Krvistrážca

Old Erth #1

by Cecy Robson, Jana Kyseľová (Translator)

Sto rokov. Desaťtisíc gladiátorov. Jeden z nich dnes povstane.

Leith dúfal, že boj v gladiátorskej aréne mu prinesie dostatok zlata, aby mohol zachrániť svoju umierajúcu sestru. Myslel si, že nemá čo stratiť. No obrali ho o nádej, slobodu i ľudskosť. Keď stretne elfskú princeznú Maeve, všetko sa zmení. Zvodná princezná mu totiž ponúkne šancu získať vytúžený titul krvistrážcu – a svoju slobodu. V kráľovstve, kde vládnu tajomstvá a lži, ho však môže i nádej a pomsta stáť úplne všetko…

Genres: Fantasy, Romance, Romantasy, Fantasy Romance, Fiction, Audiobook, Adult

480 pages, Hardcover

First published October 22, 2024

About the author

Cecy Robson is a New York Times, USA Today, and international bestselling author.

As an immigrant of El Salvador with proud Nahua Pipil indigenous heritage, Cecy worked as a registered nurse for twenty-three years and is honored to have received multiple accolades for her writing. In her free time, Cecy creates magical worlds, heart-stopping romance, and young adult adventure.

You can find Cecy laughing, crying, and cheering on her characters as she pens her next story.

Connect with Cecy online at www.cecyrobson.com

Reviews

[Ayesha the Great 🍉 (Barbie's Version)]

why am i so intrigued by the fact that the mc is a dude and not a 17 year old girl called Ariella? Maybe I want hot women love interests instead (if he swings that way ofc)

[Krysta ꕤ · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 ☆

”I thought I lost you.” I breathe her in. “Never,” she whispers. “Not until the sun casts its last ray and the moon bids the sky farewell.”

a gladiator - type romantasy told mainly from the mmc’s pov sounds great in theory but the execution was very lackluster. Leith is a gladiator who fights in these tournaments in order to up his rank and earn money to help save his sister’s life. Maeve is the princess of Arrow who sees an opportunity in proposing a marriage arrangement to Leith, which will help her hold her position as the future ruler. the dialogue was childish and i think the writing itself could’ve used some work. there was a huge hole where the world building should’ve been, this could’ve been set in Kansas and the story would’ve been the same. Leith and Maeve’s interactions were insta everything and there was no buildup to anything with them, they fell in love in the blink of an eye. i think the fight scenes had potential but i found them kinda hard to follow. i wouldn’t say i hated this cause it was easy to read but i did start getting bored halfway through and it felt way longer than its actual 430 page length.. main word for this: mediocre.

[Iqra]

The blurb is giving Male MC single pov and I’m downnn 🤭 the only time I’ll care about a guys pov is if it’s in books sns.

[Maeghan 🦋 · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF at page 165 of 430.
This was a big miss for me. The execution was lacking, the fighting scenes were excessively boring, the writing was juvenile, the plot was mainstream…

With all of this said, the biggest problem for me was the execution. The premise made me believe that we’d get more of the MMC’s life before he’d be insta-lusting on the FMC. But unfortunately, the ‘eye fucking’ (actual words used) starts under 30 pages. Someone dies and you don’t really care because you just met him and the author told you they were friends but you only see 2 interactions between them.

The writing was lacking in many departments and mostly took me out. The word ‘fuck’ is used profusely but when they’re talking about sex, it’s : ‘screwing’ lol. Pick a lane. I cringed so many times.

I was lead to believe this was a Fantasy with a romance subplot - this is very false. It’s a Romance with a dash of Fantasy. And cherry on top! The romance was truly one of the worst I’ve read this year. Well… to be fair - anything that starts with insta lust has no redeeming chances for me.

I think it’s important for me to say that I had high expectations for this. It sadly missed the mark.

PS : I couldn’t help but picture the MMC as a disgusting man who can’t take no for an answer.

