot of potential) is about to happen in the upcoming books.
3.5 stars, rounded up because of the really well done narration.
I picked this up for the Lovecraft angle -- it's set in Arkham and in the opening there are some obvious references to the canon (the unfriendly business owner at the interview is an Innsmouth person, everyone is looking at the MC funny because he's from out of town) but then he finds the vampire club and from there on it seems like standard PNR with sexy brooding vampires and people feeling mysteriously drawn to each other.
It wasn't bad. I'd probably try the second installment if it became free. But it wasn't great, either, and I'm always kind of annoyed by this new "turn a novel into a series of shorts for extra sales" approach.
This was a short novella that was more like a set up for the story. Both MCs meet, the backgrounds are more or less explained. It was rather interesting. A vampire exclusive club under witch's protective spell that nobody sees, and yet a young man can see and can get in. Lucas peaks everyone's curiosity especially the owner himself, elusive Konstantin. The subsequent meeting brings even more curious discoveries about who Lucas is and the possibility of something more between them. I liked it. There was tinsy bit of angst, no steam but a promise of one. This is going to be good. I just wish it was longer.
Writing a book about a country/language you don’t know? ASK. A. NATIVE. Here is "Ask An Expert" link: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/group... . There is a "Regional Experts" thread. Please, use it.
I really regret getting the audible version of this book. One easily avoidable mistake almost ruined it for me.
While the accents were good, I just can't comprehend why the vampires who speak many languages and over a very long period of time still retain very heavy accents. Any thoughts anyone? Really wanna figure that one out.
Club Diavol is all nice and dandy, and is correct in its written version. However this narrator's version "DIA-VOL" is nowhere near correct and not even remotely recognizable to the native speaker.
The narrator should have used English version "devil", since it's much closer to the Russian pronunciation "d'yavel" than "dia-vol".
I am so glad I came across this series, a couple of friends were discussing it and I hadn't heard about the author, talk-less the book. I decided why not, I didn't have anything else to read.
It was a terrific book and series, some were better than the other but overall, it was good. I liked Konstantin and Lucas and especially enjoyed that they had dual POVs.
Audio: 5 stars Ethan Holtan is a new to me narrator and I really enjoyed his narration of this book!
Book: 4 stars
This book is less than 100 pages, but so much detail and things go on in this first book that it flew by! Thank god I knew that X. Aratare is notorious for cliffhangers until the last book so I made sure this was a finished series lol!
Love Lucas and Konstantin so far, I can’t wait to see what happens next!
I loved the first two books and I'm anxiously waiting for the third. Yes, they are quite short and you will devour them in one sitting. But the writing is positively lovely, the characters are beautiful, and the world building is exquisite. I rarely ever write reviews but the first two books made me so happy that I have to share them.
This is my first time reading the author and let me tell you, I think I got myself into a series that has the potential to become a 2020 favorite.
In this first one we get introduced to Lucas, a regular guy that’s looking for a job when suddenly he notices a mysterious place, and even a voice inside him tells him he should look for the wolf in there. He doesn’t know why or how, but he feels like he should get inside the building. This is nothing but a club called Dyavol, a place that’s meant to be a vampire Sanctuary, leaded by Konstantin Volk.
Now, supposedly, Dyavol has its own protection from strangers and only vampires and human guests can join, but Lucas is different, you see? There’s something inside him that is both intriguing and dangerous, even if he doesn’t realize it himself.
On the other hand, we have Konstantin, a powerful vampire who’s bound to a curse that has him in constant pain. At least, until he drinks Lucas’ blood. But, what is the meaning of this? Why is this kid’s blood helping him? I guess we’ll found out in the next book, which I cannot wait to get my hands on!
This series starter has me intrigued. While it is a very short novella, it packs enough plot, relationship, and world-building that it hooks you into wanting more.
Tem vampiros? Estarei lá ( menos crepúsculo, claro 😅) o primeiro livro foi rapidinho mas curti o mistério em torno do Lucas, acho que ele ainda vai surpreender muito nos próximos livros. Fiquei curiosa e com certeza vou para o book two 😉
Review: I’m going to do a series review, which I’ll get to in a moment, because I really liked this series and only reviewing this book won’t do it justice. This story is more of a serial than a normal series. Each book doesn’t have a full story with a goal and resolution. Rather, they all link together to make one big story. I’ve given this one a 3.5-star rating on the caveat that it is only the very beginning of a story. I wasn’t super hooked until Book 3 (the first few are pretty short), but this was a decent start with believable enough characters and a bit of a mystery about why Lucas is so different from other humans that made me interested enough to keep going.
Now for my spoiler-free series review:
To get the negatives out of the way first…
– The pacing felt a little strange. It didn’t feel slow, and yet, the story took place over the course of less than a week. When I think about it, it seems like an awful lot happened, including the formation of deep relationships, in such a short period of time.
– This wasn’t something that bothered me, but I feel like I should mention there were minor editing issues. The occasional typo, but also the occasional continuity error. Like a character learning some information, and then later learning it again and being shocked, as if it were the first time.
Now for why I liked this series so much!
– I thought Konstantin would be a vampire alpha jerk, but he was very much the opposite. He was compassionate and good and really valued and cared for the vampires in his little found family.
– I liked a lot of the characters. Some were good people. Some were just plain interesting. Some were a bit of both.
– There were all sorts of complex relationships among these vampires—especially between Konstantin, the Nomad, Arsene, and Marius—and I loved it. Relationships that were familial and/or decidedly not familial, but also with rifts between them. Relationships that had love, devotion, and longing but also pain, betrayal, and jealousy. I especially loved the exploration of Konstantin’s feelings toward both his sire and his adoptive sire, and how hurt he was by the father figures in his vampiric life.
– There was an interesting vampire society structure and dynamic, with the houses and sires and relationships among them. It was a bit weird the way they called the ones they turned their children and “nursed” them but also treated them as lovers, but I can accept some weirdness in paranormal books.
– The romance was fast—less than a week, and they were already in love, willing to kill for each other, and wanting to be together for eternity—but sweet. They really cared for each other and tried to do right by each other.
– There was sexy blood drinking! (And also sexy sex. But, to be honest, I still think the hottest scene was between Marius and Arsene in Book 3, which was neither sex nor the typical sexy blood drinking.)
– I liked the acknowledgement of the feelings of abuse/assault victims. How having the people you thought cared about you choose to look the other way is a form of betrayal. How that can hurt just as much, if not more than, the actual act of abuse/assault.
– There was a very sweet found family element.
– There was also drama, action, secrets, vampires, witches, magic, and other interesting things going on, but I won’t get into detail about those because spoilers.
Overall this was a great series with romance, drama, action, secrets, betrayal, complex relationships, found family, magic, and sexy vampires!