King of Battle and Blood (Adrian X Isolde Book 1)

Wow wow wow i haven’t read such a good book in a long time. The storyline between the mcs is chef kiss and it got me excited everyday after school just to go home and continue reading. Literally buy this book u won’t regret it.

Bit confused and angry with ending . Did love Adrian and Isolde till 90% of the book. Nice story surprised by the twist .

I hate to say it but I’m a little disappointed in this book. The pacing and characterisation and ultimately the story just wasn’t there for me.Isolde hates Adrian because he’s a vampire and is destroying the kingdoms. Fair enough. But that hate passes awfully quickly for the single reason that Isolde is basically horny. In the span of four days this warrior Princess who wants to kill Adrian and hates everything that he is, is jealous of other woman, is overly possessive of her ‘husband’ and thinks maybe he’s really not a monster after all because he saved her a few times and promised not to attack her people. Four days is apparently long enough to determine that she trusts her lifelong and most hated enemy. I just don’t buy it. The story needed slowed down a lot to let a relationship and trust truly develop in a way I believed.One of the problems was that I just didn’t know enough about Isolde. All I know is she’s been trained to fight and likes sex. Oh and she’s a Princess/ queen which she likes to remind everyone of all the time. That’s it. She would do anything for her people apparently but we never got to see her relationship with her kingdom because we jumped into this story and world so quickly with no build up and very little world building or back story. Overall I found Isolde to be quite unlikeable. Yes you can write a strong female character but the author seemed to forget that as the main character she has to be likeable as well. She was ruthless, killing anyone who even slightly offended her and seems to be irritated and think herself above everyone around her. She showed no compassion, no warmth, had no redeeming features, no interesting qualities, nothing that was even remotely relatable. As a reader it was ready hard to empathise with or really buy into her reasons for marrying a vampire to save her kingdom. Also I get this author likes to write a sex scene but about 90% of the encounters the main characters have, they have sex. Where is the build up? The tension, the will they, won’t they aspect. There’s no progression in the relationship when they’ve jumped in at literally 3 chapters in and continue in the same way for the majority of the book. The author seriously needs to learn about the benefits of delayed gratification. Part of the excitement of reading a story like this is the build up of which this has none. The sex scenes became boring because they were so repetitive. I’d rather have a book with one or two well written sex scenes that are worth the wait than have the same tired tropes rehashed again and again. Once again with this author, this idea is fine and intriguing but the execution and story telling just let it down as she favours repetitive sex scenes over a compelling and well told story. For a vampire/ secret identify story, Jennifer L Armentrout ‘From Blood and Ash’ or ‘A Shadow in the Ember’ have much better world building and characters that kept me excited, kept me compelled and ultimately kept me reading.3 stars is generous as this offers nothing new or original, I’ve literally read this story so many times before in various guises only told so much better so I’d probably have to say 2 1/2 stars.

Omg…The way they met is everything. The writing is 🤌🤌We love Adrian tbh. Never ever EVER thought I would like this sort of book but when it’s written by Scarlett you already KNOW it’s going to be good 😂

This was a great read that I highly enjoyed. Isolde is a total had bitch and we love a woman who knows her own mind according let men speak it for her! I will try and keep this review as spoiled free as possible but sometimes it is unavoidable. We start this book in Lara with Isolde as their princess, not wanting to get married and eventually wanting to become queen handfuls her kingdom on her own.... Enter Adrian a conquering King who wants Isolde as his queen and wife.Their story starts on quite a Rocky path but as the book moves on their romance grows.... The chemistry they've had from the beginning. Things really started topics up about 60% in which I thought was really great, I felt we had a few key foreshadowing moments which I thought was very cleverly executed. The interwoven history and events of Revekka Adrian and Isolde was great and I could hardly put this one down.I felt the twists and turns at the end were a great way of explaining what we knew so far and also creating build up for the next book.Overall I loved this one and I can't wait for book two.

"History is just perspective. It changes depending on your side..."*Isolde de Lara's wedding day is not what she imagined - she must marry her sworn enemy for the sake of her kingdom. Adrian Aleksandr Vasiliev, the vampire King, has chosen her for his bride. Isolde will try to take him down for the sake of her people. But as she learns to navigate a ruthless vampire court she soon finds out that there is more to her enemy than she first thought.*"I was finding it harder to hate the actual person behind the monster..."*Well, I absolutely devoured this book! I've been wanting to read it for a while now and it was Barely Book Club's pick last month. I loved that Isolde's character didn't put up with any nonsense from no one and Adrian fit the part of morally grey, dark haired brooding character perfectly, even though he's blonde 😂 it definitely gave me The Bridge Kingdom and The Shadows Between Us vibes. I really enjoyed the vampire lore and I've already preordered book two that's how much I enjoyed it!*"All the stars in the sky are not as bright as my love for you..."

