DNF at 15%

This book was not what I expected going into it. I wasn't a huge fan of the way the plot was set up or the characters, which prevented me from finishing the book. Rating based on amount read.

There was something about this book I just couldn’t put it down, it’s just soooooo much I love,the characters are fabulous, the romance gorgeous, the writing is spot on. I really wanted to like this one, but I couldn’t I loved it , it’s amazeballs (I did have to read the first though you can’t really read as a stand-alone)

Thanks to netgalley and the publisher for a free copy for an honest opinion

There was something about this book I just could not connect. I don't know if it was because I did not really care about any of the characters or if I could just not connect with the writing style of this book. I really wanted to like this one, as it did sound really fun from the synopsis but I was just bored and having to force myself to read until the end.
Maybe i could not connect with this book because it's the second book in a series, which I did not originally know, but I do think you can read this as a standalone.

If you feel like a super fun paranormal romance, then this is the one for you. A follow up from Love Bytes and it is even better, but it can be read as a standalone.

I was a fan of the first novel so was really happy to see that we would be getting a second book. I feel like you might have to read the first one to fully understand the depth and relationship between some of the characters. It has a good mixture of fantasy, humour as is more gothic than the book cover lets on (no hate to the cover I love it).

I would love to see a spin off series with some of the other characters in this book, mainly Aunt Ethel as I think she would get up to enough trouble for a whole novel.

Bleeding Hearts
Author: Ry Herman
Publisher: Jo Fletcher books
Page count: 400pp
Release date: 10th June 2021

Meijing, 1906 Chinatown San Francisco
Sold into servitude to a bathhouse, like her mother, Meijing will never be free; her four year contract extended again and again until she dies, bruised and battered.
But with the earthquake that hits San Francisco, she is enslaved to Master Hiram, a heartless, arrogant vampire.

Part one starts in 2000, shortly after the events in Love Bites, and Angela the vampire and Chloe the witch are most suitably, in a graveyard.
They’ve only just discovered each other a year ago, but time is creeping up on them. They have two months left together unless they can find a cure to stop Angela’s bites affecting Chloe.
So, magic spells in graveyards, it is.
Poignant, romantic and funny; Chloe’s ‘stories’ based on ancient myths and deities, plus the use of lobsters are particularly funny.
These are part of Chloe’s own writing in which she adapts the myth of Persephone with a very witty and modern voice. These ‘excerpts’ offset the love relationship between Chloe and Angela as well as the building drama surrounding loss and awful exes.
Herman expertly weaves the historical narratives into the current  - the year 2000 - all leading up into a culmination of … well, you need to read to find out.
Add in the fact you have a vampire and her werewolf friend on a buddy road trip and it’s terrific fun. But it’s also very much centred on the heroes journey or, the heroines journey in this case.
At the heart of it, lies a dark story of abuse towards women, addiction, gaslighting and the power of love.
Yes, it’s cheesy at times but intentionally so, delivering some real laugh out loud moments.
This is a wonderful celebratory book about the LGBTQ community and the ending is beautiful.

This was such a fun read! I mean - sapphics, witches, vampires and a talking lobster, what more could you want? I hadn't read the first book but feel like this still worked well enough as a standalone, and I adored the characters. I'll definitely be reading the first book to see where Chloe and Angela's relationship began!

Many thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

I loved the first book in the series and was so excited to get am arc of this one and it did not disappoint brilliantly written I want to re read already.

Okay so I requested this without knowing it was the second in a series and that's totally on me - BUT I feel this worked quite well as a standalone? There was definitely a few nods to the first book that went by me, but it didn't spoil my experience of the book.

It's a sapphic story! Between a witch and a vampire! And there's werewolves? And also some other witches?? And a secondary story running alongside about an enslaved vamp n how that happened??

We follow our couple as they try to navigate their relationship - how do you spend any time together when one of you has to hide from the sunlight? What if you accidentally kill your witch girlfriend while feeding from her?

Look this wasn't perfect, but it was fun, cute, and a lil mysterious. It came together well at the end n I'd recommend for a light read.

Big thanks to the author, netgalley, and quercus books for the eARC!

