Wildblood was a haunting tale of magic and greed. I thoroughly enjoyed every moment of it.

Victoria is a Wildblood. The strongest of the Wildbloods. She’s also been traumatized throughout her life. Kidnapped at the age of 6? Check. Beaten? Check. Used for her ability to navigate the Forrest? Check.

Just when she thinks things are going to finally start working in her favor, she’s put through a “test”. Navigate a party through the Forrest. Then she’ll have more money and ability to save her brother.

I absolutely loved this read. There was that undermining horror factor throughout most of the novel which amped the pace and kept me entertained. What’s going to happen next?!?!

The “feelings” triangle was a hot mess and left me not knowing what was going on. That kept my heart in the book! romance? I think yes!

There was a few sayings that I felt were too frequently repeated. They were actions of the characters so I felt the author could have used different words to explain what the characters were doing. It was one of those little earwigs that just keep burrowing the longer you let it pester.

An exceptional tale of magic and mayhem brought to you by The Exotic Lands Touring Company.

I wanted to love this book but I struggled a bit getting through it. I was initially interested in the idea of an expedition through a sentient jungle and a protagonist that wielded blood magic. The jungle as a setting and a character is a definite highlight. It felt dangerous and mystical in a way that felt unique, from the elements of the whispering jungle to the deadly creatures.
My biggest issues arose in the writing and the romance. The writing at times was confusing and left a bit unexplained, especially in the description of blood science and Wildblood powers. It felt like I didn't have a complete understanding of the parameters of Victoria's power throughout the book.
The romance is also very insta-love, which I can usually stand if there is a build in depth over the course of the book. However, the relationship between Victoria and Thorn didn't feel believable.
In all, I think this book succeeds in its world building the best, and I think others would enjoy it from that aspect alone.

Wildblood hits the perfect balance of atmospheric, creepy, and fantastical all in one. From the start, the world is dark and foreboding, filled with secrets and tantalizing mystery. The adventure, heart, and complex relationships in this book make it an instant favorite.

This book was super cool conceptually but the actual execution fell flat. I loved the magical jungle, I loved that it was about work, but none of the characters really resonated with me, unfortunately.

Please check the trigger warnings for this book. Among them are racism, rape, and physical abuse. The book's content is more suitable for older readers.

Sometimes you read a book and feel like it was just made for you, which is exactly what I experienced while reading Wildblood.

Our main character, Victoria, has been abused since she was six. Originally living in the jungle, protected by forest spirits and the whispering trees, she is kidnapped and forced to work for a touring company as protection for the rich foreigners who visit. Like all the tour guides, she is a Wildblood, which means she can manipulate her own and others' blood into weapons and such. When she is forced to work with her ex-best friend on a large tour looking for gold, Victoria is forced to confront her past and question just what she wants for her future.

This book is incredibly character driven. Victoria has had so much trauma in her life, and on the journey, we see flashbacks to her past and how they had shaped her into who she is. My heart ached for her and all that she had gone through. The fact that this is written in first-person made it even more relatable and heartbreaking. As things go terribly wrong on the trip, we see firsthand what grief does to her, and how she overcomes it.

Blackwood did a wonderful job of portraying toxic relationships. Vic is forced to work with her ex, Dean, who she used to rely on until he betrayed her in the most horrible way possible. On the tour, we see how broken both of them are by their abusive boss, and how that affected the way they act. Blackwood handles this tricky dynamic in a realistic way. There is no instant forgiveness or even hatred, just two children who were forced to grow up in a world of horror, and the consequences of that.

The character development is so strong, that the world-building is neglected somewhat. It is still beautiful, with Jamaican-inspired lore, but we never take a deep look at what makes a Wildblood, and if there is magic in the rest of the world. The plot line did feel weak, but since I am more character-driven, this did not bug me. However, if you read books more for the adventures than the characters, then this one might not be for you.

Literally ADDICTED to this author's work. I was hooked when her first novel came out, and when I saw that I was approved for this one, I just about jumped for joy. Ms. Blackwood has a way with words, and character arcs. Thank you so much to the publisher, and NetGalley for an ARC to be able to review. Review will be posted on Amazon, Goodreads and IG.

This book is filled with grief, love, sacrifices, and the lengths we will go to protect ourselves from our traumas, external and internal. A great, poignant story of hope, tragedy, and the blood between them both.

Replacing the enchanted forest for a deadly jungle, Wildblood pulls the reader into its clutches after that first page. This story is incredible for many specific things. Simply put, Victoria is a reliable and realistic narrator. She is human...well, sort of. She is fallible, but also hauntingly honest with herself. This story is a celebration of empowered African women, completely comfortable in their skin and learning to defend their very lives. This type of positive feminine energy is desperately needed and will provide a lesser seen community with representation. In the hopes of not spoiling the ending too much; I cannot thank Lauren Blackwood enough for fighting against the stereotypical 'happy ending'. The ending was bittersweet. It was informed and it was ultimately the best way to stay true to Victoria's soul.

