Antonia Bernardin

My 82nd read of the year was Vicious Fae by Caroline Peckham and Susanne Valenti, the third book in the Ruthless Boys of the Zodiac Series, set in the same world as Zodiac Academy but slightly before the timeline of the series.

You can read my review for book one: Dark Fae here

and book two: Savage Fae here

Obviously, as this is book 3 out of 5, there might be spoilers for earlier books in the series in this review.

Plot summary attempt

Elise continues her investigation, following her suspicions about the school’s therapist and how she’s tied to the Black Card, as she lowers her guard around the Kings and starts to truly believe that none of them are suspects. She discovers why Gareth was blackmailing Gabriel and what he needed the money for. The four kings and Elise take a trip to Zodiac Academy on a supposed student exchange but really it’s just an elaborate plan to get Dante in front of Lionel Acrux to induct him into the Dragon’s guild. While there they follow one of Gabriel’s visions to Lance Orion, who they think can help them with whatever dark magic spell the Black Card is using to steal fey’s power. The King’s all start to find out about who Elise really is and what she’s doing at Zodiac Academy and they come together to help her investigation and to take down the Black Card, even if Elise isn’t so sure that the cult is responsible for Gareth’d death. As her investigative threads are solved one by one, she starts to believe she will never figure out how Gareth died and all this is made worse by Leon not taking the news of who she is very well.

My thoughts

This book was very much a run on from the previous and they didn’t feel particularly distinguishable, like, I’m not even 100% sure I separated out those plot points correctly (although I listened to them back to back so that may be why). I did enjoy this book but I’m honestly starting to get frustrated with the tiny pieces of the true story that we’re getting and I’m getting quite impatient now! I really liked how her relationship with the King’s progresses in this book and that they are gradually accepting how Elise wants things to go (except Gabriel). The ending was super shocking and if there wasn’t other books I had used my credit for I would have gone straight onto the next!

Look, at this point, I’m in it until the end now, I really want to find out what happened to Gareth and how it will all wrap up!