Category: Reviews

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Epeolatry Book Review: Savage Hearts by J.T. Geissinger

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Title: Savage Hearts
Author: J.T. Geissinger
Genre: Mafia Romance
Publisher: Bramble
Publication date: 22nd April, 2025

Synopsis: The third book in the scorchingly hot mafia romance Queens and Monsters series by USA Today bestselling author J.T. Geissinger, where John Wick meets Romeo and Juliet.

Savage (adjective):
1) Not domesticated; wild and untamed
2) A brutal or vicious person
3) Malek Antonov

He’s a myth. A ghost. A legend.
A Bratva assassin so feared, some won’t even dare to speak his name.

He comes in search of vengeance for the death of his brother, but what he finds instead is me.

A girl he thinks is someone else.
Someone unrelated to the man who killed his brother.
Except I am.

And when he finds out my true identity, he decides to take me as repayment for what he lost.

Now, I’m a little bird trapped in a cage, and the only way to survive is to make friends with the monster who captured me.

But friendship isn’t what the monster has in mind.

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Epeolatry Book Review: Brutal Vows by J.T. Geissinger

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Our reviews may contain affiliate links. If you purchase something through the links in this article we may receive a small commission or referral fee. This happens without any additional cost to you.

Title: Brutal Vows
Author: J.T. Geissinger
Genre: Mafia Romance
Publisher: Bramble
Publication date: 22nd April, 2025

Synopsis: Dark, sexy mafia romance where the fast-paced tension of John Wick meets the high stakes love of Romeo and Juliet.

An Irish mobster with a brutal grudge.
An Italian mafia princess with a dark secret.
Two enemy empires joined in sacred marriage vows.
Let the hating games begin.

Reyna

If this arrogant Irish mobster my brother sold my niece to thinks I’m going to play nice over this arranged marriage BS, he should think again.
I don’t care if this match with the Mob will make my brother capo of the Five Families.
I don’t care how much money, territory, or power it will gain us.
I especially don’t care that the Irishman is the sexiest man I’ve ever seen.
I won’t allow my innocent niece to suffer the same way I did.
Even if I have to kill him.

Spider

I’m supposed to marry sweet, beautiful Lili. So why can’t I stop thinking about her swamp witch of an aunt?
Reyna who hates me. Reyna who challenges me. Reyna with the guts of a Viking, the body of a fertility goddess, and the attitude of a feral cat.
Nothing good can come of what I’m feeling for a woman who’s not the one in the wedding contract I signed.
A woman I want so much, I’ll have to burn the whole world down to get.
If she doesn’t kill me first.

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Epeolatry Book Review: Death at the Playhouses by Stuart Douglas

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Title: Death at the Playhouses
Author: Stuart Douglas
Genre: Crime Fiction
Publisher: Titan Books
Publication date: 18th March, 2025

Synopsis: A second witty, fun, 1970s-set whodunnit in the Lowe and Le Breton mysteries series, featuring two ageing actors attempting to solve a murder after their famous co-star is found dead in a doorway outside the theatre in which they’re performing. Nostalgic cozy crime that’s perfect for fans of The Thursday Murder Club and Death & Croissants.

It’s 1971 and, in between filming seasons of Floggit and Leggit, ageing actors Edward Lowe and John Le Breton sign up for a short run of Shakespearean tragedies at the Bolton Playhouse. But, once in Lancashire, they discover they have been invited to join the theatre’s repertory company for two reasons – because the company manager is keen to take advantage of the publicity surrounding their successful BBC comedy series, and because Sir Nathaniel Thompson, the much-lauded star of the show and knight of the realm, has been sacked for drunkenness.

John fears an awkward scene, should Thompson – who he knew during the war – return to reclaim his job, but when the great actor’s body is found, bludgeoned to death in a nearby alleyway, the unlikely crime-solving duo find themselves investigating another fiendish mystery that takes them from the northwest of England to the Netherlands, and which, rather inconveniently, seems to have John’s ex-wife Sally at its heart.

Death at the Playhouses is the second in The Lowe and Le Breton Mysteries series.

