I have a real weak spot for sexy vampires. I also have one for fantasy romance, and another one for romance series where each book is about a different couple but there’s a connected plot arc throughout. So I had high hopes for The Black Lily, the first book in a fairy-tale retelling vampire romance series about humans rebelling against corrupt vampire overlords. Unfortunately, my ultimate reaction was pretty mixed and I have not yet decided if I’m going to continue the series.

This is too bad, because the premise is awesome. The book takes place in a fairy-tale inspired world with a feudal feel where royal vampires rule over a human-and-vampire nobility, who in turn rule over the toiling human peasants who make their opulent lifestyles possible. Meanwhile, peasants are being killed in vicious vampire attacks that go unacknowledged by the ruling class.

Peasant woman Arabelle leads a rebellion called the Black Lily. The opening scenes of the book center on her executing a plan to infiltrate a royal ball and assassinate the vampire prince, Marius. (Like Cinderella, but with intended murder.) Of course, as Marius is our hero, the assassination attempt does not go as planned, which starts a game of sexually-charged cat and mouse between the hero and heroine.

The first scenes in which Arabelle implements her assassination plan were compelling. I was struck by the initial picture of the fairy-tale infused setting, with its mystical forest, ancient magic, opulent castle, and stark divide between the haves and have-nots. I was pretty impressed by the way the book evoked a world that was legitimately gritty, violent, and dirt-infused for some people, and ethereal and gleaming and beautiful for others, all while retaining that sense of the possibility of fairy-tale magic. Furthermore, it was refreshing to see a woman leader of a rebellion whose authority and competence are not questioned by any of the burly dudes who are also in the rebellion. Arabelle herself is an enjoyably spunky heroine. I also liked Marius’ and Arabelle’s initial scenes together. Their mutually surprised reactions to their intense attraction seemed to set up an interesting dynamic between them.

I was drawn in by the world and I found Arabella to be a fun character. But while I felt that there were a lot of good ideas in this book, the execution fell somewhat flat. I had issues with the plot, the prose, and the central romance.

First, the plotting felt quite abrupt and unstructured. Once Arabella’s assassination attempt fails, there’s not an overarching objective driving the plot forward, or at least not a clearly telegraphed one. The story feels like a series of reactions with nothing to give it shape or structure. The Black Lily and the vampires mount attacks and counter-attacks on each other without a fully legible goal on either side other than either “vampires bad!!!” or “humans bad!!!” As a result, it feels like things just happen, which gives the book a sort of herky-jerky, random feel.

For example, at one point a new character is introduced, and within a few pages, she is acting like life-long best friends with Arabelle and is integral to all of the Black Lily’s plans, which was confusing as I was still in the “who is this woman and why should I care about her” headspace. It was quite jarring. Moments like this made it hard to follow what was happening, as there didn’t seem to be much build-up to what are supposed to be major events.

In addition to structural issues, I also had some concerns with the prose. First, I found some of the dialogue to be awkward enough that it distracted me. For example:

“Of course I know what it is, who you are. I have heard the merchants I deal with in

Hiddleston mention the Black Lily. They speak of a woman, a peasant, who carries hope in her heart for each one of them, hope for a world where there are no chains and no more death…My God, you are the Black Lily.”

This sounds so much like a prepared speech instead of something someone would actually say in conversation that it took me out of the story. There were a number of moments where I found the dialogue stilted and unnatural.

Second, there are also some cliches that feel canned enough as to be distracting. I’m not typically a huge stickler for cliches–I think they are perfectly serviceable for workaday prose in plot-driven stories. But even I have to draw the line at multiple clunkers strung together, e.g. “She knew it had more to do with a certain tall, dark, and handsome prince who now invaded her every waking thought.”

In addition to feeling a little frustrated by disjointed plotting and prose, I was not a huge fan of Marius for most of the book. He seems soooooooo clueless. He’s almost 100 years old at the start of the book, but somehow has no sense of the extreme poverty in his kingdom, even though it’s right on his doorstep! He keeps being SHOCKED and APPALLED at the state that the peasants live in. (He is, of course, equally SHOCKED and APPALLED to learn about peasants being murdered by vampires.)

This is a level of privileged cluelessness I can maybe deal with in a 20-year-old sheltered prince protagonist who is being let out of the castle unsupervised for the first time. But being a century old and having no sense of how oppressive your nation’s class system is??? He even tells Arabelle quite seriously at one point that vampires deserve to rule over humans because they have superior physical strength. I’m not impressed by a hero who is basically regurgitating men’s rights activist (err…vampire rights activist?) talking points before he’s transformed by love.

Later in the book, he does go to pretty great lengths to demonstrate his love for Arabella, which sorta-kinda made me like him more. But for most of the book I felt like the only reasons Arabella likes Marius are because he is hot and also not a murderer like she previously thought all vampires were. LOW BAR, GIRL.

I also did not think that Arabelle and Marius’ relationship had enough development. It felt like insta-lust that the characters couldn’t resist, which turned very quickly into love without showing the building of an actual emotional connection. Looking back at the book, they spend what seems like the majority of the plot apart (even if they are pining for each other).

With that said, their physical chemistry was sizzling and all of the ~romantic~ scenes were steamy and well-written. While their emotional connection left something to be desired, I felt sufficiently convinced that they were so intensely attracted to each other that they just simply could not resist tearing each others’ clothes off and going to town. The fact that I LOVE vampires and cannot resist a good sexy vampire feeding scene definitely increased my enjoyment of this book.

Overall, I would sum up my feelings about this book as…confused. Even though I found myself thinking semi-frequently that The Black Lily seemed a little silly to me, I kept reading. There was something strangely compelling about the world that made me want to keep exploring it, even if I did not feel much for the central couple. Every time I was on the verge of thinking “No, I actually don’t like this, do I?” something would happen that would intrigue me enough to pull me back in. I even feel sufficiently interested in the hero and heroine of the second book (who were introduced in this one) and the world that I’m seriously considering continuing with the series even though a lot about the first book was lackluster.

So I would say I give this book a caveat-filled, tepid recommendation. If you aren’t interested in the premise (especially the vampires part) I don’t think you’ll find much to enjoy here. But at the same time, if you are interested in the fairy-tale vampire world, don’t let your hopes get too high either as I don’t think The Black Lily maximized the potential of this conceit at all. At this point, I almost feel like I need to review the next book just to be able to give a clearer yay/nay recommendation about the series!