Wonderful!
Great plot, characters, and world.
Never knew how much I needed a queer vampire story til now. Absolutely love Haruka and Nico.

Overall- recommend! ( )

This book was a surprise. I stumbled upon it on Amazon looking for new releases - I've always been a fan of vampires and there's so few good m/m paranormal romances that I was willing to give it a chance blind, and I'm so glad I did!
As the description says, this is a pretty slow burn but doesn't feel stagnant or boring at all. Nikole has built a very vivid alternate world that includes different cultures and settings in under 300 pages which is very impressive. I've read entire multi-book series that didn't seem as well thought out and organized. Haruka's characterisation can feel a bit odd, but if you take into account his age and personality it doesn't feel unrealistic or overly awkward.
It'll be interesting to see more background information in the second book, The Vanishing. ( )

Given some of the scenes in the second half of Lore and Lust, I’d blush violently to recommend it to a friend.

But, I have to say I enjoyed this book much more than I thought I would, given that I don’t really read romance. It contains an interesting take on vampires and an emotional depth to the erotic elements, which explore the themes of trust and overcoming past hurts.

In this story, the existence of vamps is known to humans and they co-exist peacefully. Vampires only feed off each other rather than humans in order to preserve the purity of their bloodline (doesn’t seem to make sense in terms of the law of conservation of energy, but I quite like it anyway).

There’s also an interesting magical element to the story that neatly accounts for the love at first sight trope and the elaborate olfactory descriptions that seem to come up frequently in romantic fic.

If you don’t mind some graphic sex scenes, it’s an interesting, slow-burn read.

Also, the cover is phenomenal! I really hope we get a similar design for book two featuring Nino. I would absolutely splash out for physical copies.

Trigger warnings: child abuse ( )