Delightfully eerie and poetic. I devoured this book in one sitting. The fmc is riveting and hard to forget. The second half of the book left me missing the first part. I cared very little about present time Alma and finally realized it was like a bloodline love thing I forgave its dullness. I’m curious to read more of this author’s work.

DNF at 30%, This was not for me though I'm always down for stories of monstrous women and think they're worth giving a chance.

This book has two different POV. First half is about a vampire the second about a girl dealing with death and a sick mom. The first half of the book was so intriguing and I couldn't put it down but the second half felt a but rush and I just wanted more. More of a connection as well. But I absolutely loved the ending and the last few pages.

I received a digital advance copy of Thirst by Marina Yuszczuk (tranlated by Heather Cleary) via NetGalley. Thirst is scheduled for release on March 5, 2024.

Thirst follows two women. Maria is a nineteenth century vampire newly relocated to Buenos Aires from Europe. She is faced with a population plagued by yellow fever and her own insatiable thirst. Alma is a current day woman, faced with the mortality of her mother, and struggling to define herself as a mother to her own child. The two women are linked through a cemetery crypt, and their meeting changes them both forever.

This story is told in two parts. The first half is narrated by Maria, and the second by Alma. Both halves are written in a style that I found a bit distancing. The narrators are telling the reader what happened, but there are very few scenes. The result was a feeling of distance from the events of the story and the characters themselves. This distance also made some sections of the novel feel slow, as we were presented with large chunks of summary.

I did appreciate the new take on a vampire novel. The main characters here are women, which is a bit unusual in a vampire novel. These are women who are dealing with life’s issues, but are not waiting around to be rescued (or preyed upon) by a man. I do wish we had gotten to know both of them better, as that would have made the resolution of the novel more satisfying.

Overall, Thirst is a women-forward vampire tale that deals with desire, family, and mortality. I would recommend it to readers who enjoy a slower paced narrative novel.

This novel begins as a lesbian vampire story but switches narrators midstream. A sort of response to Interview with the Vampire, this story tracks the life of a vampire over many places and years.

3.5 stars. "Thirst" by Marina Yuszczuk, translated by Heather Cleary, offers a compelling dive into the realms of sapphic vampire horror, weaving together the lives of two women across time in Buenos Aires. The narrative unfolds in two distinct parts: the first delves into the mysterious existence of the vampire Maria (not her real name), set against the backdrop of 19th-century Europe and the Yellow Fever epidemic of 1870 in Buenos Aires. Yuszczuk's portrayal of Maria's dark romance and gothic brooding immerses readers in a world brimming with suspense and intrigue.

However, the novel's momentum shifts in the second part, as the focus shifts to a modern-day mother grappling with her own struggles amidst her mother's deteriorating health. While the intrigue mounts as the threads of the two narratives begin to converge in the second half, the story ultimately falls short of the gripping intensity established in the first part.

"Thirst" explores profound themes of death, illness, and the essence of humanity in the face of mortality. While the novel's latter half may not live up to the expectations set by its more riveting beginning, Yuszczuk's exploration of these themes offers thought-provoking reflections for readers.

"Thirst" is a recommended read for enthusiasts of vampire horror, particularly those drawn to atmospheric storytelling and dark, brooding narratives. Despite its uneven pacing, Yuszczuk's novel offers a captivating glimpse into the complexities of existence, mortality, and the allure of the supernatural.

Thirst is everything I wanted and more and I’m so thankful to Dutton Books, Marina Yuszczuk, PRH Audio, and Netgalley for the advanced physical, digital, and audio access before March 5, 2024. Thirst is an interdimensional love story where our main character, a vampire mopes through time longing for blood and lust with anyone that will invite her in. She manages to escape persecution and plague due to her immortality and seeking refuge where it’s granted. In present day, we have our other main character who’s a struggling single mother of one, her son Santiago, as she cares for her dying mother.

One day she’s granted a few documents from her ailing mom, an image of an angry woman dated 1871 and a key with the instructions not to open its passage. Our FMC comes to find out that this key is for a coffin in a mauseleum that is presumably empty, even though it’s not and once it’s opened our vampiric goddess is freed and welcomed to place havoc on the town around her.

