Book Review: Blood Echo by L.E. Royal

I started this book at the beginning of the year, and I literally finished it just last week. Not because it was bad, but because my life is a chaotic mess. Anyway, I’m glad I finally finished and reviewed this book.

Note: I received an advanced copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review on NetGalley. This novel was actually released last December.

I don’t know where she came from, how she found me, or how she knew the exact right time to walk into my life.

— i.

“Life is tragic, love is never straightforward. . . Or least not from what I’ve seen,” I added quickly, not wanting to say too much on a subject I had experienced so little of. “There’s light and dark in everything, the story doesn’t fall into the light for the sake of a happy ending. Things end badly, imperfectly. . . Like I said. . . Realistic.”

So in winter of last year, I went on the hunt on NetGalley for WLW stories, especially set in a fantasy realm. This is the first one I picked up, and as I said, it took me eons to finish. It wasn’t bad, and I wish I had finished it way earlier, but life had gotten in the way.

This is the first book in a series (I’m unsure of how many books the author is planning), and it revolves around loner Rayne Kennedy, who is unexpectedly saved by a vampire (because Rayne was being abused by her father). Then, Rayne finds herself in the vampire world of Vires (which is sort of hidden as a dimension in our world), only to discover that her saviour is actually one of the most ruthless, dangerous vampires out there. Then lots of stuff happens, and along the way, Rayne and Scarlett (the vampire) fall for each other. It was a lot to take in, so let’s get started. If you just want to skip to the end of my review, scroll to the end as always.

— ii.

I agree, it takes a certain kind of person to be able to find beauty in tragedy, to see light in darkness.

So I don’t want to make this review super long, because I don’t really have a lot to say (generally because if it’s the first book in a series I’m reading for the first time, I almost never do). The book wasn’t what I expected, and let me down, unfortunately. The characters were great, and while the dynamics between Rayne and Scarlett is something we’ve all seen in fiction thousands of times before, it was still so different for me because I’ve never seen it in an F/F relationship, so this was really nice. The trope of bad, mysterious, and sexy girl/guy with the pure good girl/guy is something I loved like, almost a decade ago, so I can just hear my fourteen/fifteen year old self squealing with glee. The secondary characters were also cool, although there weren’t many that we really got to know well enough for me to make an impression.

— iii.

I existed, living between the cracks of my death—my almost death—had left in my version of reality.

I had two issues with this book that really brought down the rating for me (see at the end of the review). The first being, the plot. I literally had no idea where it was going. When we meet Evan (I think that’s his name), shortly after Rayne makes it to Vires, and we learn of his hatred for Scarlett & her family, and his wish to overthrow the vampire hierarchy, it seems that he’s going to be the villain, and the series will build up to an epic finale of Rayne/Scarlett vs. Evan. Then his character just disappears, and we’re introduced to Scarlett’s father, then he seems like the villain all of a sudden? Evan eventually comes back, but the book literally goes nowhere for about 90% of it. Most of it was actually Rayne lamenting over Scarlett’s dark personality with some vampire related events in between to spice things up. It just greatly disappointed me, because I was expecting a novel with a kickass fantasy world with kickass characters and a plot that would make me never want to put the book down. But this book almost has no plot. For a fantasy series, it needs to have way more substance than it provided. Now that I’ve finished the book, I do plan on finishing the series, but I’m not super excited, so hopefully there’s only going to be a couple of more books. But I was sad, because Rayne and Scarlett seem like such cool characters, but characters can’t survive a novel, let alone a fantasy series on their own. They need to have a well paced plot, a good conflict, and unfortunately, Blood Echo didn’t have that.

— iv.

You see her as a monster, but to me, she’s my hero. Can’t she be both? Can’t you love her for who she is, despite what she does?

The other thing that really brought the rating down for me was the writing. The writing wasn’t bad, honestly. I liked it. What turned me off almost completely by the end was the thirty thousand mouthfuls of metaphors and similes. Seriously, there was at least one in every paragraph, sometime, several in just a sentence alone. By the end of the novel, it was just too much for me, and it was enough for me to rate the book what I did.

— v.

Overall, I had somewhat good expectations going into the novel, only to be severely disappointed. It had some great characters, but the lack of a plot and the unnecessary amount of metaphors/similes made it almost terrible. I do plan on continuing the series, because based on the ending, maybe things will turn out, but for now, I don’t have many expectations for when I get around to reading the second book.

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Rating: ★★ | GoodReads