#Castle of the Cursed

[books-to-add-to-your-tbr]

Title: Castle of the Cursed

Author: Romina Garber

Series or standalone: standalone

Publication year: 2024

Genres: fiction, fantasy, horror, gothic, romance, paranormal, mystery

Blurb: After a mysterious attack claims the lives of her parents, all Estela has left is her determination to solve the case. Suffering from survivor's guilt so intense that she might be losing her grip on reality, she accepts an invitation to live overseas with an estranged aunt at their ancestral Spanish castle, la Sombra. Beneath its gothic façade, la Sombra harbours a trove of family secrets, and Estela begins to suspect her parents' deaths may be linked to their past. Her investigation takes a supernatural turn when she crosses paths with a silver-eyed boy only she can see. Estela worries Sebastián is a hallucination, but he claims he's been trapped in the castle. They grudgingly team up to find answers...and as their investigation ignites, so does a romance, mistrust twined with every caress. As the mysteries pile up, it feels to Estela like everyone in the tiny town of Oscuro is lying, and that whoever was behind the attack has followed her to Spain. The deeper she ventures into la Sombra's secrets, the more certain she becomes that the suspect she's chasing has already found her...and they're closer than she ever realised.

[ash-and-books]

Rating: 4/5

Book Blurb:

A delicious and dark gothic romance from bestselling author Romina Garber!

THE HOUSE IS ALWAYS HUNGRY…

After a mysterious attack claims the lives of her parents, all Estela has left is her determination to solve the case. Suffering from survivor’s guilt so intense that she might be losing her grip on reality, she accepts an invitation to live overseas with an estranged aunt at their ancestral Spanish castle, la Sombra.

Beneath its gothic façade, la Sombra harbors a trove of family secrets, and Estela begins to suspect her parents’ deaths may be linked to their past. Her investigation takes a supernatural turn when she crosses paths with a silver-eyed boy only she can see. Estela worries Sebastián is a hallucination, but he claims he’s been trapped in the castle. They grudgingly team up to find answers and as their investigation ignites, so does a romance, mistrust twined with every caress.

As the mysteries pile up, it feels to Estela like everyone in the tiny town of Oscuro is lying and that whoever was behind the attack has followed her to Spain. The deeper she ventures into la Sombra’s secrets, the more certain she becomes that the suspect she’s chasing has already found her . . . and they’re closer than she ever realized.

Review:

Vampires, gothic romance, evil twins, and a haunted house. Estela's life is forever changed when a mysterious incident kills both her parents and 23 other individuals on a train... leaving Estela the sole survivor of the event. Estela has no idea what happened or why she is the only one to make it out alive. She is determined to find out why and when a mysterious invitation from an estranged aunt arrives asking her to come live with her overseas in their ancestral Spanish Castle, la Sombra, Estela agrees. The castle is a gothic, haunted, and mysterious place made only more mysterious when Estela's investigation into her parent's death becomes linked to their past... and a mysterious silver-eyed boy who drinks blood and talks about being trapped in the castle appears. His name is Sebastian and he cannot appear during the day. Sebastian first assumes that Estela is the witch who trapped him but when he realizes she has no idea what he is talking about they reluctantly agree to work together to find the answers into why they are both connected to the house. Yet as they spend more time together a romance begins to bloom... but Estela's family has many more dark secrets than she could have ever imagined and finding the answers to her parents death as well as other family members relationship to her will lead her into a world she never knew... and will ask her if she even wants to know the answers. This was definitely a fun dark gothic romance to read with a touch of haunted house/vampire romance. I love the constant twist and turns in the story and no matter what happened Estela kept digging and trying to find out what happened. Estela was a strong protagonist to read about and she never gave up. I also enjoyed the romance between Sebastian and Estela and how she brought out the best in him while also understood that he would kill for her and that he would do anything to be with her and protect her. It's a great read and one I'd highly recommend for spooky season!

Release Date: July 30,2024

Publication/Blog: Ash and Books (ash-and-books.tumblr.com)

*Thanks Netgalley and St. Martin's Press | Wednesday Books for sending me an arc in exchange for an honest review*

[quirkycatsfatstacks]

Review: Castle of the Cursed by Romina Garber

Author: Romina GarberPublisher: Wednesday BooksReleased: July 30, 2024Received: Own (OwlCrate)Find it on Goodreads | OwlCrate | More Fantasy Book Summary: After a sudden and horrifying attack, Estela is left all alone in the world. Or so she thought. Months later, she receives a mysterious letter summoning her home to a Spanish castle where he aunt lives. It’s safe to say that this is no…

[therubyreader]

Book Bites: Volume 2

Hello everyone, happy Thanksgiving! I hope you all are having a good holiday with your loved ones!  