[dani ♡]

UPDATE #4: delayed yet again until october.. was so excited to read this but with it continuing to get delayed idk anymore

UPDATE #3: delayed again until june.. not quite sure why

UPDATE #2: my preorder got pushed back to april delivery so i think release got pushed again?? — amazon shows april 16th now!

UPDATE: the fact we aren’t getting this book until march now is killing me. i’m so so interested in reading this since it’s from the male’s pov 😩

i may or may not have preordered because of the sprayed edges and the cover but nonetheless, still excited to read it :)

[Michelle · Rating 2 out of 5]

Oooh boy. This one just about broke me. This one will be long. Apologies in advance. Also - this is all my opinion. Yours might differ, and if that's the case, that's great for you! I'm happy that you enjoyed this book! Unfortunately, and to my great misfortune, I did not.

I want to preface this review by saying this should have been a slam dunk. A fantasy romance inspired by Gladiator, one of my favorite films ever made (yes I know it's not historically accurate, I'm a historian, but unfortunately I choose to love it anyway, leave me alone)? I should have loved this. Unfortunately, I don't. I want to also add that this is in no way intended as a personal attack against Robson - I don't know her, she could be a perfectly lovely person and I'm sure she has written some excellent books. I just don't think this one is quite there yet, and given the number of delays on this book, it's a damn shame.

I'm going to start by talking about what I DO like about this book. Unfortunately, all of these things were not enough to save this book for me.

This story has a very interesting premise. I love the idea of the brutality of gladiator games and the politics of ancient Rome being brought into a fantasy setting. There's a lot of potential in a story like that. I wish it had been executed better, but we'll get there.

I do love the glimmers of social and political commentary that Robson has sprinkled through this story. There is definitely commentary throughout on class, social, and political disparity and inequality. The act of closing borders to those who seek a better life is openly discussed. This is all the stuff I appreciate and expect in a work of fantasy worth its salt. There just isn't enough of it.

I also appreciate Robson's day job as a nurse is being put to work here. She's very good at describing injuries and making them feel realistic. She's using that medical knowledge, and I appreciate it because those moments were genuinely highlights for me. She's also pretty good at describing action sequences.

The third-act event (I am being intentionally vague to avoid spoilers) was pretty well rendered and I felt like the book kicked things up a notch and regained my interest in actually finishing it. It is directly out of Gladiator in tone, placement in the story, and its attempt at emotional impact, but given that movie is one of my top 10 favorites ever made, I probably liked it because it reminded me of how much I cry like a baby at that movie every time I watch it, not actually on its own merits.

Now onto the stuff I struggled with - or outright disliked. It's a lot. I'm sorry.

I'm sorry to every person who prefers first-person narrative but it's bad. This book suffers so much for it - but even more than that first-person present tense is genuinely one of the worst ways to write anything. It's genuinely painful to read because NOTHING feels organic in the writing of it. Not only is it cringe (I loathe cringe culture but here we are), but scenes where the author is trying to convey intense emotion end up just reading as ridiculous and silly - and leave a lot of detail that I would prefer to see off the page. I know a lot of people prefer to inhabit the mind of the main character in books these days - I don't - but I can often look past the first-person perspective if it's done well. It is not done well here. I spent 90% of the book feeling like everything about it would have been at least a bit better if it was at least in the past tense. There's something about first-person present tense that feels intensely juvenile and half-baked.

A lot of reviews I read leading up to reading this would have me believe that the romance is a side plot. This is false. The romance is the main aspect of the plot. The politics are barely cooked through, there is very little court intrigue, and overall the plot does not satisfy my desire for worldbuilding or give me a reason to care about any of these characters. None of them are fleshed out in any satisfactory way for me, the romance does not have an ounce of chemistry (I'm sorry but I'm tired of instant lust/love and I'm tired of main characters "fighting" their attraction to each other for about 45 pages before they just want to get in bed), and after 400 pages I still could not tell you anything about the world this takes place in besides Seirtos having a plant that is used to make perfume at the cost of the people who cultivate it for export. The map at the front of the book was not useful in any capacity because I learned nothing about this "Old Erth" setting. The romance is the center of this story and it's extremely bland because we see not one scene that convinced me that these characters fell in love over any degree of time. It was like I turned the page and suddenly they were in love.

