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A review by rjordan19
Luxuria by Colette Rhodes
funny
hopeful
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
Overall: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Readability: 📖📖📖📖
Feels: 🦋🦋🦋🦋🦋
Emotional Depth: 💔💔💔
Sexual Tension: ⚡⚡⚡⚡
Romance: 💞💞💞💞
Sensuality: 💋💋💋💋
Sex Scene Length: 🍑🍑🍑🍑
Steam Scale (Number of Sex Scenes): 🔥🔥🔥🔥
Humor: Yes, a bit
Perspective: Alternating first person from both the hero and heroine
Cliffhanger: No, this ends with a happily ever after
Epilogue: Yes
When mains are first on page together: Pretty soon in, the second chapter
Format: bought audiobook
Should I read in order?
This is the first book in Rhodes’ Shades of Sin series.
Basic plot:
An arranged marriage to forge a treaty brings a Hunter and Shade king together.
Give this a try if you want:
- Monster romance
- Shadow Realm/contemporary Earth setting - mostly shadow realm setting
- Hades and Persephone vibes
- Shadow King hero
- Hunter heroine
- Naughty drawings
- Arranged marriage
- Other woman drama
- Size difference – hero is a head taller than heroine
- Hero will literally bite your underwear off
- Higher steam – 4 scenes with knotting and breeding vibes, biting/marking, primal play
Ages:
- I think the mains are around 30? I can’t recall the hero
First line:
I wonder if any of my colleagues will be monster food tonight, I thought idly, smiling and nodding at whatever they were saying while tracing lines in the condensation of my glass.
My thoughts:
I ended up really enjoying this one! I will say, the first chapter, the prologue, kind of threw me for a loop and didn’t help me understand this monster/human world very well. The heroine is some kind of graphic designer? And it’s like a work colleague dinner? But none of this is ever mentioned again and then all of a sudden we are thrown into a world of shades and hunters. Personally didn’t like this prologue much. BUT I was very much into this arranged marriage between shade and human.
The next couple chapters I was very into. I loved the shade world and its fantasy/historical feel (my jam). But, after the wedding, I felt like I was waiting and waiting and waiting for the mains to DO something together. Ophelia wandered the gardens, Alaric loomed in shadows but I started getting bored because they weren’t together much. I got whiny around chapter 8 (and as the book is only 25 chapters or so, this felt like a lot of the book to me).
I also am not the biggest fan of other women catty and jealous behavior and that does take quite a main point in this book.
But, thankfully, once naughty drawings are discovered, the book got much better to me and became quite fun. I enjoyed the world building of the shades and I loved Alaric and Ophelia’s relationship. I really enjoyed the narration, especially Will Thorne. The latter half of the book was a lot of fun to me. I loved that as a couple they were vulnerable together, but playful and really just delightful!
Cock/Hero Stats/World Building:
- It’s a contemporary Earth, with a shadow realm inhabiting by shades. There are a select pact of humans that are Hunters that hunt the shades. Shades feed on human’s fear
- Shades become incorporeal in the human realm but have solid bodies in the shadow realm
- The hero has horns, black tipped claws, fangs, a black tongue that is long and rough and is a head taller than the heroine
- The hero (and all the shades) have amazing senses of smell and can smell human’s emotions like fear and arousal
- KNOTTING
- Hero makes almost a purring sound at some points when aroused
Quotes/thoughts: (Any mistakes are my own) More quotes under steam scenes at end of review
Faster than she could track, I grabbed Ophelia by the waist, spinning her until she was pressed back against the wall by the doors out of sight of my subjects. I caged her in, my arms braced either side of her head and called on the shadows to curl around us, creating our own little bubble of privacy.
Content warnings: (This should be taken as a minimum because I could have missed some!)
- Death of parents mentioned
- Some scenes of violence and death
- Mention of war
Locations of kisses/intimate scenes:
Safe sex? Heroine is on birth control
Chapter 12 – 🔥 oral for her, her on top
“Come to me, wife.”
Chapter 15 – 🔥 in the throne room – him holding her upside down 69, then her on top in the throne
With a growl of frustration I stood, scooping Ophelia off the ground bridal style for a moment before flipping her upside down, her upper thighs balanced on my shoulders and her face level with my...
Chapter 16 – 🔥 oral for her on a desk
Before I could question him, Alaric lifted me onto a pitch black desk, uncaring as half the contents went flying, and dropping to his knees, shoving my dress up over my thighs.
Followed a bit later by a partial scene starting but interrupted
Chapter 17 – 🔥 gardens – heroine runs from the hero and hero catches her, oral for her, doggy with a biting mark
“Little huntress, are you suggesting I hunt you?”