The two strike up a transactional relationship of, of sorts and find lust and neediness in each other. This continues leading up to the death of our FMC’s mother and how our vampiric lover consoles her companion during these hardened times.

I thought Thirst was beautiful and I fell in love with the rich histories of our first FMC and the brokenhearted losses of our second FMC. The two blended together so perfectly in intergenerational beauty.

3.5 rounded up. I personally love gothic horror, vampires, and gothic horrors that feature vampires. With the blurbs and synopsis attached to this book, I knew I had to give it a shot. I absolutely loved the POV of the vampire. Her journey of surviving through the centuries was compelling and I found her to be a very interesting character. Her POV resonated with my love of gothic horror, and it felt so real and immersed in vampire lore while also keeping a fresh perspective. The POV of the human in part 2 was less interesting to me, and while I understand why her POV existed, it took away from the gothic feel. However, part 2 was only the final third of the book so it didn't drag on. Overall, the book is a quick read and I am very thankful I read it! A big thank you to Penguin Random House who gifted me the widget in exchange for my thoughts!

I made it about 25% through before I had to call it a quits. The prologue immediately lost me -- I am not a fan of wandering beginnings. I believe it could have been great with shortening and a little less confusion on why she was there. The first chapter did not sell me any better. I can appreciate an aspect of the vicious animality of the character but the sex / murder scene made me uncomfortable, as well as what followed in that scene. I am a huge fan of Carmilla and the Dowry of Blood so I suspected I would love this as well!

Unfortunately, I did not feel comfortable continuing because it became a little to grotesque for me. I think that could be highlighted more in the description. I am sad because I always desire more sapphic retellings or just queer characters in general but this one was not the right one for me. I am sure there will be plenty of others who adore this!

I really enjoyed the first half of Thirst, I found myself wanting to keep reading chapter after chapter. Unfortunately I started losing interest towards the second half, and I pushed through but was quite disappointed with the ending. I think the writing is beautiful, I found myself highlighting a lot of passages. And it felt very atmospheric, with great clear descriptions that I could picture so vividly in my head. I would read more from Marina Yuszczuk even though this one didn’t quite hit the mark for me.

“Beautiful and obscene.”

This quote perfectly describes the book. The prose was beautifully written. In the first half, we meet the vampire and see her journey from Europe to Buenos Aires. Unlike most vampire stories, the FMC is not tortured by ethical questions of her existence.
In the second half, we meet Alma and she is dealing with the declining health of her mother. We discover the connection between the two women, which was well done. The ending was almost abrupt, I wanted to keep reading.

Vampire story of the century; a realistic take on what a Vampire must endure to survive and lessons of morality learned along the way. Composed of essentially a before-and-after structure, the novel flows seamlessly through a clockwise sequence of events. The story unfolds at a rapid pace and slows at times during which our human main character is grieving her dying mother. Marina Yuszczuk captures the most complex elements of a mother/daughter/child relationship with such effortlessness that I found myself nodding my head in agreement whilst reading and discovering how to describe feelings I had never before been able to put into words. Details throughout the story are so clear and precise in such a simplistic way, it was glorious.
Thirst is a novel I will recommend to everybody for as long as I live. I have personal issues on the subject of death and dying that keep me from reading any material surrounding the subject, though Thirst never once made me cringe with fear at the mention of death; moreover, solace on the matter.

The ending was what I wanted though not what I was expecting in the BEST way.

Overall, this is an absolute example of what a story should be; constructed beautifully, full character development, and leaving you thirsting for more.

I've read my fair share of vampire themed books, but never one that centered on a female vampire. And while the protagonist was female, the themes to other vampire themed stories were similar:
*** The vampire's origin. This one was particularly disturbing and gave me a brief moment of sympathy for the vampire, whose real name was never known.
*** How she survived her endless need for blood within her new home, Buenos Aires, which was in the midst of a plague.
*** And who she used to satisfy her thirst.

The story takes a turn when she has had enough of this world and an assistant of sorts lock her in a coffin. Then someone's curiosity got the best of them, and the terror begins anew.

The one thing this story lacked was something to draw my sympathy or affection for the vampire. Usually that is with a love interest. And while this vampire does have some memorable interactions with several people over the course of time, it wasn't enough to make me invested in them or what happened to them.

