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ninasmilliondreams's review against another edition
dark
emotional
inspiring
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
“We will rebuild. We will survive. It’s what we’re best at”
This book was phenomenal!
At first I wasn’t sure if I was going to like it but the book really pulled me in and I couldn’t put it down. The prose was beautiful and Constanza, Magdalena and Alexi were such well written characters. I found it really impressive that a book this short can have such an impact. Also loved the fast that the book was addressed to her abuser.
The relationship dynamics were so realistic and well written that I felt like I was experiencing the relationship with them. Constanza’s journey was very realistic and I understood her completely. Her conflicting emotions and feelings about him and their relationship were beautifully written and depicted the nature of a toxic relationship very well. I loved the ending and that they each went after what they wanted.
There were so many beautiful quotes and the last few sentences made me tear up I was just so happy that they managed to free themselves
This book was phenomenal!
At first I wasn’t sure if I was going to like it but the book really pulled me in and I couldn’t put it down. The prose was beautiful and Constanza, Magdalena and Alexi were such well written characters. I found it really impressive that a book this short can have such an impact. Also loved the fast that the book was addressed to her abuser.
The relationship dynamics were so realistic and well written that I felt like I was experiencing the relationship with them. Constanza’s journey was very realistic and I understood her completely. Her conflicting emotions and feelings about him and their relationship were beautifully written and depicted the nature of a toxic relationship very well. I loved the ending and that they each went after what they wanted.
There were so many beautiful quotes and the last few sentences made me tear up I was just so happy that they managed to free themselves
Content Warnings
Graphic: Toxic relationship, Emotional abuse, and Gaslighting
Moderate: Blood, Murder, and Violence
Minor: Sexual content
elskede's review against another edition
dark
emotional
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gore, Gaslighting, Grief, War, Terminal illness, Murder, Emotional abuse, Sexual content, Mental illness, Physical abuse, Blood, Violence, Toxic relationship, Suicide attempt, Sexual violence, Torture, and Injury/Injury detail
Minor: Confinement, Blood, Domestic abuse, Bullying, and Death
lailybibliography's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
I made you into my private Christ, duplicated with my own dark devotions. Nothing existed beyond the range of your exacting gaze, not even me. I was simply a nonentity when you weren’t looking at me, an empty vessel waiting to be filled by the sweet water of your attention.
A woman can’t live like that, my lord. No one can. Don’t ask me why I did it.
I think this might just be my favourite retelling. The dynamic between Constanta, Magdalena and Alexi is so touching and tragic, soaked in blood yet so enticingly erotic and horrific. I’m left in awe of how S. T. Gibson weaved this masterclass in depicting the centuries-long abuse of these three lost souls by an intricate web of gaslighting, isolation, love-bombing and manipulation. Equal parts a love story and escaping a monster, I am so in love with this novel. I cannot wait to read more of this author’s works.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Violence, Misogyny, Domestic abuse, Blood, Grief, Toxic relationship, Medical content, Gaslighting, Pandemic/Epidemic, Emotional abuse, and Confinement
Moderate: Infidelity, Body horror, and War
Minor: Sexual content
booksbyanneleen's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
What’s better than vampires? Queer, polyamorous vampires.
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ stars
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ stars
Content Warnings
Graphic: Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, Gaslighting, and Gore
caughtbetweenpages's review against another edition
emotional
reflective
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
I absolutely loved this story. It was sold to me as “polyamorous Dracula’s wives join together to overthrow him”, and honestly? I wish I hadn’t heard that. Not because I felt it spoiled things, but because I think it cheapens the impact of the story.
Constanza’s (I regret calling her by that name, because it was given to her by Dracula/her abuser) (who is never directly named and thus afforded power by way of adding to his mystery) journey of self discovery after her identity is stripped from her is empowering, and her reclamation of her religious/ethical convictions, sexuality, and understanding of her intelligence and power was exactly the story I needed when I read this book. The relationships between her, Aleksei, and Magdalena, as well as the hints to the original story of Dracula, are just icing on the cake. I absolutely devoured it.
