Spotlight Reads ➱ The Family: Blood and Bonds - The Collection Part 1: An MM Vampire Romance by Katey Hawthorne

The Family: Blood and Bonds - The Collection Part 1 by Katey Hawthorne

📖Book Info

Bookish, lonely farm boy Liam finally heads off to college at 20, determined to enjoy his freedom. He's gonna party, he's gonna get laid, and dammit, he's gonna enjoy himself. Except it kind of sucks.

Gianni never struggles with anything but boredom: the chief difficulty in the life of a vicious, century old vampire. And then his pretty little roommate Liam reminds him what he loves about being alive, and Gianni decides he simply has to have him.

It begins as pure entertainment, a provisional friendship. Then it turns into a challenge. Then something like love, at times indistinguishable from hate. It’s a love story for monsters, and the beginning of something that will affect their lives, families, friends, and world forever.

Which, for a vampire, is a hell of a long time.

The Family is a dark m4m (eventually mmm?) romance that spirals into an epic story about love, death, and an undead found family. This is the first 21 chapters, which have a love story arc of their own.

💭Our Thoughts

“You’re a feeral, unsocialized kitten who desperately wants to be petted but has no idea how to ask for it.”

Think vampire soap opera with humanity being the backdrop.

Liam is the star of the show - his life and his transformation being the main focus

With our ancient “sugar daddy” (loved this reference to their relationship), Gianni, being another main player.

The story is mostly told from Liam’s point of view, which, at times, felt just as chaotic as he himself was.

Oh, to be young and still exploring who you are.

We also get some insight from his bestie Aldo, and some of the other more prominent secondary characters (family, friends, lovers, etc), filling out the missing pieces and setting plot points

Gianni is a century-old vampire who happens to be Liam’s rommie at UNI. Not that Liam sees him much.

A late-night encounter between them leads to a deepening friendship.

But Gianni has secrets and a bit of a dark side to him.

When Liam uncovers Gianni’s secret, he is given the opportunity to embrace eternal life

And what 20yr old gothic closet romantic is going to pass that up?

I am once again going to refer to the “soap opera” feel when I read this

Everything happens pretty quickly

A lot of feelings and character growth happenind

Liam realizing he is touch starved, and that he is a lot darker emotionally than he knew.

Then we have Gianni. At times, I wanted to knock Gianni for the literal head games he played. Though when you think about it, they are just habits for Gianni, playing with his food before he devours it.

The overall story idea is solid, and definitely kept me engaged

Great characters, each was well crafted and brought a different perspective to the story, and events

There were moments that felt a bit off (lack of a better descriptor), enough that they drew me out of the story. As it progressed, though they were fewer.

There are also some areas that I would have enjoyed a bit more detail to fill in the blanks, but I do wonder if that was the author’s intention, as this is the first in a collection of events/stories.

The soap opera feel of just enough to know what is going on, but not really enough to understand the whys and hows, but the knowledge that in the future we will revisit the moment and get all the puzzle pieces (if that makes sense )

This is not going to be for everyone as it has a bit of a rollercoaster pace.

High heat

A bit of mystery

A sprinkle of angst

A whole lot of blood

I am looking forward to the next in the series as I am all kinds of curious

Author Website: http://www.kateyhawthorne.com/

My Reviews on:

Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/Joyffree

Bookbub: https://www.bookbub.com/profile/1839574094

#mmvampireromance #kateyhawthorne #bookrecommendation