I also genuinely hated every single sex scene in this book. And before I'm accused of being a prude, I love romance and smut books. I just finished a very spicy lesbian vampire romance that I enjoyed immensely and felt like the sex scenes were well done because intimacy and emotion were conveyed in a way that felt mature, realistic, and thoughtful. These were not. Both perspectives sucked any enjoyment out of them because quite frankly, I hated both of their internal monologues about what they were doing or experiencing in every sex scene. It felt very awkward and not remotely organic. I'm struggling to explain this, but it honestly gives me the impression of the cheesiest, most uncomfortable adult film you accidentally stumbled upon at 14 that was written and directed in the 70s, with the soundtrack to match.

Moving on,

We are told about many other species and races within this setting. I know next to nothing about most of them, most of their cultures, or what the majority of them even look like. About halfway through I started glossing over any names or passages referring to species other than humans and elves because they ceased to feel relevant by that point. There's no cohesion to this world, it just feels like a big old soup pot with everything the author could think of thrown in with no explanation for at least their place in it. Maybe not everyone needs that level of detail, but I do. I like to know how these groups interact with each other, what they have in common, and what they don't.

This extends to character's names. There is almost no rhyme or reason to the naming conventions in this book. I think the only convention I figured out was that ogres most often have 3 letter names. That was about the only thing I gleaned about anyone. I would have appreciated it if there was some passage explaining naming conventions, but instead, it felt like syllables, consonants, and vowels were thrown in a blender for the sake of sounding "fantasy-ish." What I'm getting at - and I hope you've figured out by now after all this - is that there's no world-building. Nothing is explained, and when it comes to fantasy, there is an expectation on my end as a reader that we will get at least some degree of explanation of the "rules" of the world we are in for 400 pages. There was barely any attempt at this, and what was there felt like it was just there for the vibes and didn't feel thought out at all.

I'm kind of running out of steam at this point - I've been writing this review for an hour - and I am just going to close on this: Red Tower Books has gotta get their business together because most of their published novels have been a full miss. I have - to date - only enjoyed the Assistant to the Villain series. I'm giving one more book by them a shot, and if that one is just as infuriating to read as this one, I'm washing my hands of this publisher - except for the aforementioned series, because I do love that one. There is just too little time in life to spend reading subpar books that masquerade as fantasy but are really just romance novels with the dressing of the genre to get people to fork over $32.99 USD for a pretty cover and sprayed edges but none of the substance that that price deserves.

[»-daly (leaving)→ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Disclaimer- I might change my rating bc I’m indecisive

˗ˏˋ ⚠︎ 𝐖𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠: This book includes a crazy amount of trigger warnings and lots of swearing. Some quotes or parts of this review will contain some these themes (but I’ll water it down). This review also contains some tiny, minor spoilers.

“‘𝑾𝒊𝒕𝒉 𝒚𝒐𝒖 𝒃𝒚 𝒎𝒚 𝒔𝒊𝒅𝒆, 𝒏𝒐𝒕𝒉𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒔𝒉𝒂𝒍𝒍 𝒔𝒕𝒐𝒑 𝒎𝒆.’”

🌶️🌶️/5

↳ I struggled rating the spice because there were only three scenes and one suggestive scene, but they were uh… pretty bad. The intensity of them was probabaly a 3.5 or a 4 but there wasn’t much.

+=={:::::::::::::::::>

𝐃𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐥𝐲, 𝐝𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐬, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐝𝐞𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐢𝐨𝐮𝐬

I don’t think I’ve ever described a book as delicious but this was so damn TASTY. I was honestly hooked from the start. I mean, gladiators in a romantasy? Hell yes. This was SO addicting and entertaining.