Thank you NetGalley and St Martin's Press for the ARC! It was one of the best reads I've had this year.

I was really excited to read this based on the synopsis, but it didn't end up delivering for me. I loved the description of the jungle and Victoria's past adventures there. However, everything else felt a bit repetitive and monotonous. I also still don't feel like I really understand the whole blood magic aspect. I think there's a good story buried in here but it needs some more editing and polishing. Speaking of, can we get rid of about five of the times people kissed their teeth because that got annoying very quickly.

2.5 stars, rounded up

Kindly received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

The concept of this novel was so cool. A sentient jungle? The setting alone had me captivated throughout the entire story. The villains were a bit underdeveloped and sometimes, the prose was repetitive. I really enjoyed the world Blackwood built and that alone made this a wonderful read.

I received a complimentary copy of this book through NetGalley. The opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

Wow that was quite the journey, which feels on brand for the theme of the story. I knew going into this novel that there would be many emotional moments, as this story sheds light on the horrifying aspects of British and American colonialism in Jamaica. The pain and trauma that Victoria and her friends endure is quite heavy, and I want to emphasize that before readers go into this book thinking it's a fun YA Fantasy.

My favorite aspect of this novel was definitely the various supernatural entities, gods/goddesses, and jungle creatures included in the story from Jamaican folklore. The descriptions and scenes with each of these beings were written in a perfectly creepy and alluring manner and I definitely found myself on the edge of my seat as more and more creatures were introduced. The magic system among the Wildbloods was also described very viscerally and added to the intensity of the story.

I think my least favorite aspect of this novel was the romance, to be honest. I adored the romance in Within These Wicked Walls, but the romance in Wildblood was not very convincing for me. After the trauma that Victoria endures from the men around her, I could not trust Thorn at all, no matter how charming he seemed. His dynamic with Victoria felt a little childish, which was perhaps the point to add to Victoria's naiveté as someone who was born and raised in the jungle and has never experienced what most upper-class folks have experienced. However, I am glad, in a way, that she didn't ultimately stay with Thorn and the end of the novel.

Overall, if you like YA fantasy novels set in the jungle with various jungle creatures like Beasts of Prey, combined with themes of colonialism, classism, environmentalism, strength, and family, check out Wildblood.

Was given the change to read this because the publisher reached put i wish i could give this a thumbs up but it was average. The story wasnt my cut of tea but it was well written and executed

Overall I enjoyed this book. The story is unique and pulled me in. I was invested and related to the character. The reason I gave 4 stars instead of 5 is due to the ending. I felt the ending could have been so much better and felt that I was left wanting more.

4 really great stars.

The story grabbed me right from the start. It's a difficult line for fantasy writers to walk: disclosing enough without backstory-dumping; keeping things for later without confusing the reader. Blackwood did a great job with this!!

Victoria was wonderful and complicated and I loved her. Did she fall in love with Thorn too fast? Nah, it's totally understandable for an 18 yo who is starved for attention, attraction, and respect. And Thorn was pretty much the ideal. He wasn't particularly three-dimensional, but he was a good person for Victoria.

The character that is truly complex and messy and real on the page, is Dean. His relationship to Victoria was revealed really well with only one exception, and the resolution was satisfying as well. Good for Victoria.

Spoiler re Dean and Thorn:
[spoiler]
The fact that Dean was so much more real than Thorn led me to wonder if there was going to be the plot twist where Thorn's actually the bad guy and Dean was working for V's benefit all along. There wasn't: the author did something much more interesting.
[/spoiler]


All in all, a great adventure, satisfying ending, and cool characters. Recommended.

CW: s3xual assau1t in the past but briefly described on page; recalled several times.

I'm on this author's ARC list because I reviewed her earlier book, Within These Wicked Walls. My thoughts are my own. ARC via #Netgalley

I loved Lauren Blackwood’s debut YA novel and so I knew I was going to love one this one and it didn’t disappoint! Wild bloods are treated as less than human and are enslaved for the purpose of leading tourists into the jungle. However, the jungle has had enough of this disrespect and it always ready to fight back. Victoria has endured trauma after trauma but has not lost her humanity, despite people believing she is less than human because of her blood science skills and connection to the forest. She hopes that leading Thorn and his group will give her a different future, one she can barely imagine. This book is gorgeous and as with her first novel the idea of religion and redemption are important to the tale. The love letter to nature, and our mistreatment of it, should make all of us pause I. This generation of global climate changes. I loved this book as much as the first and I didn’t think that was possible!

Thank you, NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press, for providing me with a digital arc of this book in exchange for my honest review.

