I originally read This Vicious Grace in May of last year. To say I was waiting for the sequel with baited breath would be an understatement. The first book just touched on so many of my favourite themes; feminism, love, fantasy inspired by non-Anglo influences, finding autonomy, etc. However, while I did like This Cursed Light, and I do believe it functions decently as a sequel, I also think that it detracted from the story of the first book more than it added to it.
While in no way bad—This Cursed Light is still beautifully written with some amazing world building—it just so happened to fall into a few pit traps that normally would have me steer clear, had this not been book two in a duology. The main one being some intense miscommunication between Dante and Alessa. I was a huge fan of their dynamic in book one, especially near the end, but the circumstances of this narrative forced a shift. So much of their back and forth in This Cursed Light was just them lying to each other that it made their romantic relationship feel disingenuous. Then having that hyper focus on their deteriorating personal relationship meant that so much of the plot that was occurring outside of their bubble felt glossed over. However, what was there was amazing, and the build up to the end kept me engaged and coming back for more, despite the fact the pacing was quite a bit slower in this book when compared with its predecessor.
All in all, if you have read or are planning to read This Vicious Grace, I would definitely recommend This Cursed Light as well. It doesn’t quite live up to the first, but it is still a worthwhile conclusion to the series as a whole.

I loved this conclusion to the duology! I loved it slightly less than the first book, but it was a solid ending to the story. I loved getting to see more of Alessa and co., and I really loved the ending.

Alessa and Dante as characters are so compelling and relatable. I love the way the characters mirror each other but also have very unique struggles and traits. Alessa’s struggles with anxiety and ADHD made her feel so real to me, and there were so many of her qualities that I see in my own life. She’s just such a great character, and I really loved reading more of her story in this book.

The only drawbacks for me in this installment were that I wanted a bit more of the banter that Alessa and Dante had in book one and that the plot felt less logical than the first book. Neither of these issues were so egregious that it significantly deteriorated my reading experience.

I would definitely recommend reading this if you loved This Vicious Grace, and I highly recommend this duology to lovers of fantasy romance!

(Also, Emily Thiede, if you read this, please write a story about those budding romances we saw in this book 👀👀👀🙏🙏🙏)

Great follow up for this fantasy, the story develops do well and cohesive towards this book, loved where is going and definitely enjoyed

I really enjoyed reading this cursed light I really enjoyed the writing style and will be keeping my eyes out for more by this author!

I've been sitting on this review, trying to figure out how to word this, and the best I can think of is... meh.

Where book 1 immersed you in magic abilities, friendship, and non-stop action, this one had crappy, unsupportive females, lackluster execution, and relationships taking major backslides, undoing any character development made in This Vicious Grace.

Alessa and Dante are constantly lying to each other because that's a thing they now do. Talia is an awful person. She hasn't seen Dante in years, since he was a child, really, but suddenly, she knows what's best for him even though she barely knows him. Not to mention how controlling and possessive she is.

There was so much dialog that didn't move the story forward, and when we finally got to what I hoped was some excitement, I must have blinked too long because I missed it.

I didn't hate this book but hoped the momentum would continue. Some people really loved this one, though, so perhaps that's just me.

Thank you, St. Martin's, for the advanced copy.

This was a tough book for me. Parts I liked and parts not so much. Glad to see Alessa and Dante together. His homeland was interesting. The whole fight with Crolle not so exciting. Sequels are difficult. The first book was just so good, it was hard to followup. Would be interested to see what the author writes next

Thank you to Wednesday Books and NetGalley for the eARC in exchange for an honest review. I thoroughly enjoyed the first book of this series and was excited to pick up where we left Alessa and Dante at the end of This Vicious Grace. This Cursed Light begins six months after Divorando with Dante, Alessa and their friends searching for other ghiotte to help restore Dante’s powers and to raise an army capable of defeating whatever the gods may test them with next.
Despite being a relatively quick read, there were parts of the story that felt dragged out. The story felt overly focused on Dante and Alessa hiding things from each other and whether or not Alessa’s touch would be harmful or not with very little focus on what they could be facing from the gods. I felt Alessa’s “growing darkness” was very lightly touched on and could have been better developed. I would say 80% of the story was spent preparing for an unknown showdown that received very little page time once it arrived.

just finished reading This Cursed Light and it was ✨ incredible ✨

5 lemons ⭐️

TCL picks up a few months after we left our heroes in This Vicious Grace (if you haven’t read it, you need to!) and takes the reader on a fantastical journey exploring self identity, ptsd, love-filled angst, and mischievous gods.

As a sequel I thought this held its own well and actually loved the inclusion of dual POV. A great wrap up for these characters and story.

Since these were Emily’s debut books, I can’t wait to see what she writes next!

Thanks to NetGalley and Wednesday Books for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Loved This Vicious Grace and This Cursed Light did not disappoint. The middle dragged a little bit as they were preparing for war, compared to in the first book it had more action. The end tied up everything pretty good which I like in series books. And it’s comforting that Dante and Alyssa are solid throughout.

I'm so sad to say this was a DNF at about 30%. I loved the first book, but I could not connect with this sequel and I felt that by 1/3 of the way through the book nothing had really happened and there had been no character growth. If I had more reading time I probably would have tried to continue, but felt like it was best to move on. 3 star rating based on what I had read so far - it was fine.