𝐖𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐄𝐱𝐩𝐞𝐜𝐭

🤍 LOTS of death, violence, and some abuse
⚔️ Dual POV- kinda insta love-y but it WORKS
🤍 Some pretty damn good world building
⚔️ Lots of characters- kinda hard to keep up with
🤍 A bloody masterpiece you can’t put down

“𝑬𝒗𝒆𝒏 𝒊𝒇 𝒔𝒉𝒆 𝒘𝒂𝒏𝒕𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒐 𝒎𝒂𝒌𝒆 𝒊𝒕 𝒑𝒖𝒃𝒍𝒊𝒄, 𝑰’𝒎 𝒏𝒐���� 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒈𝒖𝒚 𝒘𝒉𝒐 𝒃𝒍𝒐𝒘𝒔 𝒌𝒊𝒔𝒔𝒆𝒔. 𝑰’𝒎 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒎𝒂𝒏 𝒘𝒉𝒐 𝒄𝒂𝒔𝒕𝒔 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒍𝒂𝒔𝒕 𝒃𝒍𝒐𝒘.”

𝐈 𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞 𝐦𝐞 𝐚 𝐛𝐨𝐨𝐤 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐚 𝐦𝐚𝐩 𝐢𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐞𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠

I get so excited when I see a map because I take it as a promise of good world building, and that’s what I got. If Im being picky though, it could have been nice to get out of Arrow. Leith only faintly mentioned things abt Grey and I think some further exploration of outside of Arrow would be cool.

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐑𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬

❤️ Leith- 5/5 stars. SUCH A BADDIE UGH STOP
🛡️ Maeve- 4/5 stars. Totally deserving of Leith
❤️ Soro- 2/5 stars. He was a pretty good bad guy
🛡️ Gunther- 3/5 stars. I wanted a lot more of him
❤️ Giselle- 3/5 stars. Her attitude was so relatable

“𝑻𝒉𝒐𝒔𝒆 𝒎𝒐𝒕𝒉𝒆𝒓𝒇𝒖𝒄𝒌𝒆𝒓𝒔 𝒃𝒓𝒐𝒌𝒆 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒎𝒐𝒔𝒕 𝒃𝒆𝒂𝒖𝒕𝒊𝒇𝒖𝒍 𝒑𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒐𝒏 𝑰 𝒌𝒏𝒐𝒘.”

+=={:::::::::::::::::>

𝐃𝐨𝐧’𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐥𝐲 𝐭𝐡𝐫𝐨𝐰 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐬𝐞𝐥𝐟 𝐢𝐧 𝐚 𝐬𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐩𝐢𝐭 𝐰𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐦𝐨𝐧𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬

This reminds me of the matches in the arena. I absolutely ate them UP. The fights were so crazy and Leith fought like a freaking killing machine. But this review is getting a little longer than I intended so I’m afraid it has to come to an end. I would HIGHLY recommend this to any fantasy lovers.

[Bab · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF pg 338 of 430

Man I'm so disappointed. This had such a cool premise, and I absolutely love the idea of a male main character written by a woman, but every single thing about this falls flat.

The author lacked the ability to pull off this type of story. There was no flow or continuity. The whole book was just made up of a bunch of scenes placed together, which made it a very bumpy read. There was absolutely no foreshadowing for anything so it really felt like things were just happening for no reason and coming out of nowhere. The smut sucked too. There were also grammatical errors and the style of writing just did not work for a fantasy of this setting. Kind of hard to believe this was delayed so many times if this is the quality of work you're going to put out. There was hardly any description of the world or the characters which made it hard to imagine it in a fantastical world.

This also brings me to a theory I have; that many romance authors are just jumping on the romantasy train to make a quick buck. They do no real research on how to create the ambiance a magical fantasy world should have and always always throw in modern turns of phrases that just completely take you out of the book.

the characters were cardboard, the setting was drawn in crayons by a toddler, and the plot was a roller coaster of nonsense.