Victoria was kidnapped by a tourism-driven company and forced into training to protect tourists from ghosts in the jungle. After being denied a promotion, which is given to her ex who hasn’t worked as hard as she has, Victoria is determined to prove herself.

As far as the way this is written, I felt that at times the sentence structure was choppy and repetitive. The concepts described were unique, but the writing didn’t show enough to allow me to gain a full picture in my head of what exactly is going on with the magic mechanics. I also wasn’t very convinced with the insta-love aspect when I feel at some point Victoria should be desensitized to so much affection because every man she meets/has met is in love with her. The setting is the most amazing part of this narrative.

Worth the read, but I just wished for stronger characterization and clearer writing.

3.5/5 stars
Recommended for readers who like: fantasy, magic, adventure, magical woods, healing stories

This review has been posted to Goodreads as of 8/31 and my book blog as of 9/1, and will be posted to Instagram on 9/8.

TW rape (mentioned, brief non-graphic flashback), abuse

I'm disappointed because I really wanted to like this book. I really liked the concept of blood magic and venturing through a sentient, magical, vengeful jungle. Unfortunately, while I do think Blackwood did a good job bringing the forest to life, I don't really think the rest of it hit the mark. There's also the issue with the instalove. The summary makes it sound like Victoria and Thorn grow to respect and care for one another when in reality they see one another and instantly start drooling. Some of the book is also predictable, but predictability can be more easily forgiven.

I will say that I really liked the depiction of the forest. Blackwood promised us a forest full of spirits and deadly magic and then delivered. I felt the magic and the danger from the get-go and really believed Victoria's warnings that even the forest road was a dangerous place to be, let alone the heart of the woods. I liked the different fantastical elements/creatures that were brought in. I enjoyed that we got 'traditional' dangerous creatures (i.e., insects) as well as the more 'mystical' ones (i.e., the burning bull, River Mumma, etc.). I was very happy that most of the book took place in the woods because it was such a fun, rich setting.

While the jungle provided a good backdrop for the story, I don't really feel like the plot was all the way there. We're presented with this challenge of getting to the heart of the forest in order to get gold...yet from the outset we already sort of know that's not going to happen. Victoria says it, the forest says it, and there are too many adversaries for that to be the true plot. And yet most of the book is spent with that as the 'goal'/plot. It's only toward the ending that the plot pivots and we get into the new idea that the system has to change, and even that is resolve fairly quickly. Victoria's transformation is a big thing, but in order for that to be the whole plot, there needed to be more introspection throughout the entire book, and there's not.

The wildblood magic was a little confusing to me. I understand that the magic is pulled from the blood, and you need some sort of blood source in order to make it work (though it also sounds like you can pull blood out of people or animals via their pores or mucosal areas, so...). However, I would've liked a bit more description or explanation in terms of how it manifests. At first it seems like it just involves forming weapons of blood since Dean and Victoria both make needles, daggers, etc. Then later on Victoria mentions she has lightning? I don't feel like I got enough of an explanation of the magic to understand how magic manipulating blood results in electrokinesis. Some additional information in this department would've cleared things right up, especially since it's an interesting concept you don't really see that much.

In terms of the characters, I think Victoria works as a protagonist. She's got an end goal of keeping her brother, Bunny, safe and getting him away from the tour company. She wants to move up the hierarchy in order to achieve that, but is otherwise content to stay on the sidelines, away from the brutality of the boss. Her transformation over the course of the book is largely subtle and has more to do with how she transforms inside herself than anything else. This change feels believable and has a couple of natural triggers.

Thorn is an interesting character for me since I think he's written a certain way on purpose. He's very sweet to Victoria, and very chatty. He's an easy character to like for most of the book, but there's definitely a moment when my perception of him sort of...slipped sideways. He's still likeable, but looking at it from a different angle there are times when you go, 'okay, I don't think you're as nice and accommodating as you make yourself out to be,' and I definitely think that was purposeful on Blackwood's part. I do like that about the character. It gives a depth and complexity to him that I think is very interesting.

Of course, with Victoria and Thorn there's a very instalove-y thing going on. I've mentioned before in reviews that I don't like instalove but can tolerate it so long as it feels believable (i.e., you get a build up of trust and respect first and without the love aspect). Unfortunately, we don't get that here. Thorn and Victoria run into each other very briefly inside the boss' office and immediately get heart eyes, and it's all 'I'm attracted but shouldn't be' from there. If there had been a slower buildup I think it would've worked better, but as it is I have this sense that Victoria feels very deeply for him (and vice versa), but there's such a short history there that it almost feels like a betrayal.

