Bride by Ali Hazelwood Published by Berkley on February 6, 2024
Genres: Paranormal Romance, Romance, Vampires
Pages: 410
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A dangerous alliance between a Vampyre bride and an Alpha Werewolf becomes a love deep enough to sink your teeth into in this new paranormal romance.
Misery Lark, the only daughter of the most powerful Vampyre councilman of the Southwest, is an outcast—again. Her days of living in anonymity among the Humans are over: she has been called upon to uphold a historic peacekeeping alliance between the Vampyres and their mortal enemies, the Weres, and she sees little choice but to surrender herself in the exchange—again...
Weres are ruthless and unpredictable, and their Alpha, Lowe Moreland, is no exception. He rules his pack with absolute authority, but not without justice. And, unlike the Vampyre Council, not without feeling. It’s clear from the way he tracks Misery’s every movement that he doesn’t trust her. If only he knew how right he was….
Because Misery has her own reasons to agree to this marriage of convenience, reasons that have nothing to do with politics or alliances, and everything to do with the only thing she's ever cared about. And she is willing to do whatever it takes to get back what’s hers, even if it means a life alone in Were territory…alone with the wolf.
I was really excited to read Bride when I found out that Ali Hazelwood had written a paranormal urban fantasy work instead of a contemporary romantic comedy type book. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy those books, which are perfect when I want a light read, but there’s a distinct formula she uses in every one that makes it feel like if you’ve read one, you’ve read them all. So I was hoping Bride would eliminate that problem with its fantasy setting and inclusion of werewolves and vampires and to take what I like about her works and to turn it into more of a romantasy.
Unfortunately the fantasy components really felt like mere window dressing to me. There’s not much time at all spent on world-building and the most original things about the world is that vampires bleed purple and pay big bucks for light blocking windows. On the other side of the spectrum are werewolves with green blood, mates, and full moon shifting. Pretty standard fare for urban fantasy with nothing new to be found.
“There’s a tense atmosphere, and then there’s this. One venue, three species, five centuries of conflict, and zero good faith.”
The romance front of the romantasy didn’t work any better for me than the world building, which is a damn shame, because I was so interested in the first few chapters of the book. There was so much potential there in those opening chapters, but the execution is sorely lacking. Misery is the daughter of the most powerful vampire and is wed to the alpha werewolf, called Lowe, in a historical bid for peace between the two species. Though Bride claims to be enemies to lovers, Misery and Lowe are incredibly mature about their political marriage and understanding of the fact that they are from two different species and have very different needs and values. But after the thick tension of the initial meeting of Misery and Lowe, as well as the wedding itself, where violence could break out and lead to a massacre at any moment, very little actually happens in the novel.
Though Misery comes to hold her husband in high regard, there’s absolutely no chemistry between them, despite what the sex scenes and the typical tragic (and very forced) eleventh hour breakup try to demonstrate. And nothing remotely interesting occurs in Bride. Misery literally sits around in the werewolf safe house, where she is guarded by the werewolves night and day for her own protection. She sleeps in a closet during the day, and occasionally snoops or hangs out with the werewolves. The most exciting thing that happens (other than her revealing the deep dark secret of enjoying peanut butter) is an assassination attempt or two, but that’s treated as a predictable and tired affair, and has very little consequences of note.
“Or maybe spending the first eighteen years of my life becoming acquainted with the cruelty of all species didn’t quite set me up for a bright future. Who knows.”
I kept waiting for things to get interesting or for the pining between Misery and her husband to happen, but it’s just incredibly bland, like reading a grocery list for paranormal romance. I’m not sure who wants to read about the daily mundanities of a newlywed vampire shut-in who doesn’t fit in anywhere with any species, and has an okay husband who can tolerate her existence, but it’s not me. Though I enjoyed Misery’s sense of humor and her banter with her husband, I did not find her at all compelling. As a vampire who grew up with humans, she should be perfectly positioned to highlight the differences between all of the species and should clearly possess some significant inner conflict about her belonging, but she’s so indifferent to absolutely everything (except finding her missing foster sister) that it’s really impossible to care about her.
It’s really an interesting narrative choice to make the only first person narrator of your book unable to feel much of anything and to treat everything that manages to evoke any sort of reaction as a mild inconvenience. Misery’s not a good vampire or decent at passing for human either, and her one character trait, other than her sense of humor, is basically her skill as an IT person/hacker. And that trait felt very much like it was written by someone with no actual expertise in the area, which is coming from a reader with no actual experience in that field either.
It also doesn’t help matters that Bride really doesn’t know what it wants to be. It tries to be romantasy, a mystery, and a thriller all at once, and doesn’t fully commit to any of these things or do any single one of these things particularly well. The romance didn’t give me butterflies, the secret twist at the end was not exciting, and the political intrigue was as shallow as all of the characters, which are more walking and talking archetypes than actual developed characters. If you don’t mind reading the classic trope of everything—misunderstood unfeeling vampire woman, super powerful and violent werewolf leader with a heart of gold and soft spot for his little sister, and evil, manipulative vampire father who cares nothing for his children and everything for his species survival—then you might like this. If you’re looking for an edge-of-your-seat urban fantasy with star crossed lovers from warring species with a world of things to lose, Bride is just not it.
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yeah I didn’t read this one because it didn’t appeal to me even though I like some of her other work. I know people who really liked it though. ??
Anne
I really liked the beginning myself, but not much past that. 😞