2.5/5 stars

I’m struggling to collect my feelings about this book. There were certainly parts I really enjoyed and the overall premise was very captivating, but I’m left feeling like I didn’t enjoy the book overall. I love the idea of a reluctant vampire trying to deal with her ‘disorder’ so to speak. I am also always an advocate of mental health representation, especially in romance, so I loved that both of our characters were deeply flawed and just trying their best. But something about the book also just felt off. It was slightly uncomfortable to read, I wasn’t a huge fan of the setting and the relationships felt very artificial to me. All of the features of a good book were there, but something was missing. I had a similar feeling reading the first book, so perhaps its just a case of a writing style that is not for me.

The writing style of this book was super unique. I think that some people will really love the way the book was structured. There were short story chapters that broke up the overall arc, and the perspectives also changed throughout. While I appreciate the premise of an almost vignette-style storytelling, I ended up just feeling like the book was disjointed. I also found it very hard to connect to any of the characters, even in the more tender or emotional scenes. The structure of the book and the narration style made it feel like the characters were distant. While this is fine for some stories, for me, I need to feel a connection to the characters in a rom-com. And because I felt distant from the characters, the romance wasn’t enough to keep me engaged. I also really hoped to feel much more connected to the characters since I had already read one book about them (this being the second), but I still felt very disconnected from our main characters, let alone the side characters.

While I enjoyed the first book in the series, this book hinged more on the paranormal aspect than the romance aspect, and because of that, I ended up enjoying it less. The plot just didn't interest me very much, and Angela and Chloë spent most of the book apart from each other which made the romance feel pretty much non-existent. While I still liked how weird this was (even weirder than the first book!), I found myself bored a lot of the time. I did really like the epilogue, though!

I wasn't aware this was the second book in a series when I requested it on Netgalley and as I don't own the first book it's difficult to give this the review that it deserves. I did attempt to read it in the hopes that I'd be able to pick up on what happened, but I felt that the character dynamic was missing without an understanding of their history. I love the idea of vampire/witch girlfriends and I'm hoping to grab a copy of the first in the series at some point in the future. If I do read this series I'll make sure to update this review.

DNF (did not finish)
I think I rated Love Bites around 3 stars, and I didn’t have much intention of continuing with the series.
Then a few early readers rated this five star and I thought I’d give it a go!
Unfortunately a lot of the struggles I had with Love Bites continued into Bleeding Hearts. I read a hefty chunk (about 70%) of Bleeding Hearts before deciding to put it down. I found the narrative hard to follow and much like Love Bites the characters had very little about them. There’s no progression or development.
For me the book had no comedic value and I just couldn’t get behind the characters.
Giving it two stars, as I do feel there’ll be people out there who’ll enjoy this series. But it’s just not for me.

If your a paranormal lover this book has it all, vampires, werewolves, a trio of dead witches, a talking lobster 🦞 This is the second book in the series (I will share my review to book one in my stories) but it can definitely be read as a stand alone.

In this story we see the two main characters, Chloë (witch) and Angela (vampire) trying to navigate a relationship together despite the challenges in their path. Running parallel to this is the story of Maijing, an ancient enslaved vampire which seems unconnected until over half way through the book.

I really liked the mini story that Chloë wrote was the story unfolded, it was great to see the Greek gods featured and the talking lobster was a bonus.

4.5* rounded to 5
I loved Love Bytes for the mix of paranormal romance, humor and great characters.
I loved Bleeding Hearts for it’s a great follow up and had a lot of fun in reading it.
One note: even if it’s possible to read it as a standalone I think it’s better to read the two books in order to get a full picture of what is going on.
I found this story poignant, entertaining and gripping. Even if it’s a bit slow at the beginning I was hooked and turned pages as fast as I could.
Chloe and Angela are a great couple and the new characters, like Meijing, are interesting. I loved how the author shows Chloe and Angela as a couple but also as they change and grow as person.
Even if the story deals with some serious issues like homophobia and racism the author incorporates them in the plot and is able to switch to a more sombre tone.
I missed aunt Ethel, a great quirky characters, but there’s plenty of funny situations.
I would be happy to read some spin-off featuring aunt Ether or Mike and Shelly as I loved this characters.
An excellent, gripping and entertaining story that I strongly recommend.
Many thanks to JoFletcher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine

Bleeding Hearts is the sequel to the enjoyable Love Bites. Picking up a few months after Love Bites we again join Angela and Chloe, Vampire and Witch respectively as they desperately struggle to find a way to let Angela safely feed from Chloe so they can save their relationship. With their self imposed timeline of one year to find a solution looming, its looking less and less likely they will succeed.