We follow the point of view of Dracula's first wife, a young woman named Constanza. I regret calling her by that name, because she has forgotten her real name and Constanza is the name that Dracula gave her when he sired her after a incredibly traumatic event happened to her and her family. And she comes back to life as a vampire and takes revenge on the people who hurt her, and feels tremendous amount of debt to and love for the person who (she feels, at the time) allowed her to save herself. But as the story goes on and as her sire's selfishness and cruelty and calculation become more and more evident, Constanza finds herself in an increasingly tense and difficult situation, one in which her agency is stripped from her and she is sort of forced into a role of learned helplessness. Never before have I read something that evoked in me the tension of being in an abusive relationship, the terror of being powerless in your own home against someone you still love and are connected to deeply.
I keep calling him Dracula. He's never actually named within the book. There are a couple hints--like there is a passage where they're talking about some annoying English people called the Harkers in Victorian England that the family has to deal with at some point--and there's a tremendous amount of, like, vampiric lore that I feel was popularized if not created by Bram Stoker within Dracula. But regardless, he is never directly addressed by name as such. As I said, the novella is told in Constanza's point of view but it is also told with the direct address: YOU did this, YOU are a monster, with the "you" being Dracula in this case. For much of the story, while he holds the majority of the power, this distancing, this almost mythologizing of this incredibly powerful figure, not even giving him a name because that would be to make him base, gives him a tremendous amount of power. But towards the end given what happens the "you" goes from just a telling of what's happening to an accusation. It's Constanza's taking back her agency, it's her reclaiming The Narrative that was taken from her the moment that she was killed. Her journey of self discovery after her identity is stripped from her is empowering, and her reclamation of her religious/ethical convictions, sexuality, and understanding of her intelligence and power was exactly the story I needed when I read this book.
But until we get to that point of empowerment I cannot describe to you the degree of tension that this book holds. The power and balance is is so skewed as to almost not need to be mentioned, C and D, they're on such stratospherically different levels of control within this situation. It's one of the most accurate depictions that I have ever read about of an abusive relationship and it was absolutely chilling. The introduction of Dracula's other partners with Magdalena (who Constanza has a, like, very deep depth of emotion towards) and then Aleksei (who she also loves but in a slightly different way) it's that love and it's the those connections that finally empower them. But it I feel like the way that they love is so inhuman and vampire in nature; I think St Gibson did a really really good job of demonstrating that there is a monstrosity to this type of thing as well. Though the novella was quite short and it predominantly focused on the reclamation of agency for Constanza (and then also of Magdalena and Aleksei to a lesser degree), I feel like it also did an excellent job of addressing, like, classical vampire preoccupations, like the things that are at the cornerstones of most vampire stories. So we address themes of religiosity; of what it means to actually be a monster; of the unchanging and unadaptable nature of vampirism and what that means in its positives, like the sort of eternity of beauty, and what that means in its negatives, in terms of stagnation and how that can disallow you to continue existing in a modern sense.
I truly think that vampires are probably the sexiest monster and that that is an intentional thing; there's a tremendous degree of like sensuality and sexuality within this novella and I really enjoyed how St Gibson played with the themes of, like, vampiric obsession versus love, of ownership versus agency, of queerness, of stagnating beauty, about how the sort of societally prescriptive ideas of what love and romance are meant to look like don't necessarily play well with the mythos of this thing, and does the monstrosity come from the fact that you are undying and you need to consume blood and Life Force to live forever or are you a monster because people consider your way of living and your way of being monstrous? I don't think it's coincidence that many queer people attach ourselves to stories about monstrosity and I think St Gibson plays that line and sort of makes it evident as to why those connections exist in the first place. I absolutely loved A Dowry of Blood I will be reading everything St Gibson has to write from here on out.
Constanza’s (I regret calling her by that name, because it was given to her by Dracula/her abuser) (who is never directly named and thus afforded power by way of adding to his mystery) journey of self discovery after her identity is stripped from her is empowering, and her reclamation of her religious/ethical convictions, sexuality, and understanding of her intelligence and power was exactly the story I needed when I read this book. The relationships between her, Aleksei, and Magdalena, as well as the hints to the original story of Dracula, are just icing on the cake. I absolutely devoured it.