The Wisteria Society of Lady Scoundrels - India Holton ☆☆☆☆☆ 

I feel like the fact that I not only found but really enjoyed this book is surprising to no one given the premise, 19th century female pirates who commit their crimes from flying houses along with a fun love story, sounds like something written specifically with me in mind. The book follows Cecelia Bassingthwaite, the niece of a prominent member of the Wisteria Society, a league of lady pirates, vying for a seat at the table who gets caught up in a scheme that sees her aunt kidnapped and forms an unlikely alliance with a male pirate who has been ordered to kill her. I absolutely loved this book, the writing style is so creative, a mix of Victorian tone with modern humor, the characters are super interesting, and the satirical use of Victorian etiquette among a group of criminals was super fun to read. The chapter titles were also super creative and funny, if you skim through them then you’re bound to miss some great jokes. Despite its surface level silliness, the book deals with serious topics like grief, love, and the role of women in society in ways that directly add to the story and characters. I absolutely loved reading it and recommend it to anyone who enjoyed Bridgerton and loves fantasy.  

Castle of the Cursed - Romina Garber ☆☆★★★ 

When I came across this book so many months ago, I was super excited to read it as the premise is super interesting, our main character Estela loses her parents in a tragic accident and ends up finding out she has family in Spain who live in a creepy castle where she finds a boy with silver eyes that only she can see, but unfortunately the book fell flat. I absolutely loved the beginning especially with how good of a job the author did portraying mental health issues, but right around the middle of the book it turned into a completely different story, and it was so sudden and jarring that I stopped enjoying it. Right in the middle a magic system and multiple alternate dimensions were introduced with a basis in absolutely nothing before this point and the ending was extremely anticlimactic. If the book just stayed grounded in gothic magical realism, I would’ve enjoyed it so much more than whatever it was that the book turned into. I will give it two stars for the first half, the rest is just not worth it.  

Vampire Academy - Richelle Mead ☆☆☆☆★ 

Though I read these books before, it’s been well over ten years since I’ve picked this up, so I essentially was reading this as it was for the first time, mostly, I still remembered some of the major plot points. This book follows Rose Hathaway, a dhampir, half human half vampire hybrid, protectors of the mortal vampires who can use earth’s magic, called moroi, and her best friend Lissa Dragomir, a moroi princess, who after two years of running away from their vampire boarding school are caught and sent back causing them to experience more trouble than they had bargained for. I watched the movie version of this a couple of weeks ago with a friend and the movie is very much a product of its time so I was worried the book would be too, luckily, I was wrong and besides the lack of smartphones and the fashion choices, it still holds up pretty well. Even with reading a book meant for teens with my adult eyes it still holds up and I enjoyed it almost as much as I did when I first read it back in middle school. Though, if memory serves right, this is the tamest of the books but a solid introduction to the world and the plot thread that goes through the whole series. I did knock a star off for aforementioned tameness and also because as a 24-year-old, reading Dimitri falling in love with a 17-year-old Rose was extra gross and I really could not imagine doing the same. I am going to keep reading this series though as its fun nostalgia and I was glad my middle school fondness for the series wasn’t misplaced.   

[between-the-pages657]

Girl, you’ve known him for what? Two weeks? There’s no way you love him.

[blogthefiresidechats]

Latest haul today...

I had to get out and run a couple of errands today on my day off from work. While I was out, I stopped by my local book store and ended up getting some new books. I knew this would happen after I added another bookcase for my library. I did end up picking up some books that were on my list and found at least one that wasn’t on my list.

[msbibliophage]

I was surprised this was available as the ebook had a long wait list but you bet I snatched it up before someone else did. I have been waiting for what feels like ages for this.

[tanyasreading]

Castle of the Cursed by Romina Garber

[rominagarber]

👀👀👀👀👀 A #coverreveal is coming!!!!! 🏰🩸🇪🇸 #castleofthecursed #rominagarber

[kazz-brekker]

the more we see of harrenhal the funnier it is to me that house strong has produced three of the most normal and reasonable characters on this show, and the fourth is weird in ways that seemingly have nothing to do with having been raised in a haunted castle

[curse-of-dming-strahd]

Oh right... The curse. The curse of Strahd. The curse chosen specially to torture Strahd, Strahd’s curse.

[daisey14]

do you guys understand

[pigeon-princess]

You may be ancient and you may be the land... but I'll be damned if you're not my liege.

I wanted to have a go at designing some outfits for Strahd and Rahadin! I really miss running around Castle Ravenloft and being scared out of my mind interacting with these two.

[dailymirabelle]

Mira using the most effective form of paper craft (throwing her collection of huge horror novels at your head)

(( DAY 5 … MEMORY OF BOOK CLUB CLOBBERING ))

[see-arcane]

Mina: "I screamed when live ammunition pierced through the glass. I suppose I am a coward. Makes sense they don't want my cowardliness around."

Also Mina, after reading that Jonathan screamed and ran when the vampires loomed over him: "He's so brave to have endured this despite how scary it was"

Mina: "I'm such a coward for screaming aloud over a measly little gunshot!"

Jonathan: "Then you think I'm a coward for screaming at the Weird Sisters?" 🥺

Mina: "No, never! How could anyone think so pitilessly of someone in fear for their life?"

Jonathan: :3

Mina: "...Damn it, you tricked me into improving my self-esteem again."

Jonathan: "And I'll do it again <3"

[between-the-pages657]

So was it Antonela or Estela that made a blood pact with Felipe?

Also, I don’t buy the romance between Sebastian and Estela. There’s been absolutely no build up.