[Paulina Rae · Rating 1 out of 5]

GEEEEEETTTTTT ready for a love story for the ages between Maeve and Leith-rhymes-with-Keith. She’s an underestimated princess with a heart of gold, face of aesthetically pleasing scars, and a broken memory that totes doesn’t hide any damming secrets about how her Grandmother died. He’s a dumb asshole with a hair trigger temper who oscillates between blind rage and (attempting) clever comparisons between his enemies and body parts. Together they will blunder around the kingdom, completely missing major elements in the fight for their world until characters blatantly explain them in little words.

Prepare yourself for writing so stupid that you have to stop and send a screenshot to friends so you aren’t the only one to suffer. On the topic of suffering, the book would be gruesome except for the fact that the carnage is so comical that it can’t be taken seriously. Picture second graders throwing all their toys in a bucket and shaking it. You’ll have a good idea of how the combat in this story goes.

This sweeping mess will encompass boring dialogue, mediocre world building, and a final battle that - I cannot stress this enough - takes the form of a musical chairs game.

I needed a break from Sanderson and wanted something stupid I could read in a day and BOY did I find what I was looking for. Curse my inability to DNF books.

TL;DR This book sucked

[vanessa ⋆.☕︎ [semiᝰia]]

⋆♡⸝💌⊹➴ I kept seeing this book all over Pinterest, and honestly? The posts got to me, so I finally thought, why not give it a try too? The vibe, the aesthetics, the little snippets, they all hinted at the kind of romantasy I usually fall in love with. So here I am, diving in and hoping it gives me exactly what I’m craving: magic, tension, romance, and a world I can get lost in.
Fingers crossed it lives up to the promise. 🤍

[Laura Díaz · Rating 4 out of 5]

Creo que se puede tomar perfectamente como AUTOCONCLUSIVO. De hecho yo lo voy a tomar así.
Me ha gustado bastante, tiene un aderezo de todas las cosas que nos gustan sin pasarse. La dinámica entre los personajes y la forma de narrar me parece moderna y muy muy divertida. Novedoso y, a pesar de tener un par de cositas que me han parecido como muy “oh, qué casualidad”, la historia está bastante bien hilada y con algo que me gusta mucho: no pone freno a la violencia, es muy muy sangriento y a la vez imaginativo en este ámbito. Así que muy recomendado. Tiene un nivel medio-alto de romance pero la trama, historia, ambientación y personajes son muy importantes para no dejar que el romance sea lo principal. Un equilibrio muy bueno.

[Daughter of Paper and Stone · Rating 2 out of 5]

Red Tower Books can’t keep getting away with not having a bloody editor… THEY CANT KEEP GETTING AWAY WITH THIS 👹

[madeline · Rating 3 out of 5]

this was not good enough to justify it being delayed 3 times

[Zoë · Rating 3 out of 5]

first half really had me. second half kinda lost me ?

[Emely Zoe · Rating 2 out of 5]

War ganz ok.
War tatsächlich sehr erfrischend, mal mehr aus Sichtweise des männlichen Protagonisten zu lesen.
Hab einige Rechtschreibfehler entdeckt und durch viele geschachtelte Sätze habe ich mir persönlich teilweise echt schwer getan beim Lesen.
Wer sehr detaillierte Kampfszenen mag, könnte bei diesem Buch aber viel Freude haben!

[Anila]

DNF at 52%

The premise of this book really intrigued me, but I don’t think it was executed very well. I struggled so much to get through this book. It was painstakingly slow. I could never get into the story because of it. There were even some fight scenes in the gladiators’ arena, which you think would be fast paced and full of action, yet somehow those chapters were the most boring for me. The author wasn’t able to describe it in a way that would excite me and keep me on the edge of my seat. It fell flat for me. There were some modern day lingo thrown in at times which took me out of the story too, since it just didn’t feel right in this fantasy world the author had created.

