Thank you so much to Netgalley and the publisher for an e-arc of this novel! Thirst comes out March 5, 2024.

Thirst follows two women across different time periods dealing with loss, grief, and loneliness, yearning for something that they can't quite explain. Our first narrator, an unnamed vampire wandering the streets of Yellow Fever ridden Buenos Aires; our second narrator, a woman grappling with her mother's progressing degenerative disease, while simultaneously trying to work and co-parent her son.

I really enjoyed this! The first half of the novel is so atmospheric, dark, and gritty as we follow the vampire's journey through Buenos Aires. I love how the author depicts her constant obsession with blood and her never-ending thirst that she can't satiate. She's not a brooding Romantic vampire, but rather a vampire that's animalistic and uncontrollable. I loved that take.

The story definitely slows down a bit once we shift to the present day, but I thought the way that the author depicted grief and the loss of someone who isn't gone yet was authentic and heartbreaking.

I wanted just a bit more from the ending, but the way that the two characters come together is so well done.

I would highly recommend if you're looking for a good vampiric queer horror story. Shout out to the translator, Heather Clearly, who I think did a fantastic job.

"No one knows what it means to be as I am. No one can imagine. Humans have invented countless stories in which those of my kind have no life of our own; if I might be permitted a moment of lyricism, we exist only to populate their nightmares. They could never understand this insatiable thirst."

This is a story in two parts. In part 1, we follow a nameless woman as she is turned into a vampire. She at first is brought into a group of vampires, but they're all killed except for her. She is forced to fend for herself in the shadows and flees from Europe to Argentina.

Part 2 follows a mortal woman named Alma who is distantly connected to our vampire. She is related to a cemetery worker who befriended and protected our vampire. Alma's mother is slowly and painfully dying. Before she does pass, her mother gives Alma a key... A key that opens our vampire's coffin.

This is gothic and very lyrical.

3.5 stars rounded up.

Thank you Penguin Group Dutton for giving me an advanced review copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

3.5 rounded up to 4. Structurally this was interesting. The first half is 8 chapters worth of a female vampire romping around, quenching her thirst, navigating hunting on her own, and a lot of erotic moments with various people. Part 2 picks up with a different woman (whose connection you learn as you read) whose mother is dying, so she inherits an item that leads her on an unexpected path to a vampire.

The story is filled with a lot of grief and sopping with gothic atmosphere. It's reminiscent of Dracula & A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night. It's moody, and when I was in a scene I was IN IT. But cohesively as a story I was left feeling a bit unsatisfied due to the structure. The pacing and structure was different from what I expected, but I can still appreciate the story for what it was and how well written it was.

Featured in this reading vlog: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0L8g5amE0jE

Thank you to the publisher for granting me access to an ARC via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All opinions remain my own.

"Thirst" by Marina Yuszczuk is a haunting journey that expertly blends historical depth with the complexities of human and supernatural existence, earning a solid 3.5 stars. The novel captivates with its dual narratives - a vampire navigating her existence through centuries in Buenos Aires and a contemporary woman wrestling with personal and existential dilemmas. While the book masterfully explores themes of loneliness, desire, and the search for meaning, it left me yearning for deeper connections with its characters. "Thirst" stands out for its bold genre-blurring and feminist gothic influences, making it a compelling read for those intrigued by the darker, more introspective corners of the human experience.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me an ARC in exchange for an honest review!

This book turned my stomach, but in a good way. The first half centers on a female vampire who relocates to Argentina after being persecuted in Europe. Her point of view is violent and dark, though I found myself sympathizing for her and the thirst for blood that drives her story. When the threat of persecution rears its head once again in Buenos Aires (I won’t spoil it, but this part of the story is gruesome), she begins living in a cemetery. She “befriends” a cemetery worker named Mario and eventually decides to entomb herself, foresaking her bloodlust by having Mario lock her into a coffin. The second half of the book is written from the perspective of an ancestor of that cemetery worker, Alma. Alma is suffering from depression as her mother struggles with an illness that is slowly paralyzing her. During a visit to her mother’s bedside, Alma’s mother gives her a mysterious key with a written warning to never use it. I bet you can guess what happens next.

This felt like reading a modern-day classic gothic novel, a mix of Dracula by Bram Stoker and Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. The writing style was wonderful. The novel navigates the themes of reason vs. primal instinct, female sensuality, religion, and also that of motherhood. The book asks us to ponder the act of creation and its aftereffects, showcasing the consequences of the decisions each character takes in an effort to create something we don’t normally have a choice in - another vampire, a peaceful death, an act of revenge on the church.

I wish the last half of the book had been a bit longer and more developed, as I enjoyed it more than the first half. I related to Alma and her struggles with the illness of her mother, and the journal-style chapters interested me more than the cold musings of the vampire in the first half. So with that, Thirst gets 4 stars!

I am sitting here and grappling with this review because I really don’t understand this novel. I don’t know if something was lost in translation on this, but I just couldn’t get into this story. This book was sold as gothic horror with a sapphic love story across time, and I didn’t really get a lot of that until the very end of the book. I am also trying to read more horror in translation, so this also fits the bill for that!

