Title: Daughter of Darkness

Author: Juliana Haygert

Pub. Date: December 11, 2020

Pages: 364

Pub: Independently Published

Genre: Fantasy Romance

Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

She is destined to kill a demon.
He is sent to protect her.
One of them is about to fail …

He spent centuries in the dark …

After 300 years spent in the underworld as a punishment, warrior Devon is called on by the gods for a chance to fix his mistake—and to win his redemption. But there’s a catch: the gods won’t tell him details about his mission. He’s supposed to suffer while trying to figure out what he did wrong in the past, and fix it in the present.

All Kenna ever wanted was to be the owner of her own life and destiny. But for now all she can do is run away from the evil wanting to claim her powers.

… until she came …

When Devon becomes unintentionally entangled in his new neighbor’s life, he can’t help but feel he’s closer to his purpose. Every moment he spends with Kenna makes him confused, and every time he touches her, glimpses of the past, of his failed mission, come back to haunt him.

… and showed him the light.

Darkness is closing in, and with Kenna’s help, Devon needs to put the pieces of the puzzle together before he fails his mission again and evil consumes the world.

Only this time, he’s sure he won’t be the only one damned.

This will be a spoiler free review. I pre-ordered this ebook last year, and I’ve been meaning to read it. I finally sat down and figured I would breeze through it. I was looking for a quick standalone fantasy read, and this hit some of those boxes.

For only being 364 pages, this book felt so long. Overall, I was pretty disappointed in this. It just didn’t meet my expectations and I kept growing bored. It took forever for things to happen. And then things suddenly sped up to a lighting fast paced and I didn’t appreciate it.

I was not a fan of the dual timelines – the past and present. I didn’t realize that the book was doing that at first, so I was really confused. It took me a few chapters before I caught on. I also didn’t really like that the past and present were basically mirroring each other. Now, I love a good reincarnation, fated love story as much as the next person – but for events to play out almost exactly the same as the past…

It just felt like I was reading the same story over…and still only reading one book. I wish that they hadn’t mirrored each other so much. If the book had been either the past (fantasy aspect) or the present (almost paranormal) I think I would have enjoyed, it whole lot more.

With that being said, I get what the author was going for – I just think it was a lot of story to pack into 364 and contain the proper emotional weights.

We’re supposed to care for Devon and Kianna/Kenna but honestly, I didn’t. Not really. I bought it more in the past timeline – the progression of their relationship felt more believable. The present just felt off. Like, you already knew how it was going to play out, so it didn’t matter, and that just left me feeling meh about them. It felt too convenient.

As a whole, I think this book has potential, and it’s not terrible. It was a quick(ish) fantasy standalone read. Unfortunately, it just didn’t live up to my expectations. I will also say that the only “New Adult” thing about this book are the characters ages. If you’re expecting any kind of spice, this isn’t the book. This doesn’t even have fade to black, just a quick paragraph about how they joined as one, and then it was over. Ultimately very depressing – though, to be fair, I’ve been on a spice kick and reading quite a bit of steamy spice, so I’m skewed right now.

So, overall, not terrible, but not has good as I’d hoped it would be.