It also doesn’t help that the characters are just carbon copies of other characters we usually see in the fantasy genre. They brought absolutely nothing new. I mean the FMC Maeve was the typical naive princess who thinks she can save her kingdom and that she knows best. And the MMC Leith was the broody man who can wield a sword.
And the romance was basically insta-lust. There was no build-up and they are all in with each other immediately.

This is definitely not the last time I’m going to be drawn by a pretty cover, but I hope the content will at least be better than this.

[amarachireads · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved the gladiator aspect and plot in this. It’s just unique and makes a great backdrop for this romantasy. There is a dual pov in this but the book starts off with a male pov before we get introduced to the fmc. It’s mostly in the mmc’s pov though. The mmc is fighting and has been a gladiator for a while. He’s trying to win and become a bloodguard so he can provide and save his family. He meets the fmc who is a princess and js trying to take back the kingdom from uncle and his son.

The main character fall for each other pretty fast especially after the mmc starts protecting the fmc. They have some cute and steamy scenes but it wasn’t overpowering in the book. There is so much action, magic, magical creatures, political intrigue and secrets in this one and it was good to read though i found myself wanting more with the romance.

[Mel Lenore · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sadly, this did not work for me. I was enjoying it in the begenning, but the further we went, the more repetitive things got and the more it lost me. I think this story really just needed more depth in every way. The plot felt very cookie cutter and the politics never intricate enough for me. The gladiator sections were cool, but involved too little of the story in the end. The romance, once it started, was severe insta love. I also wish the side characters had been more fleshed out. I didn't care about any of the deaths and they weren't impactful because I didn't know the characters well. This book had potential but just didn't deliver

[Christina | christinas.booknook · Rating 4 out of 5]

Bloodguard was such a unique fantasy. This book blends the violence of the gladiator arena with elements of magic, fantasy, and romance.

Leith is a deadly human gladiator, competing to save his family and send money to them he is only a few short battles away from becoming a Bloodguard, a gladiator who has earned riches, freedom, and nobility through their abilities.

Maeve is the future queen to a kingdom ruled by her uncle after the imprisonment of her father but in order to take the throne she needs a husband.

I really enjoyed this story. It was a quick read and I feel like it could have dug deeper into the political intrigue but I enjoyed that this book very much felt like a standalone. There was no big cliffhanger at the end which was refreshing for a fantasy.

Read if you like:
* Political Intrigue
* Engagement of convenience
* Gladiators
* Magical Creatures

[˚₊‧⁺⋆♱ giorgia at scusastavoleggendo · Rating 2 out of 5]

(❁ᴗ͈ˬᴗ͈) ༉‧ ♡*.✧ pre read thoughts !

my currently reading does not have an audiobook. that's not admissible so here i am choosing my side kick book to help my commuting <3

i had this in my tbr since february 2023 so it's finally time to dive-in! the gladiator meets romantasy meets vampires? count me in! i did not saw this one a lot online, i hope it's good :c.

audiobook girlie here ↻ ◁ II ▷ ↺

(❁ᴗ͈ˬᴗ͈) ༉‧ ♡*.✧ review time

˗ˏˋ꒰ 🍒 ꒱ bloodguard drops you straight into a world of violence, magic and power, where survival is earned with blood. leith is a warrior, a gladiator, thrown into brutal pit to fight for his life, while maeve is an elven princess that wants what is her by birth right, the throne. their alliance is full of tension, distrust and scheming, but it soon evolves into something deeper (and a little cringe) as they’re forced to fight for the kingdom and their families.

⋆⁺ ☾🩸₊⋆ i had some mixed feelings regarding this book. the romance leaned more toward instant attraction than a true old slow-burn, which made parts of their emotional connection feel a bit rushed and the smut scene cringed me a lot. i even started to question if i was not into smut anymore. ew. some dialogue felt a little bit overdramatic but the dual pov worked well, and while the world has potential, i wanted more development, something more fleshed out. in the end, it was entertaining but it just fell flat and without heart.