The majority of this story reads like vignettes of first the vampire’s life and then the second woman’s, and it isn’t until the very end that their stories come together. A lot of the novel feels like meandering thoughts and stories that don’t feel like a very cohesive narrative. And again, I am not sure if this is a translation issue or a me issue. I found parts of this book to be absolutely stunning, but overall, I am left feeling very underwhelmed. I was just bored for most of this one and felt myself having to force myself to read it (I would have DNF’d probably if it wouldn’t have affected my NetGalley score).

I did enjoy the author's meditations on the concept of desire and most of all the interconnectedness of death and sexuality. There is a very poignant section towards the end where the woman is contemplating death as a concept due to her mother’s illness and feels like she has already died as she aged because the woman she once was with hopes, dreams, and an unlimited future is dead. Obviously vampire stories have always relied on tying death and sexuality together as vampires have often been depicted as very sexual beings despite their “undead” status. I think my main issue I am grappling with is I don’t think this book did anything very interesting with the vampire genre. It felt very much like a standard vampire story which is fine but not really something I am currently looking for as so many exciting things have been done with the genre recently.

I think this book will definitely connect with some, and I really wish I was one of those people. But I am left with not a very enjoyable reading experience which is why I am rating this the way I am.

Thirst by Marina Yuszczuk was a vampire story like none I’ve ever read.

Two points of view, the woman vampire and Alma, single mother. Two time periods, present day and long ago. These two women are separated by time but are brought together by fate.

Lots more of dark gothic vibes with a feminist twist. I’ll have to think a bit on the ending.

Recommended for readers who like gothic horror, female rage horror and fans of Daphne De Meuiere.

I am entranced with the writing style of this story. The prose is lush, poetic, and evocative.

The story was... a bit disjointed for me. I was compelled by both women's story, and was on board for the meeting of these stories. Except that didn't totally happen. We get vampiric history, which is intriguing if a bit flat a as far as charact depth goes, and then we're learning about a completely different person's history. And it's rich with emotionally heavy hitting themes. That connect almost not at all to the vampire story being told. And as the story blends back to being vampiric... it sort ends. Poetically to be sure. But without anything having happened!

Queer sapphic vampire romance!! Queer sapphic romance!! This book was so good, so fun, and overall very dreamy. Thank you to the author and publisher for the opportunity to check this book out in advance of its official publishing.

This book was very much not for me and even at 256 pages, I struggled to get through it (I admit, I resorted to skimming).

I was intrigued by the premise of a vampire and a woman falling in love, but the decision to split the book in half with each of their perspectives meant each story felt incomplete. The choice to use past tense also drained the story of any immediacy or stakes and it was far too heavy on the telling and too light on the showing.

thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group Dutton for the eARC in exchange for an honest review!

this was everything i could ever want out of a modern gothic vampire story. anne rice fans: look no further than here. this story was told through two points of views, a vampire and a human woman both living in buenos aires going through their own shit. both of their stories were equally unique and tragic. my ONLY complaint is that their two stories don't actually mesh together until ~80% into the book. the romance isn't until much later than even that. i wish we got to see a more of these characters together, this author left a lot to the imagination.

i heard someone refer to this book as a sapphic vampire romance, which it DOES have that, but don't read this if that's your only appeal. there was so much more to this story. after completing, i have already pre-ordered a copy for my own bookshelf!

This was the femme vampire story I have been waiting ages for. I really enjoyed this book and the author’s writing style, it felt very immersive and was super entertaining to read.

This book is told from two timelines with two POVs, and each POV highlights the pain, loneliness and anger each woman felt. The two story lines do come together eventually and it was really fun to see how it would play out, especially as a reader knowing the background information from the first part of the book.
I will say the tone shifted immensely between the two storylines and could have benefited from a dual storyline told alongside each other. Reading the first half of the book kind of set the tone that I would be reading a vampire novel about how she survived centuries as a monster, but then we get to the second half of the story that felt very anticlimactic and a little disjointed. Both women are dealing with massive amounts of grief and telling their story’s alongside each other could have built up the climax a bit more.

Overall, I thought this was pretty good. I love vampires, I love lesbians, and I love unhinged women, what more could you want?

Content Warnings: Hospice Care/End of Life Care, Assisted Suicide

Thirst has some intriguing ideas, especially in the first part exploring Buenos Aires during the Yellow Fever epidemic. I thought that setting and seeing how the unnamed vampire narrator handled herself in not only a new place but in a land where she could operate more freely were the strongest parts of the novel. The second half, which follows a human woman named Alma handling her mother’s deterioration and death, was also well written in terms of emotion though (for me) less interesting.

The real problem for me was that the two halves didn’t feel joined. I could have either read an entire book just of the vampire’s retelling or an entire book of Alma encountering the vampire and giving up her life to join her – but having to do with half of each left me unsatisfied.

Those who enjoy gothic fiction or vampire fiction may dig the vibe of this novel for at least the first half, but I think the second half will leave audiences more divided. Some may like it, but others will probably feel disappointed in it.

3.5/5

Do not go into this thinking of a vampire/romance story, but more thinking about how the poetic themes painted on the pages intertwine with real life.

