Nocturnal Book Reviews

4.5/5
Egalley thanks to Sourcebooks Casablanca
Please, someone, hold me! This book is scorching. *grinning*

If you're looking for pure steampunk, this is not it. Kiss of Steel is a paranormal historical romance with steampunk-ish elements, and oh boy it's done sooo well!

You get a classic trope of a damsel in distress falling on hard times and living in poor areas of London with two younger siblings. However, Honoria Todd is no gentle flower. Her father was an inventor working on a vaccine against vampirism for one of the vampires of aristocracy - Duke of Vickers. When Honoria's father experiments became way too dangerous and Vickers games of cat and mouse with Honoria got more and more twisted, the family fled but not without their father getting murdered.

Now Honoria is hiding in dark and dingy Whitechapel's apartments and dreading the moment when local master of the rookeries, Blade, will come knocking on her door asking to pay him for her protection.

Blade was absolutely fabulous, roguish, seductive, sharp and dangerous. He is a vampire hybrid who's been fighting his descent to madness for a long time and who hates all vampiric aristocracy and especially Vickers, his personal enemy.

He knows that Vickers put a huge price on Honoria's head and tries to keep her close in hopes that his enemy will get close enough for him to strike the Duke. There is plenty of politics, intrigues, experiments and wonderful secondary characters, but most of all, there is this undeniable, crackling with tension chemistry between Blade and Honoria, and this pretty much makes the book.

Of course, there is a bonus of vampire sword duel, but hey, who's counting? *wink*

I think, that fans of Firelight and Moonglow by Kristen Callihan will enjoy Bec McMaster as well.