[Lauren Lara · Rating 5 out of 5]

Physically this book is gorgeous! So super gripping & exciting right from the beginning! I didn’t want to put it down. The world building was top notch! Games & Trials! Arranged marriage trope. Slow burn but so perfectly spicy. Betrayal & heartbreak. A beautiful ending.

[Devin The Book Dragon · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF at 42%.

I’m really sad I didn’t love this because it had such an interesting concept and it really started out so good. But after the second arena battle, this book went downhill so fast.

It almost feels like this books was rushed. While the beginning felt polished, the middle felt like a first draft. I know this book was delayed several times and I think the author might have just been trying to get it out. Whatever happened, it did this book a great disservice.

I’ve seen other reviewers say that this felt like random scenes pieced together for no reason and I really felt that. I think the world building needed to be better, and the characters needed to be fleshed out as well.

I think with more time, editing, and polish, and more depth, this could have been a real masterpiece. Really sad about this since I loved the concept, the fact this was a male main character in a romantasy book, and the arena aspect.

[☕️Kimberly (Caffeinated Reviewer) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant Cecy!! Read the book, then listened to the audio. Gladiators, Elves, Mages, Dragons and a steamy romance. I laughed, cried, got angry and cannot wait for more.

[Phoebe ❀ ✩ · Rating 2 out of 5]

RELEASE DAY TMR 🤭 I've been waiting for this literally forever I hope it's good

2.5 stars, disappointment 💔💔 I might change my review after I process my feelings on this one

[Laura]

DNF. This book sounded so good, gladiators and magical beings and romance? Sign me up.

But Bloodguard fell incredibly flat and I just couldn’t do it anymore. It was extremely bumpy and felt as if scenes were just pieced together randomly and weren’t flowing well whatsoever. Not for me at all and I will most likely not be picking it back up.

[Emms-hiatus(ish) · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF @51%

Fun concept, terrible execution. Everything about this falls flat and sex scene - all the cringe!

[Maddie · Rating 3 out of 5]

good, then bad, then alright

[Jena · Rating 3 out of 5]

Decent premise weighed down by crummy writing.

I really like gladiator stories, so I was really drawn in by the premise of Bloodguard. However, most of the book isn't actually gladiator fights, it's political drama. Normally, I get excited when a fantasy book veers into a more political storyline. It didn't work for me with this book though because the initial premise of the story was the only pillar holding the book up. The world building, themes and characters are all so shallow. This world was clearly created hastily, and the politics are a copy and paste of every other YA fantasy to have come out in the last decade. The characters are also walking, talking nobodies, with the same personalities and motivations of every other YA protagonist you've read before.

But by far the worst part of this book for me was the way that the author's writing style and humour clashed with the book's tense and serious moments. There are admittedly some really exciting battle scenes in this book, with high stakes and intense gore. The problem is that these scenes are all narrated by our insufferable main characters who speak like it's 2012 and they work at Buzzfeed. A character will be in the middle of being brutally mutilated and stop to say "Wow, you really put the dick in dictator" or "Received 20 lashes and found out my whole family is dead. Yup, this is definitely winning shittiest day award." It's so incongruent to the tone and themes of the story. Maybe if the quips were funny I could ignore how out of place they are, but they didn't even make me laugh. Normally I just cringed.

It's worth noting that the author's first language isn't English. That being said, none of my issues were with grammar or diction, they were with creative choices.

This book does have some highlights, I won't deny that. The end battle had me on the edge of my seat. But I just couldn't get past the narrative voice.

[Shannon Farley · Rating 2 out of 5]

I think this will be a DNF for me 😕 I was really hoping this would be good but it’s just not building.

I was very interested in the concept this story was building in the first 100 pages but the more I read the less interested I became. This just felt very flat and I couldn’t feel the emotional connection that this story should have.

As always, I didn’t finish so maybe give it a try! You will probably know if you are going to like it by 150 pages in.

[Rebeca SC]

I am excited to read a New Adult Fantasy story with a male MC written by a woman. This is going to be interesting. I'm looking forward to this upcoming release.