Title: A Touch of Darkness
Author: Scarlett St. Clair
Paperback (Available in Hardback, Paperback, eBook, and Audio.)
Pages: 379 (Even though B&N is saying 400 pages, the actual story is 379, you have author notes, excerpt from A Game of Fate.)
Publisher: Sourcebooks
ISBN: 9781728258454 (Paperback Edition)
Release Date: 8-13-21
Book Details: Paperback, 5x8, it was a bit of a heavier feeling book and the paper used is very nice. The cover has a touch of tackiness to it, it’s textured but not overly so.
Where To Find It: I got my copy through Barnes & Noble. Though I do see it is available at other retailers and Indie Bookstores
Time that the story takes place? An alternate current day.
POV? Third person limited viewpoint. Told entirely through Persephone’s perspective.
What caught your eye? I’m a sucker for Hades and Persephone stories. I mean, what more can I say? God of the Underworld in love with the Goddess of Spring? Yes, please. I can’t lie, if you give me the alleged ‘villain’ who falls in love with a good person, I’m going to pick it every single time. I know it’s a trope, and I don’t care.
Did you enjoy it? I did, more than I actually thought I would.
Was it predictable? Honestly, no. I didn’t see half the stuff coming at me. There were a couple of points in the story where you’d kind of see the thing coming, but it wasn’t one of those eye rolling moments of “Duh, that’s been so done.” Lots of good twists and turns on what you might have been expecting.
Was it sexy? Tame? It was very sexy. A bit too sexy in a couple of places. Which shocked me at first, because honest to goodness, I thought this was a YA novel and I was doing the whole shifty eye whilst thinking, “Is this what the kids are reading now? Holy beans and cheese, wasn’t like this when I was a kid!” However, I was quickly assured that this was in fact written for adults.
Did you find it funny? Entertaining? It was absolutely entertaining. Funny or humorous? Perhaps in places, but I would say the book was more charming than anything.
Would you read it again? I most likely will as this is part of a series, and I like to keep track of details.
Is this part of a series? *points to above* This is the first book in the series. It also looks as though there a secondary parallel series where Hades is the main head we live in. *Edit, just checked a couple of websites, and indeed this looks as if we have the same story told from two different POVs. I’m cool with that. Here’s the big question: Do I read all of the Touch Of series as they were released or do I go ahead and read the Hades book; A Game of Fate next?
I had no idea what to expect with this book. I’m a mythology nerd like a lot of people, but this was absolutely a new take on the Hades and Persephone story, and I was digging it.
The Gods and Goddesses living among the mortals like rock stars. They’re owning night clubs and stuff. They are watched much like the Royal Family, reported about in gossip magazines and have revealing articles written about them. I just loved how normal this all was, that’s why I’m calling this an alternate current time as you have all the modern tech we enjoy as our lowly regular selves, but then there’s a truckload of Gods and stuff.
I can’t even do justice to this . . . the book was great. It had everything you could want: A lovely girl trying to prove herself to get out from under her mother’s thumb. The God of the Underworld . . . do I even need to go on there? You’ve got bitches and snarky dudes. You got contracts with Gods, you got some blackmail. You got glamour and glitz and then places that don’t even exist in our world. And the author does a great job of making you feel and see those places, I was immersed, truly from Chapter 2 (you know how that first chapter can be, we got to settle into things, get to know each other).
As stated above, this is a romance with a good deal of sexy sex in it. Those that don’t like graphic content, be warned, this is pretty explicit. The F-word is used during love making or rather pre/post coital, which at times I find a bit distracting. Now don’t get me wrong, I use that four letter word whilst making my morning toast, I’ve just never enjoyed seeing it in a moment of passion. However, the use of it in this story, wasn’t enough to distract me completely from the action. With that being said, the sex in this is pretty intense.
As this is only the first book in the series, I’m sure we’ll get more relationship stuff, but in this book, I felt it was more lust than love. Persephone is clearly attracted to Hades, even when she tries to hide it, she can’t. Most of the time, I felt as if they’re barely keeping it together. “Let’s try and pretend we’re normal lovers,” before they transport to the under realm and rip off each other’s clothing. There are tender moments, and you do see that Hades does care for Persephone’s well being, so it’s not all sex.
But man is it intense!
I tried to post links for Sourcebooks and for the author’s website, however, that was not to be had this day of posting. Sourcebooks kept giving me error messages and from what I can see, Scarlett St. Clair only has a Tumblr site. I won’t link to it in case this isn’t the actual author.
