What an enjoyable debut novel from this author.
In a world where monsters have, at least for a long long time, been a part of the human world, there's a part of the city Luca lives in that's just for humans, and a border into the monster side of the city.
Luca has always stayed away, as his mother, now passed, would always tell him to stay away from monsters, even if she never explained to him exactly why she disliked/distrusted them.
But now she's gone, he's 25 and just been fired from his job, and he needs to go out and find one. During one such afternoon, he doesn't realize how far he goes when he walking, too up in his thoughts as no job seems to want to hire him, especially after they hear the reason he was fired from his previous job.
Before he knows it, he's at the border and instead of turning around, he goes over to the monster side. There, he walks for awhile, following a monster, and finds the monster side to be pleasant and nothing like his mother made monsters out to be. In actuality, none of them even gawk at the human in their midst and just go about their days.
Luca is stunned but happy about this, as he's always felt something drawing him to the monster side of the city, although he always ignored it before.
As he walks the city, he ends up outside a building called "The Veil" and when he knocks on the door, he's let in and then meets Cair the owner of the lounge club he's stumbled upon.
There's an instant connection between them, as we later learn it's because they're soulmates, fated mates, what have you.
Luca doesn't know it, even though he feels that something, because he's not Fae, but Cair knows right away.
So there is that insta-love element to this, and things do happen fairly quickly between them. But about 2 months go by before anything even happens between them, as Cair tries to stay away from him for several reasons.
The main one being that in order to go to the human world, Cair struck up a deal with his parents, the King and Queen of Far, a bargain, wherein he could stay in the human world for 100 years, no longer, and then he'd never be able to go back after those 100 years are up.
Also, human can't survive going through the Veil into the Fae world, and Luca is human, so it's seemingly pointless for them to start anything, when Cair will be leaving in several months time.
But of course, there's more to everything than meets the eye, and there is a way for these two to get their HEA.
I'm glad this took the time for these two to get together, as we were able to see how they are together instead of them just getting together immediately. I enjoyed them and their chemistry for that very reason. Once they do have sex, the steam is 🔥🔥🔥. It was very very well done.
This was slow, at times, for me, and I wasn't always riveted to the page, so I did give this a lower rating, as there were times this kind of dragged. Not much was happening at times.
But, once they did, I was glued to the page.
I would definitely give this a read. It is such a strong debut novel and I can't wait for more.
The next book is going to be about Tee, Cair's half-brother who is a total grump to Cair's more happy, laid back attitude, and Alex, who is Luca's best friend. I can't wait, as those two have two totally different personalities to Cair and Luca, so I can't wait to get their story. Hopefully there will be a little less insta-love between them - as we they already do meet in this story, but Tee is just a grump about it and Alex is all about the sexual part of it.
I bet they are soulmates as well, and Tee knows it....but isn't happy about it lol. So a little more resistance, some push and pull, will be so fun to read. Can't wait!
Highly recommend this, it's definitely worth picking up! 🥰