Overall, while this was an interesting story, I missed having a connection to the story and a reason to care about the vampire's fate.

Thank you to the publisher for inviting me to read this title in advance!

I REALLY enjoyed the first half of this one. The historical settings and the storytelling in it was so lush and immersive for me that it really felt like I was sitting and listening to someone actually recounting their life and history. I found it suspenseful and engaging and once it truly started I struggled to put it down.

The second half left a little to be desired, I think, but I did still enjoy it. Our modern day narrator I found much less engaging to follow, especially since I just kind of found her unlikable. That could have easily been to display the levels of trauma she was experiencing, and I understand it, but she just wasn't the kind of unlikable that I enjoy reading. She was kind of weirdly mean sometimes? Some of the commentary about her elderly neighbor stuck out to me.

Once their stories fully combined I got much more into it again, but I did feel the ending was kind of stilted. I did overall enjoy it though, and I learned that I DO enjoy vampire stories! I'm just incredibly particular about them now!

Would definitely recommend to anyone looking for lush, sapphic, gothic horror!

Thank you NetGalley for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

The writing in this is so beautiful - gothic, dark, and sensual - both the author and the translator are incredibly talented!

Thirst is a short vampire story told in 2 parts. Part 1 (the main story) is about a nameless woman who is turned by a male vampire in the 1500s (?). The master vampire has created a harem of women vampires and he provides bodies for them to feed on, but then he is killed, and the women have to learn how to hunt on their own. And THEN all of the lady vampires are brutally killed except for our heroine, who goes on to live in the shadows, hunting, occasionally making alliances, and sometimes taking lovers, for centuries.

The story is told from the heroine's POV with very little emotion. She relays her actions matter of factly to the reader, as if she is not even sure herself how she feels about everything she's doing.

Part 2 is told from the POV of a modern day heroine, Alma, whose story converges with, and in a strange way, mirrors the vampire heroine's story.

This isn't so much a book about queer vampires (although, the vampire heroine is queer), as it is a book that uses vampire lore as an allegory to queerness. Our vampire heroine is persecuted, hated, ostracized, and occasionally even fetishized because of her desires. The book explores themes of grief, loneliness, death, and desire in a very poetic way.

This novel is set up in two portions. In the first half, we follow a vampire (whose name we truly never know, apart from the one she uses for a brief while – Maria) and see her journey from the old world to the new (specifically Buenos Aires). I enjoyed reading about the vampire and how she tried to survive in an ever-changing and evolving world, one that she didn’t really understand or get accustomed to.

The second half of the novel takes place in present time Buenos Aires and it’s about a woman, Alma, who has to deal with the grief of her mother’s sickness and the dissolution of her marriage. Obviously, at one point the protagonist of the second portion of the book comes in contact with the vampire from the first half of the novel.

This novel was well written but it was marketed as a literary vampire romance, and well, I’m not sure if that’s entirely accurate because the romance part comes so very late in the novel, and when it does it rushes full speed. I guess I was expecting more of a slow burn (or at least it occurred earlier in the book).

Overall, I did enjoy the book and enjoyed the vampire character a lot. But if you’re looking for a romantic vampire book I’m not sure if this one exactly fits the bill as one might expect. If you wish to read a character study about a vampire and a woman dealing with grief, then this will be up your alley.

*Thank you so much to NetGalley and Dutton (Penguin Books) for the digital copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

Thirst is split into two parts - the first half is told from the POV of an unnamed vampiress who flees to the wild frontier of Argentina as it was first being colonized by the Europeans. The second half is set in modern Buenos Aires by a single mother dealing with the recent separation from her ex, raising her son, slowly losing her mother to a degenerative disease, and uncovering the family secret, which ties the lives of the vampiress and the woman together.

Honestly, I liked the second half more than the first part - there was a lot more emotion and character development - intentional, I think, because the vampiress is designed to be a rather static undead character. This is yet another book that I thought was good but could've benefitted from being longer. I wanted to know more after the women [redacted spoilers] but that's also just a sign of a well-written book.

Thirst releases on 03.05.2024.