We follow the point of view of Dracula's first wife, a young woman named Constanza. I regret calling her by that name, because she has forgotten her real name and Constanza is the name that Dracula gave her when he sired her after a incredibly traumatic event happened to her and her family. And she comes back to life as a vampire and takes revenge on the people who hurt her, and feels tremendous amount of debt to and love for the person who (she feels, at the time) allowed her to save herself. But as the story goes on and as her sire's selfishness and cruelty and calculation become more and more evident, Constanza finds herself in an increasingly tense and difficult situation, one in which her agency is stripped from her and she is sort of forced into a role of learned helplessness. Never before have I read something that evoked in me the tension of being in an abusive relationship, the terror of being powerless in your own home against someone you still love and are connected to deeply.
I keep calling him Dracula. He's never actually named within the book. There are a couple hints--like there is a passage where they're talking about some annoying English people called the Harkers in Victorian England that the family has to deal with at some point--and there's a tremendous amount of, like, vampiric lore that I feel was popularized if not created by Bram Stoker within Dracula. But regardless, he is never directly addressed by name as such. As I said, the novella is told in Constanza's point of view but it is also told with the direct address: YOU did this, YOU are a monster, with the "you" being Dracula in this case. For much of the story, while he holds the majority of the power, this distancing, this almost mythologizing of this incredibly powerful figure, not even giving him a name because that would be to make him base, gives him a tremendous amount of power. But towards the end given what happens the "you" goes from just a telling of what's happening to an accusation. It's Constanza's taking back her agency, it's her reclaiming The Narrative that was taken from her the moment that she was killed. Her journey of self discovery after her identity is stripped from her is empowering, and her reclamation of her religious/ethical convictions, sexuality, and understanding of her intelligence and power was exactly the story I needed when I read this book.
But until we get to that point of empowerment I cannot describe to you the degree of tension that this book holds. The power and balance is is so skewed as to almost not need to be mentioned, C and D, they're on such stratospherically different levels of control within this situation. It's one of the most accurate depictions that I have ever read about of an abusive relationship and it was absolutely chilling. The introduction of Dracula's other partners with Magdalena (who Constanza has a, like, very deep depth of emotion towards) and then Aleksei (who she also loves but in a slightly different way) it's that love and it's the those connections that finally empower them. But it I feel like the way that they love is so inhuman and vampire in nature; I think St Gibson did a really really good job of demonstrating that there is a monstrosity to this type of thing as well. Though the novella was quite short and it predominantly focused on the reclamation of agency for Constanza (and then also of Magdalena and Aleksei to a lesser degree), I feel like it also did an excellent job of addressing, like, classical vampire preoccupations, like the things that are at the cornerstones of most vampire stories. So we address themes of religiosity; of what it means to actually be a monster; of the unchanging and unadaptable nature of vampirism and what that means in its positives, like the sort of eternity of beauty, and what that means in its negatives, in terms of stagnation and how that can disallow you to continue existing in a modern sense.
I truly think that vampires are probably the sexiest monster and that that is an intentional thing; there's a tremendous degree of like sensuality and sexuality within this novella and I really enjoyed how St Gibson played with the themes of, like, vampiric obsession versus love, of ownership versus agency, of queerness, of stagnating beauty, about how the sort of societally prescriptive ideas of what love and romance are meant to look like don't necessarily play well with the mythos of this thing, and does the monstrosity come from the fact that you are undying and you need to consume blood and Life Force to live forever or are you a monster because people consider your way of living and your way of being monstrous? I don't think it's coincidence that many queer people attach ourselves to stories about monstrosity and I think St Gibson plays that line and sort of makes it evident as to why those connections exist in the first place. I absolutely loved A Dowry of Blood I will be reading everything St Gibson has to write from here on out.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Confinement, Violence, Murder, Sexism, Toxic relationship, and Sexual violence
Moderate: Gaslighting, Death, Domestic abuse, and Pandemic/Epidemic
scam_lark's review against another edition
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Grief, Abandonment, Gore, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Murder, Addiction, Death, Toxic relationship, Violence, Sexual content, Blood, Confinement, and Domestic abuse
errie's review against another edition
dark
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
4.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Mental illness, Toxic relationship, Blood, Death, Confinement, Emotional abuse, Gaslighting, Sexual content, Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Domestic abuse, Self harm, and Violence
Moderate: Infidelity, War, and Physical abuse
samantha_ellen's review against another edition
dark
emotional
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Super unique story telling - Very different to read from the pov of a diary entry
For me it was a hard listen as it explored domestic abuse + gaslighting + narcissistic abuse - it was really beautifully & sensitively handled but if these are triggers for you I would urge you to only read if you feel in a good place.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Domestic abuse, Gaslighting, Violence, Toxic relationship, and Murder
jkpiowa's review against another edition
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Gaslighting and Emotional abuse
Moderate: Confinement
kaiyakaiyo's review against another edition
dark
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
This was good. I’ve always lamented that modern Dracula adaptations squander the concept of “vampire wives” by making them oversexualized, Uber-hetero, and/or catty; im looking at you The Invitation (kinda), Van Helsing, Dracula: 2000, etc. this book takes the concept and runs in a different, much cooler direction. The sexy bits of this book weren’t very sexy (for good reason imo), but they spoke of an intimacy and connection between the spouses I’ve always wanted to see.