This book is perfect for fans of atmospheric settings, unhinged women, dealings of grief and terminal illness. The first half of this book was my favorite while the other half felt like a different story. I was surprised to find that this vampire book actually had life-long themes, though that could have been my bad for assuming this book was something it (mostly) was not.

The first half was full of twists and turns as we follow a vampire trying to operate her new life in a plagued Buenos Aires. The imagery was crisp, brutal, and animalistic, and one finds themselves rooting for the monster and against the usual good (religion, morals, humanity.)

The second half follows a woman who is dealing with the grief that comes with her mother having a terminal illness. Being as I was reading this for the vampire element, I felt like this dragged on. It should be mentioned that the introspection and emotions this character was going through were well done, however, I personally cared more about the whole story and characters coming together rather than this individual character’s story itself.

At around 80% both parts come together and the rest of the story I enjoyed very much. It is exactly the chaos, bloodshed, and weird romance I expected/wanted more of from this story. I do wish there was a bit more to the ending/ the two’s relationship, but I did enjoy the way it ended. All in all, Yuszczuk somehow combined vampires, mommy issues, and terminal illness all into one story and made it something that could haunt you forever. If there was a sequel following them, I would definitely read it.

Overall rating: ⅖

There was so much about this book that I really wished I liked. Thirst is a story of two women spanning across vast timelines battling loneliness, death and mortality. The twist, one woman is a vampire learning to live on her own after becoming free from her master and later chased down by the church to execute her. We follow her life, learn her story and begin to understand the lonely solitude that is vampirism; however, it was such an incredible bore that at times I questioned why I even read through to the end.

There were so many aspects I wish could have been better. The character development felt only fleshed out for one character, while the others became forgettable and surface level. The setting could have been something amazing, a gothic, eerie cemetery where a vampire is locked away in a mausoleum waiting for the owner of her key to set her free. So much could have been explored but everything just fell short. The genre of vampirism can go a couple ways sensational and cheesy, epic and amazing, or drab and slow. This book started with a promise of being cathartic and hauntingly beautiful, even the synopsis ropes you in, but the story itself falls horribly short and drags on only for the last 10 pages to be the only redeeming quality of it. I’m guessing vampiric, gothic, period pieces just aren’t what they used to be anymore.

I mostly loved this.

Part one deals with the mostly unnamed vampire. She gives a fake name to a lover and uses it for a time, Maria. She is in Buenos Aires during the yellow fever, which is an epic backdrop to the horror she creates. When a man, a short-lived lover, finds out her true nature, he captures her and takes a picture which haunts her into the very century we are in now

Part two follows a woman with a dying mother and a young son. This seems to take place in the present . This part was frustrating to me because I had all the earlier excitement with part one, and this just felt a bit too morose and was hard to get into. Plus, I really wish there was more explanation with the ending because that was especially interesting to me.

Out March 5, 2024!

Thank you, Netgalley and Publisher, for this Arc!

4.5 rounded up

Behind the beautiful vampire facade, this is really a literary exploration of grief, death, and what happens when the spirit is ready to move on but the body remains.

The first half follows our vampire, newly arrived from Europe in 19th century Buenos Aires where yellow fever has broken out. This part had the tenets of every good vampire story - incredible gothic atmosphere, longing, violence, etc.

Then we shift gears to modern day, following a woman who has recently gone through a separation and is grappling with her mother's illness which leaves her increasingly more and more paralyzed.

Though the two narratives eventually converge, my only complaint is that they weren't interwoven a bit earlier on. It took me out of the story a little bit when the perspectives shifted so suddenly.

I loved the writing and I loved the first third and a chunk of the final third, but the second POV fell a bit flat for me. I also am not the biggest fan of the ending. I would love an entire story following after the ending. The sum of it all ends up being a three for me. I do wonder if some things were lost in translation on this one.

First things first, that cover? To die for.

I really enjoyed this one! Thirst was truly a literary gothic horror gem. Expect themes of motherhood, womanhood, and mortality.

The book is split into two timelines, set in Buenos Aires. The first follows a vampire in the 1800s, freshly off the boat and navigating a new town after fleeing Europe to avoid detection. And boy is she thirsty. This half of the book was such a vibe and I loved how quietly terrifying it was. The writing was poetic and lyrical, and I honestly highlighted a good chunk on my kindle. The second half shifts gears to present day and follows a grieving woman who is watching her mother die. Her mother passes along a key to a crypt in the local cemetery. Guess who's in the crypt? I personally love books about grief and thought that added an interesting layer to the story. The second half didn't capture my attention as much, but I loved how they connected.

Heathy Cleary did a fantastic job with this one because the prose was so beautiful and powerful, I'm happy that didn't get lost in the translation. I love foreign horror and would eagerly read another translated novel by her.

Overall, this was a beautiful and haunting read. Highly recommend to fans of literary gems with a short page count and gothic horror about vampires.

I think there is something magical about the gothic South American writing style that speaks to me. Dual POV of two women during two different time periods. A beautiful allegory for grief and suffering. I was hooked from the start. A fascinating and engaging read!

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Group Dutton for an advanced reader copy