Lovely story line!!! Easy read excellent spice

I did not read something as good since ACOTAR by Sara J. Mass. This book is amazing!! I read it so fast I couldn't put it down. One of my favorite so far 😍 I hope you'll fall in love as much as I did!

Alerta de spicy + vampiros ✨🥵En King of battle and blood vamos a seguir la historia de Isolde una princesa que no desea casarse y ha sido entrenada para ser guerrera, pero cuando el Rey Vampiro, que ha estado conquistando reinos de Córdoba aparece en su reino eso cambia. El padre de Isolde pide hablar antes de atacar pero ahí se llevan una sorpresa y es que el quiere a Isolde de esposa.Apartir de ahí seguiremos su historia como futura reina de los vampiros siendo una mortal mientras descubre como no todo es como le han contado y lucha con la atracción que siente por el enemigo del reino.Ahhhhh estuvo muy bueno 🥵🥵Tiene vampiros, spicy, matrimonio arreglado, escenas de la daga en el cuello que lo hicieron más entretenido.Me gustó la personalidad de Isolde porque no se deja vencer por las circunstancias, además donde se daba a respetar por aquellos que la deseaban enfadar 📈🛐Adrian es el "tocala y acabaré contigo", el que cae primero.Si tiene varios capítulos que van dedicado al spicy y dejan de lado a la trama, pero sinceramente era lo que buscaba así que no me molestó, pero para que lo tomen en cuenta.Si leyeron la caricia de la oscuridad de Hades y Perséfone, estarán acostumbrados a este tipo de escritura porque es la misma autora.Si lo recomiendo cuando quieres leer romance con fantasía y deseas spicy.

Good, but the love is just there. I missed the details about falling in love. It was too fast to build.

Did I just buy and read a book that was released 10 days ago, and won’t have a sexual until next year? Yes I did. Did I regret my decision? No! Maybe… Reason? Because I need the second book like YESTERDAY!I honestly blame TikTok, because if not for them, I would have found out about the book a bit later, and I would have made a rational decision to wait to read it closer to the release of the second book, so I wouldn’t have to wait for a year to read the second book. At least it’s not a massive cliffhanger, and calmed down from the hype of last 2 chapters after like 2 hours, enough to write this review, and not fling my iPad across the room, because now I need to choose what to read next…I remember watching a tiktok about female leads and how they use or don’t use their brain, and Issa was part of that list, and I can’t agree more, she’s great, annoying at parts, but she knows what she wants and she goes for it, be it the answers or Adrian.Isolde is smart, and she can fight, she’s rash, but you know what, I loved all those moments she drew her sword, because no matter what people say sometimes violence is an answer and the solution.The book was what I needed at the moment. As it had the fantasy, mystery some action (I honestly would have like to see more of action, considering that the book is called King of Blood and battle, Adrian drew his sword like what 3 times?) and it had a good amount of horniness that I was content. It had a good balance, and that’s what I was looking for. Though honestly unless you were blind you would have guessed Adrian’s and Isolde’s secret probably somewhere 40% into the book.Now it’s time to rant! I was so frustrated with everyone in Lara, first it was Killian, dude!!!! Take no for an answer!!!! And then Nadia, oh my god, she was so annoying. All her talks that Issi has to save her people. She did for hell’s sake, she went and married Adrian and secured that he won’t hurt people of LAra, but no! That’s apparently not enough. Hypocrite!And lastly the award of best father goes to King Henry! For those who’ve read the book, you know what I’m talking about. And for those who have yet to start it, buckle up, it’s going to be a bumpy ride! I was rooting for the guy, but nah, he just had to go and ruin it all.One more thing that I both enjoyed and found a tad bit excessive was that the book had more gay couples than straight ones. My fujoshi brain was ecstatic (if you don’t know what that word means, google it) I got M/M action twice, and it was good. Especially the scene in the library. And now that I am writing the review I finally realise why it is that frustrated me about those scenes. I needed them to be longer more descriptive to satisfy me. It was as if author just added them to show that Vampires didn’t discriminate love, and that was great, but it was so matter of factory done, that it lacked some kind of fundamental feeling of belonging in the book.And I guess I left Adrian to the end. And that’s because he’s such a fantastic character. Honestly, he is the reason why I sometimes think that love doesn’t exist in real life. To go to war with everything and everyone for love! The man had me at his description, and he never let me go. When I was describing him to my partner, and telling him that I usually go for dark haired brooding characters, but I guess I do like blonds (as villains/anti-heroes). Now I’m just waiting for fans to do some great fan art of his, so I can print it and post it to my wall!I do recommend this book, and if you’ll get it now, and read it and will have the mixed feelings about not waiting until next year, then send me a chat, and let’s talk more about it!XOXOKatie

Il miglior libro che abbia mai letto, autrice di grande talento, lo dico non solo per questo libro ma anche per la saga Hades x Persephone che consiglio vivamente di leggere.