this book was a really nice exploration of the inherent queerness in vampirism; if you live forever, completely transgressing any & all rules of humanity, what’s stopping you from swinging any way the wind blows??? nothing! there’s no quibbling about what kind of person any of the chars are sucking & fucking, and im living for it. it probably would’ve made the book too clunky, but i would have loved it if the author tackled gender identity in vampirism too. maybe something for next time! my only real complaint here is that there were no strap-ons or whatever the ancient equivalent would be. ye olde inventors could make intricate torture devices, but not a way for women to fuck men? I can’t believe that. where was the pegging! u can’t tell me Magdalena wouldn’t have been into that
on a serious note, this book was also a very real depiction of control and abusive power dynamics. the vampire spouses are inhumanly strong, never die, never tire, but their relative strength doesn’t preclude them from being gaslit and abused. information on their vampire anatomy, wealth, independence: “dracula” holds these over Constanta, Alexi, and Magdalena as someone older and more experienced in vampire life; he whittles them down to beings who can’t fathom how they’d survive without him as a guide, and puts them to work to keep each other content in his clutches. Constanta can’t even remember her real name; just the one he gave her at “birth”. a twisted, evil man to his core, empowered by his ability to “grant” eternal life to vulnerable, isolated people he handpicks. a serial abuser given the power to give and take life as he sees fit; now THATS what I call horror.
this take on the monster that is dracula is refreshing; in media he is almost always monstrous and manipulative, but this is the first time I’ve seen that reflected in his “family life”; usually he is just Bad Because Bloodsucking. Here his murder and bloodlust takes a backseat to the interpersonal violence he commits. incredibly well done
The best thing about this book, to me, was that it wasn’t really a dracula adaptation at all. He takes only a nameless villain role in the story of love and perseverance that is Constanta/Magdalena/Alexi. I loved Constanta, she was so earnest, so honest in her retelling of her history, nearly to the point of being unkind to her past self. she laments, she foreshadows, she rages, and I felt immense compassion and empathy for her and her spouses. I could read about her discovering pants and mp3 players for 100+ more pages; she is just that charming. She writes this “letter” to help herself process; dracula is a ghost on the page of a chapter she is ready to close. loved it!!!
That being said, I did not like the “you” POV or the near-epistolary style; it was jarring and a bit distracting. i found myself getting confused between “you” meaning the dead Dracula the letter was addressed to, and “you” meaning the person being spoken to in the actual dialogue. I’ve never liked epistolary novels, so i came in with that expectation, but the pov threw me for a loop. I much preferred the style in An Education in Malice. (I liked that book more than this one, and a good bit of the reason is style). just not my cup of tea, but the characters and story were enough to outweigh my dislike of the storytelling method.
I’ve rambled enough but I really liked this, and would be thrilled to read more from this author. I really fuck with her frank interpretation of what eternal life and preternatural power would mean for relationships, and the simultaneous love and harm that would inhabit vampiric spaces. fantasy often glosses over the unsavory parts of love & sex to get to romance, but Gibson instead respectfully hones in on those elements while still managing a love story in the end. bravo
Content Warnings
Graphic: Domestic abuse, Blood, Gaslighting, Violence, Murder, Emotional abuse, Physical abuse, and Toxic relationship
Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Death, Infidelity, Confinement, Gore, and Sexual content
Minor: War and Pandemic/Epidemic