Dean is another major character, and is Victoria's vicious, cruel ex-boyfriend. This is definitely a case where a character is made out to be terrible and then actually is. He takes nearly every opportunity to make Victoria feel small, even when she's right and being helpful and, you know, trying to make sure they don't all die in the magical jungle. In the last 30% of the book it does feel like there's a major personality change for his character and, to be honest, I don't believe it (and neither, I think, does Victoria, not completely at least). I think there is definitely complexity there that could be explored, but it happens too fast and isn't explored enough. Additionally, I feel like Dean gives so many different excuses for his past sins that they all just feel like lies. I can't really tell if this is on purpose or if Blackwood genuinely struggled with why this character would do some of the things he did.

Bunny is Victoria's brother, a 14-year-old who is in a terrible situation and uses his magic to try and gain some control over his life, despite the detrimental effects it has on him. While he can be annoying and dismissive at times, I do feel like Bunny is written to be his age. He's very teenager-y, which fits. Despite him brushing off Victoria's concerns, he genuinely cares about her and her wellbeing. Samson is another brother-like figure for Victoria and has known her for basically her entire time with the tour company. I liked Samson's character and that he looked out for Victoria. He's definitely got his own flaws, but overall he's a pretty enjoyable, jovial character.

One of the issues with this book is that none of the characters that are close to Victoria actually look out for her fully. They may worry about certain things and warn her and try to protect her, but none of them manage to achieve the full outcome. Thorn does a good job worrying and protecting, but he doesn't heed her advice about the forest and he doesn't truly listen when she talks about taking the gold as a form of violence. Samson cares for her and protects her, but he doesn't apologize when he's wrong. Yet these people are, by and large, presented as viable, good options.

I did like the ending, and I'm glad that's the direction the author went with it instead of the one it seemed like it was going. I think it's true to Victoria and the message of the story. I was worried for a bit since it seemed like Blackwood was going to go a more traditional route, either HEA or something else ((view spoiler)), but the one she went with works perfectly. It does actually deal with some of the stuff I'd worried about as I was reading and the kinds of things I'd thought didn't fit well with Victoria, so I was pleased about that as well.

Overall, I went into this book wanting to like it more than I did. The premise is good and I think there are definitely aspects of it that are promising, but it just falls flat. For one, the plot isn't really where it needs to be, which is recoverable if the characters and magic are where they need to be, but they weren't. I did like the setting, though, and I think the ending really hits the mark.

I absolutely adored this book. Wildblood was original, gritty and full of excitement yet also touched base with difficult topics. I loved Victoria as a character and she felt so much like a real person so I loved following her on her journey. First of all I really loved the idea of Wildblood magic and would have loved more details on it! However, I also enjoyed that this story wasn't only steeped in human magic but it mostly focused on the magic of nature. I would have loved more details about the Jamaican jungle but the author did a good job making the reader try to picture themselves surrounded by the jungle and all it's elements... Even the mystical ones! I really loved that the author spun this fantasy story with harsh truths and lessons of the real world. The main characters weren't slaves, per se but their life style and the way they were treated by white men was a difficult topic to breach and I felt like the author did a really good job with handling that. I really loved the folklore involved, between the ghosts and River Mumma. I loved the exploration and greed for gold and all that went wrong along the way. I even really loved the non-traditional girl puts her dreams before a man ending! With that being said, Thorn was sweet but I could've lived without the romance. I absolutely loved this book and I think any fantasy lover is going to enjoy it too!

I loved Within These Wicked Walls, so I had high hopes for Wildblood. But this one just didn't draw me in the way Blackwood's last book did. I thought the magic system was so interesting, but I wanted more explanation and history behind the how the Wildbloods came to be and how exactly the science worked. I thought the commentary about colonialism was excellent, but I wasn't too connected to the characters. Call me a hopeless romantic, but I really disliked the ending, too.

A unique story full of magical realism, Wildblood explores the struggles of a group of people who are able to use their blood to manipulate their environment. They are regarded as lesser-than due to their magic and also the darkness of their skin. Wildbloods who have lighter skin hold higher positions within the Touring Company, and are seen as more desirable. Victoria is the most powerful Wildblood of them all and the story follows her struggles to overcome trauma and find her place in the world.

While the overall concept for the story is wholly unique and full of potential, I found the execution flat. The characters, including Victoria, were one dimensional, and the narrative left me with more questions than were answered. Mine revolve mainly around the origins of the Wildbloods, their bondage (?) to The Exotic Lands Touring Company, and Victoria’s power. Additionally, the instant love between Victoria and Thorn was unbelievable and unnecessary.

The characterization of the jungle was by far my favorite part of the story. I loved Victoria’s relationship with the River Mumma, and the creativity of spirits like the pickneys and duppy.

Although this story was missing key elements for me personally, I do think readers will be drawn in by the themes of survival, perseverance, and self-discovery. Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press/Wednesday Books for an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.