Chapter 18 – fade to black scene
Chapter 24 - kiss
Total chapters: 25
Readability: 📖📖📖📖
Feels: 🦋🦋🦋🦋🦋
Emotional Depth: 💔💔💔
Sexual Tension: ⚡⚡⚡⚡
Romance: 💞💞💞💞
Sensuality: 💋💋💋💋
Sex Scene Length: 🍑🍑🍑🍑
Steam Scale (Number of Sex Scenes): 🔥🔥🔥🔥
Humor: Yes, a bit
Perspective: Alternating first person from both the hero and heroine
Cliffhanger: No, this ends with a happily ever after
Epilogue: Yes
When mains are first on page together: Pretty soon in, the second chapter
Format: bought audiobook
Should I read in order?
This is the first book in Rhodes’ Shades of Sin series.
Basic plot:
An arranged marriage to forge a treaty brings a Hunter and Shade king together.
Give this a try if you want:
- Monster romance
- Shadow Realm/contemporary Earth setting - mostly shadow realm setting
- Hades and Persephone vibes
- Shadow King hero
- Hunter heroine
- Naughty drawings
- Arranged marriage
- Other woman drama
- Size difference – hero is a head taller than heroine
- Hero will literally bite your underwear off
- Higher steam – 4 scenes with knotting and breeding vibes, biting/marking, primal play
Ages:
- I think the mains are around 30? I can’t recall the hero
First line:
I wonder if any of my colleagues will be monster food tonight, I thought idly, smiling and nodding at whatever they were saying while tracing lines in the condensation of my glass.
My thoughts:
I ended up really enjoying this one! I will say, the first chapter, the prologue, kind of threw me for a loop and didn’t help me understand this monster/human world very well. The heroine is some kind of graphic designer? And it’s like a work colleague dinner? But none of this is ever mentioned again and then all of a sudden we are thrown into a world of shades and hunters. Personally didn’t like this prologue much. BUT I was very much into this arranged marriage between shade and human.
The next couple chapters I was very into. I loved the shade world and its fantasy/historical feel (my jam). But, after the wedding, I felt like I was waiting and waiting and waiting for the mains to DO something together. Ophelia wandered the gardens, Alaric loomed in shadows but I started getting bored because they weren’t together much. I got whiny around chapter 8 (and as the book is only 25 chapters or so, this felt like a lot of the book to me).
I also am not the biggest fan of other women catty and jealous behavior and that does take quite a main point in this book.
But, thankfully, once naughty drawings are discovered, the book got much better to me and became quite fun. I enjoyed the world building of the shades and I loved Alaric and Ophelia’s relationship. I really enjoyed the narration, especially Will Thorne. The latter half of the book was a lot of fun to me. I loved that as a couple they were vulnerable together, but playful and really just delightful!
Cock/Hero Stats/World Building:
- It’s a contemporary Earth, with a shadow realm inhabiting by shades. There are a select pact of humans that are Hunters that hunt the shades. Shades feed on human’s fear
- Shades become incorporeal in the human realm but have solid bodies in the shadow realm
- The hero has horns, black tipped claws, fangs, a black tongue that is long and rough and is a head taller than the heroine
- The hero (and all the shades) have amazing senses of smell and can smell human’s emotions like fear and arousal
- KNOTTING
- Hero makes almost a purring sound at some points when aroused
Quotes/thoughts: (Any mistakes are my own) More quotes under steam scenes at end of review
Faster than she could track, I grabbed Ophelia by the waist, spinning her until she was pressed back against the wall by the doors out of sight of my subjects. I caged her in, my arms braced either side of her head and called on the shadows to curl around us, creating our own little bubble of privacy.
Content warnings: (This should be taken as a minimum because I could have missed some!)
- Death of parents mentioned
- Some scenes of violence and death
- Mention of war
Locations of kisses/intimate scenes:
Safe sex?
Chapter 12 – 🔥 oral for her, her on top
“Come to me, wife.”
Chapter 15 – 🔥 in the throne room – him holding her upside down 69, then her on top in the throne
With a growl of frustration I stood, scooping Ophelia off the ground bridal style for a moment before flipping her upside down, her upper thighs balanced on my shoulders and her face level with my...
Chapter 16 – 🔥 oral for her on a desk
Before I could question him, Alaric lifted me onto a pitch black desk, uncaring as half the contents went flying, and dropping to his knees, shoving my dress up over my thighs.
Followed a bit later by a partial scene starting but interrupted
Chapter 17 – 🔥 gardens – heroine runs from the hero and hero catches her, oral for her, doggy with a biting mark
“Little huntress, are you suggesting I hunt you?”
Chapter 18 – fade to black scene
Chapter 24 - kiss
Total chapters: 25