I really enjoyed this return to Angela and Chloe. In this book we learn a lot more about the supernatural lore of the world, both Vampire and Werewolf. The Vampire lore was fun to read and I liked the way it was done by skipping back in time to a much older Vampire so we got to learn it rather than just be told.

Chloe gets to grow as a character and a Witch in this book too, while Angela was the main focus for the first book, Chloe got a bigger part of this one. Her sometimes slightly surreal dealings with magic and the underworld added a fun new element to the world building of this Boston.

A nice continuation of the story with a decent chunk of action and a slightly stronger focus on the supernatural elements than the first, while maintaining its charm.

I have always wondered how people can believe in some things but not others. If you have a world that has vampires roaming at night, what makes bloodsuckers so great that they get to be the only things that bump in the night? Ry Herman already introduced us to the idea of vampires, witches and a glimpse of werewolves in the excellent Love Bites, but in the sequel, Bleeding Hearts, the reader discovers that were there are vampires there is also, quite rightly, a load more messed up stuff to discover.

It took a while for Angela and Chloe to find one another. They both just came out of violent relationships and Angela happens to be a vampire. It also appears that Chloe has discovered her dormant witch powers. If they can overcome these differences, they should be able to overcome anything, except for Angela’s thirst for blood. If they don’t find some sort of cure within a year, they have decided to split. Easier said than done when the cure means contacting ancient ones and walking the plain between the living and the dead.

Love Bites was a lovely romantic tale about two people finding one another, they just happened to be supernatural. It told a very human story and treated the witchcraft and vampirism in its stride. Rather than just continue in the exact same vein Herman has naturally moved the story onwards. If these two really want to be together they are going to have to tackle the supernatural and that means learning more about it and each other.

Chloe is a novice witch, but even if Angela has been at it for a while longer, in vampire terms she is also very much a novice. They have no idea how to save their relationship so they must research. The core relationship between the two remains the most important part of book and it is their love that drives them on to increasingly desperate measures. Their experiments open their world, and the reader’s, to a wider supernatural world where Greek myths are based in some truth.

Hearts feels like a much larger novel than the first. The stakes are higher. You would think that this would alter the cosiness that made up large parts of the first book, but Herman is able to retain the wry sense of humour and mutual attraction between the two protagonists. The book is told from the perspective of three characters; Angela, Chloe and a mysterious woman who we first meet during an Earthquake in San Fransisco.

During parts of the book the three are separated and are undertaking their own adventures. Herman proves that thrills are also a forte as you leap from one tale to another clambering to discover what will happen next. There is even a fight scene told from several perspectives that gets very exciting.

I love that fact that Herman has taken the strong elements of Love Bites and decided not to recreate them, but to evolve them. These are the same characters with the same strong bond, but the world around them has become a lot larger. The potential for the series is now as vast as Herman’s imagination as there is limitless potential. If Angela and Chole walk into the night after this book, fans will be satisfied, but you can also imagine a lot more tales.

I adore queer fiction and paranormal so jumped at the chance to review this book. Sadly that is the highlight for me of this tale.

I wish Netgalley would add to the criteria which tense a book is written in as I really struggle to read in third person which was my first issue with this book.

However, preferences aside, I dove in this book. Or tried to. The book felt jumbled and confused, like it didn't know what to be. I thought I was getting a comedy but it certainly wasn't that. It felt long winded and flat and I struggled to finish the book.

The characters felt one dimensional and I didn't feel like I got to know anything about them. I became aware this was the second book in a series after I'd selected it and wouldn't say it does a good job of standing alone. I didn't feel emotionally invested in the characters and struggled to feel their connection.

Sadly the highlight for me was the epilogue where Gay Marriage was approved and they went to get their marriage licence. And that's the part that bumped this up to a 3 star rating.

I'm grateful to Jo Fletcher books for an advance copy of Bleeding Hearts and for inviting me to take part in the social media blast.

It was great to return to Ry Herman's Boston and to meet Angela and Chloë, introduced in Love Bites, again. Angela, you may recall, is a vampire, and Chloë a witch, and they are deeply in love. But there is a problem - Angela is desperately afraid that she will take too much from Chloë and she has allowed a year for them to find a way for Chloë not to end up undead. Or even, dead. Now there are only two months left before some hard facts need to be faced...

