You know when you find a book and the story just engages you and doesn’t let you go until the last page?

That was thirst for me, a classic gothic enchanting story that draws you in and doesn’t let you go.

Thank you Netgalley and Dutton for the ARC!
lit fic + vampires = YASSS

this book is told in two parts: first, the story of a vampire living in buenos aires just being murderous and capital L longing and the second, a woman struggling to deal with her mother’s sever illness.

the writing was so addicting and engaging i couldn’t put it down! i loved how callous and inhumane the vampire was since i feel like most vampire stories try to make you sympathize with them. i definitely enjoyed the first part more because it was just so entertaining seeing what she was gonna do next! i also really enjoyed learning about the history of buenos aires.
the second part was very sad and made me think too much about my own family members possibly falling ill. however, it was so impactful and important. the ending i think brought everything full circle and felt bittersweet in a sense.
i highly recommend this to anyone honestly!!

Thank you to NetGalley and Dutton for the ARC!
This book follows the lives of two women in Buenos Aires who “confront fear, loneliness, mortality, and a haunting yearning that will not let them rest.” One is a vampire who fled from Europe to the coast of Buenos Aires in the nineteenth century, and the other is a young mom in present-day Buenos Aires grappling with her mother's illness.
The first half of the book details the centuries the vampire lived from her origin to present day. I loved the eerie gothic vibe of her story. I reflected on how many people are drawn to darkness and mystery, from the perspective of a dark and mysterious creature.
The second half tells the story of Alma, who is trying her best to maintain some normalcy for her son while she watches her mother decline from a degenerative disease. It is an unflinchingly honest story of grieving a person who is still alive, which anyone who has had someone in their life with a similar disease can understand.
The two women don’t interact until nearly the end of the book so the end of the story feels rushed. I didn’t fully understand what made their pairing so different for the vampire and what motivated Alma’s actions. Perhaps if we had more time for their story together to develop or got the vampire's perspective after meeting Alma, it would have made more sense. All in all, I enjoyed this book. I learned a bit about Argentinian history and it gave me the spooky queer vampire vibes I was looking for.

I always enjoy a gothic horror story with vampires. This story explores mother/daughter relationships, selfish and personal wants. The story is very moody with dark themes and self reflection outlook. It's a short story less than 300 pages and I do believe it accomplishes the goal of telling two women stories who come from different worlds. There were places that slowed a little bit, over all if you are into gothic horror storyline, you would enjoy it.

What immediately struck me about this book is its beautiful prose. The struggles of isolation and grief that both protagonists experience are touching, even if one is not human. I really enjoyed the dual perspective narration of the two main characters. From the prologue, it is clear that the two story lines would intersect, but there points towards the middle of the book that left me wondering how and when that would happen. I found myself wanting more from the crossover when it did happen, though overall it was a very enticing and enjoyable read. I would recommend this book to lovers of gothic horror and dark historical
fiction genres.

I enjoyed this overall, though I was expecting more of the relationship between the two women. I also really preferred the first half. The second half ends up being a meditation on grief in the present day, which might appeal to some readers but wasn't what I was expecting so it threw me off, especially after the wonderfully spooky and tragic first half.

I did really appreciate the history of Buenos Aires and the sense of place is fantastic.

Overall, good look at vampire lore, loneliness, and grief, but not quite what I expected from the summary.

This book pulled me in and didn't let go until the very last page. Extremely riveting, the story kept me on edge (in the absolutely best way).

Two women, one an immortal vampire and the other mortal, meet when both are grappling with their identity in a world that seems set against them.

I enjoyed this book overall and I wasn’t completely sure how the last half felt tacked on to me. I was hoping to see more of the two women together at the end, but the book seemed to stop abruptly before their story together could begin. I really enjoyed the first half of the book, though.

This book does a wonderful job, however, of the search for one’s own identity separate from others. Each woman faces their own ennui, which is interesting in general, but also unique given one of them is a vampire. The loneliness and search for meaning of both women is palpable and relatable.

I may not have liked the end, but this is a good book. It reflects our individual search for meaning outside of ourselves and how some look for something to make them whole.

When this book hits its rhythm, the eerie gothic atmosphere combines together so seamlessly with with Queer femme vampirism and deep longing & loneliness. The plot starts off wildly alluring, with a familiar tale of the brides of Dracula, expanding past the death of Dracula into the cruel fate of one bride's exile from her homeland. Upon granted freedom for the first time in years, she experiences a never-ending wave of emotions, from unbridled bloodlust into searing loneliness.