Thank you NetGalley for providing this ARC in exchange for an honest review! I’m a big sucker (pun heavily intended) for anything and everything vampires, so obviously I was eager to read Thirst!

What I loved most about this book is just how bestial our vampire is - she is not your run of the mill, sparkly vampire who attempts to blend in with mortals. Instead, Thirst follows a vampire who embraces her predatory nature, taking not only what she needs but what she wants.

The first half of the book begins with our unnamed vampire fleeing her former life of excess in Europe to Buenos Aires to forge a new life in parts unknown. The city is in it’s infancy, the perfect location to hunt without repercussions. We follow her as the city grows around her and eventually battles a horrible plague of yellow fever. The burden of immortality eventually takes its toll, and our vampire secludes herself in a coffin within a mausoleum to sleep the ages away.

The second half of the book didn’t grip me quite as much as the first, as we follow a woman in modern times who’s dying mother gives her keys to an old mausoleum and insists she is not to open it…

All in all, I loved this book - despite not enjoying the second half quite as much as the first, the way the two halves merged at the end was a satisfying conclusion! There were so many themes (womanhood, mortality, religion, melancholy) that were handled with such beautiful prose. I’m crossing my fingers that more of this authors work will be translated!

**SPOILERS**
The only piece of this story I struggled with was our modern MC deciding to leave her son behind to live an immortal life with her vampire lover. It seemed to contradict the protective mother we are introduced to. I found it rash to all of a sudden decide that your son has been “pulling away from you since the day he was born.”

Two women. Two times. Two species. Thirst by Marina Yuszczuk is a romance novel like I haven’t read before. Beautifully translated by Heather Cleary, this is a character study done on a bloody backdrop. Buenos Aires was not prepared for either of them. And I’ll be honest, neither was I. You can sink your teeth in on March 5th when this releases from Dutton.

I want to begin, as the novel does, with our vampire. She is… inhuman. That sounds like a given, I understand. But I was impressed. Yuszczuk truly embraced the otherness of the vampire as character. No, embrace isn’t even the right word. She delighted in it. I had so much fun reading some pretty unhinged scenes. I love when an author goes past my expectations. And this vampire? She went past them. And then kept going.

But, interestingly, she also stops. I debated discussing this detail in this review, but I don’t think it’s really a spoiler. It is advertised as being told “across two different time periods,” after all. But someone asked me about this and I’ve been mulling it over. It is across two times, but they are sequential. Maybe it’s my own bias as a reader, but I expected more of a back-and-forth. Choosing not to do that resulted in, to me, almost a feeling of two novellas tied together.

I don’t mean that in a negative way. I actually think it was kind of brilliant. It means we as the reader fully know both sides of our pairing before their stories connect. It also further highlights the stark differences between our blood-lustful vampire and our grieving human. Personally, I don’t believe that contrast would be as impactful if we’d been skipping between their timelines. It’s like how cold water can feel warm after being in even colder water. The differences become highlighted in comparison.

Which brings us to our human character. Grief horror has become one of my favorite subgenres. And her story is quintessential grief horror. She’s losing her mom. And if you ever wondered how agonizing a slow death can be, this will get you close. But it goes so much deeper than that. She’s divorced and struggling with being a single mother. She’s hitting a wall at work for the first time. This is a woman losing her place. She’s losing her self. And what she really needs is something to hold on to. Some thread to follow back to steady ground.

That thread of course leads to a certain vampire. Again, this is not a plot spoiler. It would actually be quite difficult for me to spoil this book. The magic happens in the reading. It’s in the journey. I went in not knowing much at all, as I am wont to do, but I can’t see how knowing something in the official synopsis would harm this experience. That’s one of my favorite things about the whole “no plot, just vibes” descriptor some books get. It can’t be diminished by a little information.

I think this is a must-read for any vampire fan. But I also think even non-horror readers could find something in these pages. Yes, there is a lot of blood. And there are quite a few explicit scenes. But I never felt fear. And while I do believe fear is a secondary emotion in the best horror novels, I understand some people don’t like to be scared. This one is described as genre-blurring for a reason. It has the cadence of literary fiction. Just you know, with more sacrilegious violence.

I wanted more and was left underwhelmed. Too much telling vs. showing, not the romance that I thought I was going to get.