I loved this book so much didn't think the series could get any better but this book proved me wrong

Wow! What a fantastic way to end the duology. We are taken yet again on an exciting quest to save the world and save a true love story.

I was very underwhelmed by this conclusion to the duology. To me, the best part of reading This Vicious Grace was the banter and relationship between Alessa and Dante. In this one however, I found that to be severely lacking and their interactions seemed more immature than before. I was also put off by the repetition and inconsistencies that were present throughout. Hopefully this is something that will be fixed as a final edit, but the fact that I noticed so many was disappointing. What do I like about this series? The magic system. It is very creative and I really like the idea of the Finestra amplifying powers of those around her. The underlying concept was there but just didn’t work well with how it was written. If you really enjoyed This Vicious Grace then it is worth a read to have a conclusion and to learn a bit more about the magic the characters hold.

This book was a bit of a mixed bag for me. I loved book one but this one lacked some of the urgency of the original. I liked the personal struggle of our characters but the stakes didn't feel like they were set up well and
the pacing dragged in spots. I still enjoyed it and I thought it was a satisfying ending. Thank you to netgalley and the author for the arc. My opinions are my own.

I really loved the first book in this series, but I was a little bored by this one. I wanted to be invested, but the plot never grabbed me.

Liked it but didn’t love it.

Book Name: This Cursed Light — The Last Finestra #2
Author: Emily Thiede

ARC
Thank you to St. Martin's Press, ****Wednesday Books for a Copy of Emily Thiede’s This Cursed Light

Stars: 3.75
Spice: 1 YA Fade to Black

Series Ending
Satisfying Conclusion
Fast Paced
Dual POV
High Fantasy with Italian Elements

- Topics
- Overcoming Systematic Racicisim/ Sterpty[es
- Working Together
- Truthfulness in Relationships
- Selfishness vs selflessness
- Tropes
- Apocalyptic Stakes
- Gallows Humor
- Found Family
- Gameboard of the Gods
- Daggers Everywhere
- Thoughts.
- Get to Know Dante More
- Training Montage was …long
- Pacing Issues
- The Quick Forgiveness Was Difficult to Process
- Satisfying Closure
- Romance Was Sweet
- Love the Gods Aspect (wish there was more explored there)

(3.5/5 stars, rounded up) Honestly, I was a tad disappointed in the second book of this series. I LOVED the premise of the magic system and Thiede's world-building, but I felt a bit let down by this second book. Let me start by saying that I don't love miscommunication tropes and that's all that seemed to fill This Cursed Light. Someone, or multiple someones, inevitably hold back information to "protect" others and it ultimately creates tension and disastrous outcomes that could have otherwise been avoided. Call it the drama that brings the reader into the story, but I call it an unnecessary way to draw out a book that doesn't have a ton of fulfilling content. I think I just found this book to be a bit "young" in the way the main characters pine after each other, don't communicate, and complicate literally everything.

I will say I loved the inclusion of the Ghiotte and the twists that Thiede took when talking about Crollo's army. I felt like the ending was a bit of a reach though.

Thank you to NetGalley, St. Martin's Press, and Emily Thiede for allowing me access to an advanced reader's copy in exchange for an honest review!

There is a lot to be said about This Cursed Light. Coming into it off a reread of This Vicious Grace, I found myself looking forward to where this book would bring our heroes next. Overall, I found this sequel pretty underwhelming.

While Alessa and Dante have wonderful chemistry and banter in the first book, this book really showed their insecurity in their relationship. It really emphasizes the reality of relationships and their challenges. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing, but it took away from the storyline, being emphasized so heavily. It was refreshing to have dual perspectives, especially how seamless the transitions could be at times. But some transitions were harder to differentiate, especially those mid-chapter. Neither character really goes through any real growth either that I personally saw.

While I’m all for sexual exploration in YA books, I felt like the representation in this book was over the top. The innuendo felt overly adult, like it was written for an older audience than teens. I wish more YA books lately were written with teens in mind, not the older audience reading them. The book felt overly sexualized for what it was.

I saw a more clear explanation of the magic system in this book, but it still felt kind of vague. It was something I really struggled with in the first book. On the other hand, the handling of the ghiotte’s isolation felt vaguely harmful. At no point was the prejudice against them formally addressed, just sort of brushed over as an “we don’t feel that way,” when clearly others still did/do. Even their inclusion in the epilogue felt sort of rushed and unapologetic for this harmful nature of their isolation.

The synopsis focuses on the quest to find the ghiotte and this epic battle to come, yet it is hardly covered in the book with Alessa’s struggles and Dante’s desperation to get his power back. The pacing was pretty slow, leaving little time for the epic battle, so it to fall short for me. Key details were left out between the ending and the epilogue that would have been good to explore farther if there had been more time. The ending did most wrap up loose storylines nicely despite this.

I did enjoy this book, but it really fell short of what I was hoping for an expecting. The writing is solid, but the storylines felt too much like the first book rewritten as a new struggle.

I enjoyed this book so much! It was such a good continuation of the series. The romance was so amazing and the world drew me in. I highly recommend this series!

Arc from netgalley. Loved this! Enjoyed how the story continues and answers questions left open from the last book. I will continue to read from this author