Her story starts to dissolve in her first non-platonic encounter with a human woman, where the human woman's body is described as "childlike" (which was so nasty and pedophilic). After which the vampire promptly uses her and leaves, going on to sustain relationships (platonic or otherwise) with men. This fixation on male relationships repeats itself for a time, but the reasoning behind the vampire never having a lasting/strong relationship with a woman is simply not there. The vampire's choices could perhaps be a marker of her dark past with her former male master, but that relationship was not reflected on for longer than a page or two in the beginning, so instead we have a flat vampire character who's life is seemingly dominated by men, completely at random.

And then we arrive at the story of Alma, the other main character to this story. Alma's story was heart-wrenching, showing the pain of watching a loved one suffer debilitating illness while balancing the struggles of raising her son. Through moments of beautiful prose, the author shows Alma's loneliness and desire for personhood independent from expectations of motherhood, a stark reflection of the vampire's emotions. But as with the vampire, Alma pushes away her female friendships; thought this could easily be attributed to the grief and trauma she is experiencing, the scene where she cuts off Julia was so abrupt that the impact to the story felt minimal.

To add to that, Alma and the vampire don't encounter each other until the 85% mark, and after their meeting the sequence of events in the book are so rushed that it doesn't feel like readers have a chance to sit with the impact of their strange relationship and subsequent choices.

HOWEVER, I will say that the passage of time in the book is really fascinating; the vampire's half of this book is marked by no markers of years nor days, showing how time can be so fluid and meaningless for an immortal being. In high contrast, Alma's half of the book is heavily directed by day-by-day journal-like entries, adding a more monotonously depressing pace to her story, especially hand-to-hand with her mother's deteriorating health.

Overall, I really liked the ideas within the story, but I wished the ideas had been explored to a deeper extent OR that the story had be pared back to allow for a few concepts to truly shine.

Thirst by Marina Yuszczuk was not at all what I expected, but surprisingly it provided the escape I was looking for and I devoured this novel in a day.

The story is in two parts: the story of a tragic vampire struggling between wanting to hold onto humanity and the thirst of her kind, and a human years later losing her mother. Their stories collide in the most interesting and beautiful way.

There were things I really enjoyed about this novel. The prose was very well written and translated. I was constantly highlighting parts that made me stop and savor the moment.

On the other hand, I struggles with how distant I felt from the story at times. The style used made it feel like a person telling a story not like a person *living* a story and sometimes that created a wall between the emotions of the scene and me the reader.

The description of this story uses the words genre-bending and I would have to agree. I could not at all predict where the story was going. I would say this is the book for those interested in Gothic literature, feminist lit, and a story that will put you in the feels—in all the best ways.

This story gets a 3 out of 5 vampire bites from me.

Thank you to Netgalley and Penguin Group Dutton for the opportunity to read this story for my unbiased review.

set in two different time periods, this book is an absolute delight. I'm always down for sapphic vampires, but often disappointed. This was great though! Really intriguing, sad and hard at times, but well written.

With translated books, things can get confusing at times. Not so with this one. It was translated beautifully.

Europe wasn’t a great place to be early on. A lot of excesses and people behaving very badly. As a woman leaves Europe for Buenos Aires, she is running for her life. Literally. As she steps off the boat in this strange and not so modern town, she has to learn to live without drawing attention to herself. She is angry and lonely and confused. She needs blood and with the Yellow Fever burning through the entire country, she has a lot of bodies to choose from.

In our own time, another woman is struggling with life, her mother’s illness, and even with her own role as a mom.

She has taken to wandering in the cemetery. And in a twist, her mother has given her an envelope with two keys and the deed to a mausoleum at this cemetery. But since her mom is unable to speak, it’s still a bit of a puzzle.

Finally, she takes out the keys and opens the mausoleum. The smaller key opens a casket and when she opens it, she gets a shock. This other woman has locked herself in there for decades. And yes, she is a vampire!

The relationship between the two women kept me reading long after bedtime. It was intriguing and different from anything I have read. And I absolutely loved it.

If this is gothic, I am all in!

netgalley/ Penguin Group/ Dutton March 05, 2024

Enjoyed from beginning to end,a vampire gothic story told in different time lines.So well written a true page turner a gothic adventure.#netgalley #dutton.

One of those books that I definitely skimmed over because it didn’t capture my attention like I hoped it would

A queer vampire grappling loneliness, rage, and thirst in Buenos Aires. A woman coping with her mother’s illness: navigating motherhood and grief.

This novel is divided into two segments, and eventually comes together as their stories intertwine.

I was so enthralled by the writing! Having never any of read Yuszczuk’s previous works, I’m excited to dive in after having read Thirst.

A gothic/horror love story, told from two points of view, one from the past and one from the present.

Read if you're a fan of; vampires, grief

I just reviewed Thirst by Marina Yuszczuk. #Thirst #NetGalley

Thirst opens as a very good vampire novel spanning centuries abroad. I found part 1 to be so readable and interesting. Part 2 takes a sharp turn into a study in grief. While also well written, I found this part to drag as the pace slowed drastically. Overall, I think the book was uneven but enjoyable. Thanks to NetGallery for the advanced copy.

