Jack Harbon

Desires Darkly

Lauren Sullivan

This is one of those novellas that you finish and then wonder what the heck you just read. I’d never read erotic horror before so I wasn’t exactly sure what to expect, but it’s pretty much what it says on the tin. Imagine your usual abandoned summer camp horror flick, except in this case the main character screws Jason Voorhees.

“He’s real,” she said, the corners of her mouth wet with saliva. “He’s real. He killed them. You have to help me. We have to go.”

Without going into too many spoilers, there is, of course, a reason for why Nathan’s at the closed camp (and why he doesn’t get murdered) that forms a basis for the romantic portion of the story, along with some thoughtful work to deal with the moral issues. Nathan’s an entirely sympathetic character, and the beginning of the book was particularly wrenching. I’m not sure I completely agreed with Nathan’s reasoning, but for such a short novella, it was very well-done. And I’m always a sucker for two traumatized people finding love. This author usually tackles issues having to do with racism and trauma, and it’s no different with this novella. There’s also a good balance between the horror and romance aspects, and the way they intersected was well done. And while I think the author categorized this as erotica rather than romance, there is a HFN.

Overall, this isn’t my cup of tea, but it was a thought-provoking read.

I received an advance review copy of this book from BookSprout. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Content notes: (view spoiler)[suicidal ideation (including intent to commit suicide), death of a parent (in the past), bullying (in the past), racism, homophobia, murder, extreme gore and violence, grief, PTSD, police brutality (hide spoiler)]

Desires Darkly

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