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3.43 AVERAGE
3.43 AVERAGE
adventurous
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
challenging
emotional
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
N/A
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
emotional
funny
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
adventurous
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
dark
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Just meh for me. I wanted to love it but thw main character was beyond annoying.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Racism, Slavery, Violence, War
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
adventurous
challenging
emotional
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
It’s a historical fantasy (love!) that takes place during the civil war. A formerly enslaved girl named Jerusalem is a “saint” (someone with special abilities to kill vampires) on the run, fighting for the union army alongside other saints and Alexei, a vampire who happens to be in love with her, to save her brother and the rest of the people enslaved by her former captors.
The story is so intricate, woven delicately around necessary reparations, permeating anger and suffering, star-crossed, forbidden love, and reclaiming dignity for those who’ve been oppressed. Jerusalem is fiery, righteously angry, and justifiably set of vengeance for her family. Alexei is an ancient vampire, terrified of his former undead captor, but loving Jerusalem enough to want to support her in the fight to save her brother.
Highly recommend picking this one up, even if it’s a departure for your normal reading. Actually, *especially* if it’s a departure. Books like this are worth reading for anyone and everyone!
The story is so intricate, woven delicately around necessary reparations, permeating anger and suffering, star-crossed, forbidden love, and reclaiming dignity for those who’ve been oppressed. Jerusalem is fiery, righteously angry, and justifiably set of vengeance for her family. Alexei is an ancient vampire, terrified of his former undead captor, but loving Jerusalem enough to want to support her in the fight to save her brother.
Highly recommend picking this one up, even if it’s a departure for your normal reading. Actually, *especially* if it’s a departure. Books like this are worth reading for anyone and everyone!
Find this review and more on my blog at Worlds Unlike Our Own.
Thank you to the publisher, Wednesday Books, and NetGalley for providing me with an eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
After seventeen year old Jerusalem killed her slave master, her own family was murdered in retaliation and she had no choice but to escape north, to Union territory where the army is fighting slavery, and the vampires who benefit from it like the one who enslaved her. Alexei is an ancient vampire fighting with the Union army, but he is running from a past of his own. Driven by revenge, all Jerusalem wants is to kill the vampire that enslaved her, but she will have to team up with Alexei to do it, for her target is no ordinary vampire but an ancient herself.
I wasn’t too impressed by this author’s first book, Within These Wicked Walls, and so decided to skip the second book, but I thought I’d try out this one because the premise sounded quite promising. I’ve read fantasy retellings set during the Civil War before, most notably, Dread Nation, which I loved, so I had high hopes for The Dangerous Ones.
The Civil War, but with vampires, was such a fascinating premise, and the way the initial chapters laid out the plot blended the two concepts really well. However, I feel like between vampires and saints and everyone’s personal revenge missions, the story ended up revolving around just that and didn’t spare much time to dwell on the larger conflict at hand.
I did like that the author didn’t waste much time at the beginning explaining things or building up the tension and the story opened in the middle of the action and more or less stayed there the entire time.
This story could have used some more world building. It was never clearly explained what it meant to be a Saint, or how exactly some people happened to be born with these powers, or even what all the different powers were.
I found the language highly off-putting. Between the slang and vernacular that didn’t fit the time period I was irritated within the first five minutes because it made for a very jarring reading experience. The narrative also hopped between the main story and flashbacks to Jerusalem or Alexei’s pasts with no warning or indication and there was no particular order to it either. There were several times when a chapter started with a flashback and then abruptly moved back into present day (and vice versa). While I did enjoy the insights into the characters that these interludes provided, it needed some structure to it.
And speaking of structure, there were many other parts of this book that could have used it too, starting with the pacing. This story seemed to be in a rush the entire time, starting with Jerusalem’s rather dramatic escape, but then jumping a year ahead in the very next chapter, leaving the reader to discover how she made her way to safety and met the other central characters through dialogue between the various characters, extremely concise flashbacks, and other context clues. For me, this had a detrimental effect not only on the character arcs (more on that in a minute), but this was also a large part of why this story didn’t hook me.
On the plus side, the rapid pacing was probably the only reason why I didn’t DNF this book. Because it was moving so fast, I was able to sit down and get through the book. The action scenes were pretty decent as was the writing and the two narrative voices were distinct and easy to follow.
Going back to the characters, when we met Alexei and Jerusalem after the prologue, they were already kind of friends and the relationship was established. It would have been so much better if that developed on page – primarily because this route made the romance feel so forced and I found it very unrealistic. If this was meant to be an enemies to lovers trope, at least let it play out during the story rather than presenting the reader with a fait accompli.
I also didn’t like Jerusalem as a main character at all as she didn’t have much of an arc. The way her story started made her a highly promising MC, with so much potential for development, but by the end, it was like she hadn’t grown at all – she was still immature and annoying, not to mention snapping at Alexei all the time to the point that it was basically verbal abuse. Alexei in comparison felt like a much better written character as there was enough background given to understand his personality and motivations, but he was still a pretty bland character. Overall however, I didn’t find myself invested in either character and was mostly reading just to find out how it would end.