Thank you to NetGalley and Dutton for the ARC!

Needless to say, I loved this book—very short, sweet, and powerful. I wasn't sure what to expect with this type of story; they tend to be contrived and overwrought. Many of the classic vampire tropes remain but with an emotional edge. I was a little skeptical about the ending (the narrator just sort of abandoning her family for a vampire she's known for a couple days isn't exactly original and a little absurd) but it did feel neatly tied up. Overall this is a very entertaining and beautifully written addition to queer wlw vampire lit—all I've read in this angle is A Dowry of Blood and Carmilla—so it's a welcome offering to the genre. I'd recommend it to anyone looking for a quick, erudite vampire read! The English translator did an amazing job.

How fitting that I've finished this book the day before Halloween, although I wouldn't call this scary. It's more of a feminist, gothic horror tale, with quite a bit of gore and sex thrown in. A female version if you may of the vampire Lestat but more gorey, atmospheric, and dark.

As all vampires do, she arrives in Buenos Aires via ship from an unnamed European country where she's been persecuted and her family slain. There are some great paragraphs here to set the mood: "I had only emerged a few times during the journey to feed.It had not been difficult to stalk and seduce my prey: the challenge had been waiting long enough between attacks that the passengers and crew would not notice that someone was eating them."

Upon disembarking, Buenos Aires is soon engulfed in yellow fever, which works in her favor. Able to hide among the dying, she squats in an abandoned house and gets settled. She soon stumbles upon a doctor treating the afflicted and begins a relationship with him, or so he thinks. In his opium induced haze, he doesn't realize she's been feeding on him. "His wavy hair was combed back and had been flattened against his forehead by sweat, heat, and effort. Only his lower lip peeked out from under his moustache, and it was a warm red, like an offering, a proof of carnality trying modestly to cover itself." Things get out of hand and soon she must relocate to avoid capture. She does so in a mausoleum in the center of the city. We never learn her name.

The novel then fast forwards to part two, set in the present day, where we meet another woman, dealing with the imminent death of her mother. Upon a chance meeting, they become obsessed with each other. This woman has a son, Santi, and a father, and 1-2 friends. Due to her mother's condition she feels that 'death is all around her', and has 'taken a seat within her'. She soon starts neglecting all her obligations to begin a torrid affair with the vampire. She then makes a decision that will alter her life forever.

This reminded me of Mariana Enriquez' "Our Share of Night", another argentinian female gothic horror writer. In 'Thirst', however, it's much easier to determine what is going on, but the same atmosphere is there. It's very well written, but does drag in some spots, towards the end of part one. If you want a different type of vampire novel, with a Latin American setting, this could be the book for you.

Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Group for the eARC in exchange for my unfettered opinion.

Perhaps current horror fans somehow missed <I>The Vampire Lestat</i> by Anne Rice, so by making this comparison, I can both support <I>Lestat</i> and illuminate <i>Thirst</i>.

Down with sparkly vampires! Up with moral ambiguity and the gnashing of fangs!

In my opinion the comparison with Lestat is apt: each centers on an immortal blood drinker with a philosophical bent who spends centuries considering truth, evil, value, and meaning, while doing dark deeds in a beautiful, Gothic setting.

In <I>Thirst</i>, we start with a nameless child in a medieval European mountain landscape: a child sacrificed to a monster, and then made into a monster herself. After the villagers storm the castle, killing all of her "sisters" and the creature that sired them, she realizes that she must move, that she has to find a way to adapt to the changes in the world. Before long, she disembarks from a ship into 19th C Buenos Aires, where she hunts and survives, watching to coming and goings of yellow fever, human population, time.

As with Lestat, the vampire kills with brutal carelessness, with sensual care, or with a devilish desire to offend a Christian god. She takes lovers, one of whom betrays her, causing a photograph to be taken –– one of the most feared of trespasses for the vampire.

Meanwhile in present-day Buenos Aires, a woman is caught between caring for her child and caring for her dying mother. She discovers a photography and the key to a long-unopened crypt, and, as one might expect, discovers the vampire.

The first half of the novel, focused on the vampire is a --ahem!--feast of beautiful imagery. Buenos Aires seems like a New Orleans of dark delight; a chamber of commerce couldn't ask for more appealing atmospheric press. The second half, focused on the living, was less compelling to me: the quotidian details and the character's seemingly inexplicable decisions about choosing death over life were not compelling to me.

Nevertheless, this novel is so much more interesting and entertaining than nearly any other "vampire" novel I've read recently, I wish I could prescribe it, like powerful medicine, against anemic genre fiction.