I love the way that, in these two books, Herman centres the love between two supernaturally blessed (or cursed?) young women and the ups and downs of their relationship. Angela's belief, in particular, that there may be no way for her safely to feed from Chloë threatens to break them up. Without Chloë, Angela would be faced by a choice between starving, and going back to picking up strangers in bars and clubs to feed from. Issues of consent are never far away, Angela recalling the abuse she suffered from Tess, her ex, who made her into a vampire, and Herman showing us an another model for vampirism. This is in a story strand beginning in San Francisco just before the earthquake of 1906 where Meijing, who has been trafficked and abused, falls into the company of Master Hiram, an even more ruthless vampire than Tess - and one with a dash of religious fervour to him.

As Chloë digs deep into ancient legend and magical practice to find an answer to Angela's fears (and more fundamentally, a way that she can make an acceptable life with a person who can only emerge when it's dark), Angela wonders if she might not find answers with Tess after all. It's a mark of just how much Herman makes the reader feel for his characters that as the tension between them over this trip rises (Chloë wants to go along, fearful of losing Angela, while Angela resists that, knowing how dangerous Tess might be to the woman she sees as having stolen her lover) I almost didn't want to turn the next page from concern that one or the other would go too far, say just too much, from a mixture of love and fear and provoke a split.

Almost. This is a compelling and involving fantasy romance, and I HAD to turn that page.

And the next.

And the next.

Angela's quest takes her physically further and further from Boston, and Chloë's... well... it's hard to describe. Further spiritually? Or mythically? Chloë seems to find herself travelling into a weird realm that blends the symbolism of Boston's past with that of myth and story, a sort of Otherworld - and we know don't we, that the Otherworld is perilous place? Both women face dangers, in a story set in those weeks of later 2000 when a US election was decided by "hanging chads" and politicised legal cases - a setting with echoes, of course, twenty years later.

I love the way that in this book Herman gives us a deft fantasy blending vampirism, lycanththropy and witchcraft while not shying away from the more incongruous aspects of that (Angela, an astrophysicist, is in despair at the logical contradictions - what would happen if werewolf Mike were to visit a lane with no moon? Where does the mass-energy come from (an go) when he transforms?)

I love the way he also gives us a complex modern romance, one that requires supernatural issues to be faced in the same breath as more conventional relationship problems (and which combines the two creating some really knotty life difficulties).

But above all I love the way he grounds this in a response to and depiction of some of the darker parts of reality: in the desire Angela and Chloë have to live their lives like any other couple, despite political trends that want to deny them that, or in the prejudice faces by Meijing through nearly a century. It's a very affirming book, with people, in their diversity, finding a way despite human - or supernatural - obstacles to express their love.

Wow. Thats the first thing I have to say about Bleeding Hearts. I knew very little about the book going in to it, just that it was sapphic and about vampires. I didn't even realise it was the second in a series. Luckily for me it still made perfect sense and managed to get itself a 5 star review. I can tell you now I will be ordering myself a copy of Love Bites so I can get the full impact of Bleeding Hearts when I inevitably reread it.

Bleeding Hearts is a adult paranormal romance following Angela, a vampire, and her girlfriend Chloe, a witch. Already, what more could I ask for? It follows them trying to muddle through life together, when Angela must sleep during the day and desperately doesn't want to accidentally kill her girlfriend when feeding. Set in the year 2000 they also have the joys of contending with homophobia along the way, as if being a vampire and a witch weren't difficult enough. The auther Ry Herman managed to create a beautiful story about two young women that just want to be together, no matter what the world (or Gods) throw at them.

This is where it gets even better, because there are even some aspects of mythology as Chloe learns about her magical abilities as a witch. So really Bleeding Hearts has everything a girl could want and more; wampires, witches, mythology, lesbians and an adorable cat. All the characters are so likable and you can't help but root for them. Both girls are relatable in their own ways and the third person narrative really aided that, allowing the reader to really understand the different characters emotions. There were funny bits, emotional bits, a little bit of spice as well. It really was a very enjoyable and well rounded book.

I'm trying to think of anything I didn't like about it and all I can come up with is that I was a little confused about the switching points in time at first but I quickly got used to it and made sense of it all in my head. I suppose when there are characters that are centuries old vampires their timeline is bound to be a little confusing. That didn't stop me though, I wizzed through Bleeding Hearts and loved every bit of it. Even the ending left me satisfied which is seeming harder and harder to do these days.