The ending of this story was basically all about the ending of Jerusalem’s quest to avenge her family and it all came together quite well. I am a bit disappointed however, that the author chose to conclude the book there since the war was technically still going on. An epilogue to talk about how that worked out would have been nice. I don’t know if leaving this obvious loose end means there might be a sequel planned, but I doubt I’d read it if that was the case.
This was quite interesting conceptually, but it didn’t make good use of that potential in my opinion. All in all, I didn’t enjoy this much, and it was just not my type of read. I think, after this, it’s unlikely I’ll be returning to any of this author’s books, and personally, I would not recommend The Dangerous Ones.
Thank you to the publisher, Wednesday Books, and NetGalley for providing me with an eARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.
After seventeen year old Jerusalem killed her slave master, her own family was murdered in retaliation and she had no choice but to escape north, to Union territory where the army is fighting slavery, and the vampires who benefit from it like the one who enslaved her. Alexei is an ancient vampire fighting with the Union army, but he is running from a past of his own. Driven by revenge, all Jerusalem wants is to kill the vampire that enslaved her, but she will have to team up with Alexei to do it, for her target is no ordinary vampire but an ancient herself.
I wasn’t too impressed by this author’s first book, Within These Wicked Walls, and so decided to skip the second book, but I thought I’d try out this one because the premise sounded quite promising. I’ve read fantasy retellings set during the Civil War before, most notably, Dread Nation, which I loved, so I had high hopes for The Dangerous Ones.
The Civil War, but with vampires, was such a fascinating premise, and the way the initial chapters laid out the plot blended the two concepts really well. However, I feel like between vampires and saints and everyone’s personal revenge missions, the story ended up revolving around just that and didn’t spare much time to dwell on the larger conflict at hand.
I did like that the author didn’t waste much time at the beginning explaining things or building up the tension and the story opened in the middle of the action and more or less stayed there the entire time.
This story could have used some more world building. It was never clearly explained what it meant to be a Saint, or how exactly some people happened to be born with these powers, or even what all the different powers were.
I found the language highly off-putting. Between the slang and vernacular that didn’t fit the time period I was irritated within the first five minutes because it made for a very jarring reading experience. The narrative also hopped between the main story and flashbacks to Jerusalem or Alexei’s pasts with no warning or indication and there was no particular order to it either. There were several times when a chapter started with a flashback and then abruptly moved back into present day (and vice versa). While I did enjoy the insights into the characters that these interludes provided, it needed some structure to it.
And speaking of structure, there were many other parts of this book that could have used it too, starting with the pacing. This story seemed to be in a rush the entire time, starting with Jerusalem’s rather dramatic escape, but then jumping a year ahead in the very next chapter, leaving the reader to discover how she made her way to safety and met the other central characters through dialogue between the various characters, extremely concise flashbacks, and other context clues. For me, this had a detrimental effect not only on the character arcs (more on that in a minute), but this was also a large part of why this story didn’t hook me.
On the plus side, the rapid pacing was probably the only reason why I didn’t DNF this book. Because it was moving so fast, I was able to sit down and get through the book. The action scenes were pretty decent as was the writing and the two narrative voices were distinct and easy to follow.
Going back to the characters, when we met Alexei and Jerusalem after the prologue, they were already kind of friends and the relationship was established. It would have been so much better if that developed on page – primarily because this route made the romance feel so forced and I found it very unrealistic. If this was meant to be an enemies to lovers trope, at least let it play out during the story rather than presenting the reader with a fait accompli.
I also didn’t like Jerusalem as a main character at all as she didn’t have much of an arc. The way her story started made her a highly promising MC, with so much potential for development, but by the end, it was like she hadn’t grown at all – she was still immature and annoying, not to mention snapping at Alexei all the time to the point that it was basically verbal abuse. Alexei in comparison felt like a much better written character as there was enough background given to understand his personality and motivations, but he was still a pretty bland character. Overall however, I didn’t find myself invested in either character and was mostly reading just to find out how it would end.
The ending of this story was basically all about the ending of Jerusalem’s quest to avenge her family and it all came together quite well. I am a bit disappointed however, that the author chose to conclude the book there since the war was technically still going on. An epilogue to talk about how that worked out would have been nice. I don’t know if leaving this obvious loose end means there might be a sequel planned, but I doubt I’d read it if that was the case.
This was quite interesting conceptually, but it didn’t make good use of that potential in my opinion. All in all, I didn’t enjoy this much, and it was just not my type of read. I think, after this, it’s unlikely I’ll be returning to any of this author’s books, and personally, I would not recommend The Dangerous Ones.
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
hopeful
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated