Bride

She was never anyone’s first choice—until him. Now she’s greedy for a love she never believed she could have.

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What Is This Book About?

Misery Lark has always been the expendable one. As the daughter of the most powerful Vampyre councilman, she was sent to live among humans as a child—a political pawn in a centuries-old game. Now, she's being used again: ordered into a marriage with Lowe Moreland, the Alpha of the Weres, to solidify a fragile peace between their warring species.

But Misery has her own agenda. Her best friend, Serena, has vanished, and the only clue points to the Were pack. Agreeing to the marriage isn't about diplomacy; it's about getting inside their territory to uncover the truth.

Lowe is everything Misery expected: formidable, commanding, and deeply suspicious of his new bride. Yet, as they navigate their uneasy alliance, Misery discovers layers to Lowe she didn't anticipate—layers that challenge her mission and her heart.

As secrets unravel and tensions rise, Misery must decide where her loyalties lie. In a world where trust is a luxury and love is a risk, can a Vampyre and a Were find common ground—or will their union ignite the very war they sought to prevent?

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“You think, but you don’t know. You don’t know anything about what it’s like to find your other half, I would take anything she chose to give me—the tiniest fraction or her entire world. I would take her for a single night knowing that I’ll lose her by morning, and I would hold on to her and never let go. I would take her healthy, or sick, or tired, or angry, or strong, and it would be my fucking privilege. I would take her problems, her gifts, her moods, her passions, her jokes, her body—I would take every last thing, if she chose to give it to me.” - Lowe

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Quick Facts

• Title and Author: “Bride” by

  Ali Hazelwood

• HEA: Yes

• Tropes: Alpha male, fated mates, enemies to lovers, forced proximity, found family, he falls first, knotting.

• POV: FMC (brief MMC POV at start of each chapter)

• Trigger Warnings: Child neglect (past), attempted murder, kidnapping.

• Books in Series: 1 book as of 5/3/25 (Book two comes out in Oct 2025)

• Overall Story: ★★★★

• World Building: ★★★

• Character Development: ★★★★

• Plot: ★★★★

• Pacing: ★★★★

• Spice: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️

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My Take (Minor Spoilers)

I found Bride in the best possible way: a friend said to me, “You have to read this.”

I’m glad I did.

This is Ali Hazelwood’s first foray into paranormal romance (PNR) after building her name in contemporary, and I hope she keeps going. Bride is fast-paced, emotionally satisfying, and delivers exactly what I want from this kind of story. Fated mates, enemies to lovers, political marriage of convenience—only now it comes with vampires, werewolves, bloodlust, and scent-marking. So. Upgrades.

Let’s meet our main characters:

Misery Lark is a Vampyre with daddy issues and a mission. She’s spent most of her life as an outcast, living among humans as the “collateral” and conveniently forgotten by her councilman father. But when he calls her back after five years of silence, she’s handed a political marriage to the new alpha of the Weres, Lowe Moreland. Misery agrees—but not for peace. She’s searching for her best friend, who’s gone missing, and “L. Moreland” is the only lead she has. So she consents to the marriage, packs up her sarcasm and secret agenda, and heads straight into enemy territory.

Misery is easy to root for as a heroine. She’s a hacker, has a childhood full of trauma, and the kind of humor that feels like armor. She’s soft and sarcastic, competent and awkward, someone who second-guesses her feelings but never stops moving toward what matters. Her relationship with Lowe’s little sister Anna is so sweet, while her growth in the relationship with Lowe is quiet, earned, and satisfying.

Lowe is everything you want in a reluctant-alpha hero: powerful, emotionally guarded, loyal to his pack, and low-key feral the moment Misery enters the room. He doesn’t trust her. And definitely doesn’t want a Vampyre in his space. Except... he kind of does. Because Misery is smart, weird, unpredictable, and funny as hell. And no one’s ever said “no” to him the way she does.

The book is in Misery’s POV, but we do get little glimpses into Lowe’s head at the start of each chapter—usually one sharp, perfect line that hints at how hard he’s falling for her while she remains mostly clueless. Is it enough? For me, yes. Would I have loved full MMC chapters? Also yes. But what we get from Lowe is still delicious: obsessive, protective, deeply respectful, and emotionally confused enough to be hot.

One of the things that sets their relationship apart from the start is how they don’t respond to each other in typical PNR fashion. Usually, the MMC is clearly obsessed with how the FMC smells—like it drives him wild from the moment they meet. But Misery thinks Lowe hates the way she smells. It gets in her head so much that she starts obsessively bathing anytime she might see him, trying to scrub off whatever it is that’s so offensive. Of course, we eventually find out why her scent bothers him—and no, it’s not because she actually smells bad.

I also appreciated how the leads are fundamentally different people with unique instincts, needs, and cultural baggage. They don’t magically overcome that with one good hookup. They talk. They screw up. They apologize. They try. There’s this beautiful moment when Lowe says, “Maybe you’re not meant for me the way I’m meant for you, but I’m going to choose you anyway, over and over and over again.”

I mean, how can a gal say no to that? I ask you.

This story is a slow burn, with most of the heat landing in the second half—but when it hits? It hits. The scene where he marks her with his scent? Hot. The one where he tastes her on the closet floor after bringing her to release in the bathtub? Scorching. And when they finally consummate things? No notes. The spice is intimate, emotionally charged, and tied directly to character development. There’s also knotting—which, judging by some of the reviews, came as a bit of a shock to Hazelwood’s contemporary romance readers. But for those of us who devour PNR kinks? Bring. It.

If you’re in a slump, Bride might be the thing that pulls you out. It’s fun, sexy, emotionally sincere, and full of tropes done with a wink and a little polish. You’ve got a cranky werewolf trying not to fall in love, a Vampyre bride with a hidden agenda and a surprisingly tender core, and the kind of mutual pining that makes your stomach flip. Hazelwood took her signature formula—science nerds, obsessive MMCs, emotionally overwhelmed heroines—and dropped it into a paranormal world with blood, politics, scent-marking, and claws.

It works. I want more. And thankfully, book 2 in this series comes out in October.

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“My smell. Do I smell like…?”

“Mine.” It’s a rumble in his throat. “You smell like you’re mine, Misery.”

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