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Epeolatry Book Review: We Like It Cherry by Jacy Morris

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Title: We Like It Cherry
Author: Jacy Morris
Genre: Supernatural Horror
Publisher: Tenebrous Press
Publication date: 31st July, 2025

Synopsis: Ezra Montbanc is burned out. The reality series he hosts—immersing himself into the cultures and celebrations of Indigenous tribes—borders on pure exploitation and has been relegated to tax write-off status by the network; this was not the prestigious journalism career he had long envisioned.
Everything changes when Ezra receives an invitation to document the rites of a mysterious, hitherto unknown tribe: the Winoquin, who reside in the harrowing, inhospitable Arctic. Ezra and his crew depart immediately for the home of the Winoquin, only to find themselves in a bloody battle for survival against a mythical horror with a serious grudge against modern man.
We Like It Cherry is a story about identity and the quest for success, splashed with supernatural slasher vibes and the nail-biting relentlessness of survival horror.

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Epeolatry Book Review: Jake’s Guide to Getting Into Hell by Jake Bannerman

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Title: Jake’s Guide to Getting Into Hell
Author: Jake Bannerman
Genre: Dark Humor / Satirical Horror / Religious Satire
Publisher: Independent
Publication date: 4th April, 2025

Synopsis: Jake’s Guide to Getting Into Hell is a ferocious, no-holds-barred guide for those who have rejected the polished dogma of religion and are seeking something more real, raw, and laugh-out-loud funny. Written with blasphemous wit, it tears apart religious conventions and exposes the absurdities of society’s sanctimonious attitudes. The book uses humor and extreme language to make readers question their beliefs, laugh at their own discomfort, and consider what “hell” really is.

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Epeolatry Book Review: This Skin Was Once Mine By Eric LaRocca

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Title: This Skin Was Once Mine and Other Disturbances
Author: Eric LaRocca
Genre: Horror
Publisher: Titan Books
Publication date: A brand-new collection of four intense, claustrophobic and terrifying horror tales from the Bram Stoker Award®-nominated and Splatterpunk Award-winning author of Things Have Gotten Worse Since We Last Spoke.

THIS SKIN WAS ONCE MINE
When her father dies under mysterious circumstances, Jillian Finch finds herself grieving the man she idolized while struggling to feel comfortable in the childhood home she was sent away from nearly twenty years ago. Then Jillian discovers a dark secret that will threaten to undo everything she has ever known about her father.

SEEDLING
A young man’s father calls him early in the morning to say that his mother has passed away. He arrives home to find his mother’s body still in the house. Struggling to process what has happened he notices a small black wound appear on his wrist. Then he discovers his father is cursed with the same affliction.

ALL THE PARTS OF YOU THAT WON’T EASILY BURN
Enoch Leadbetter goes to buy a knife for his husband to use at a forthcoming dinner party. He encounters a strange shopkeeper who draws him into an intoxicating new obsession and sets him on a path towards mutilation and destruction…

PRICKLE
Two old men revive a cruel game with devastating consequences…

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Epeolatry Book Review: Omniviolence by Jones Worthington

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Title: Omniviolence
Author: Jones Worthington
Genre: Science Fiction
Publisher: Vesuvian Books
Publication date: 25th February, 2025

Synopsis: Jackson Cross kills strangers with nothing more than a drone and a computer in exchange for crypto—all from his mother’s basement.

When his accounts are scythed, and he’s pegged at the top of the most popular slaysite, Jackson is ejected from his virtual comfort zone and forced to go on the run.

Joseph “Bones” Carboni is an old-school mafia hitman with a lot of demons and one big problem: he’s developed a conscience. When tasked with slaying fifteen-year-old Jackson, Joe breaks rank. Now, he must decide if playing the hero is worth having a target on his own back.

Attacked from all sides and struggling to survive in a world where your elderly neighbor or an angry kid on social media can be your executioner, neither Joe nor Jackson realize they’ve become entangled in a global power struggle that could change what it means to be human.

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Epeolatry Book Review: Splitter by Stu Croskell

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Title: Splitter
Author: Stu Croskell
Genre: Military Thriller; Crime Action; Mystery Action
Publisher: Severed Press
Publication date: 8th January, 2025

Synopsis: When a deadly marine creature escapes AUTEC, the US Navy’s top-secret Bahamian research facility, retired Navy SEAL, turned marine biologist, Jack Tarr, is called back into action. Reluctantly leading a team of SEALs, Jack embarks on a perilous pursuit across the Caribbean, through the treacherous Florida Keys, and into the stormy Gulf of Mexico.

But the hunt takes a dark turn when Jack uncovers a shocking link to his best friend’s mysterious disappearance. As the terrifying creature pushes the team to their limits, Jack must navigate a web of Navy secrets and confront a horrifying truth—one that could shatter everything he thought he knew about loyalty, survival, and the ocean’s darkest depths.

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