Curses Keys and Secret Societies – Past Midnight Book Reviews & More

My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Spice: 🌶️🌶️

Title: Curses, Keys, and Secret Societies (Sisters of Light and Shadow, #2)

Author: Breanne Randall

Format: eBook (NetGalley)

Pages: 384

Publication Date: 5/26/26

Publisher: Dell

Categories: Contemporary Fantasy, Romance, Paranormal, Series

Disclaimer: **I received this book free from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own.**

Thank you to Dell for giving me a chance to read this eARC in exchange for an honest review!

Dark secrets. Deadly choices. A destiny that can’t be outrun. Welcome to Shadowcraft Academy.

Eléa Deniz has dreamed of her home in the French countryside for the last four years after nearly dying in the Forgotten Forest. But when she finally returns, she finds the estate has become host to the Shadowcraft Academy, an elite graduate school where a world of mysteries and power plays await. It’s there she discovers a secret about her magic that’s not just a threat to the established order, but a prophecy that could change everything. What’s worse, her father is the school’s enigmatic and ruthless headmaster with an agenda of his own—one that could tear their world apart if she can’t find a way to stop him.

As alliances shift and her power is tested, Eléa becomes torn between Alex, her stoic first love whose loyalties are as murky as his past, and the brash, irreverent Logan, who challenges her to see herself in new ways. Faced with her father’s schemes, a secret society, and the weight of her own magic, Eléa must decide: Will she embrace her fate, or fight to reclaim her power and forge her own path? Destiny is calling… and it demands a price.

Content Warning: violence

+ This is book two in the Sisters of Light and Shadow series, book one being Spells, Things and Forgotten Things, which I enjoyed. I didn’t expect book two to go in the direction it went, but I did find it an interesting read.

+ Eléa is back home, after being with her brother Lucien in book one, where he falls for a Lightcrafter. Now with Eléa home in France, she finds that her father has created a Shadowcraft Academy and that she is in enrolled. I was surprised with this direction of the story but I went with it. She takes classes learning how to control her magic and makes lots of new friends. I liked the diversity of the characters.

+~ There is a romance between Eléa and Logan, an American student. But there is a big twist in the romance storyline that I was not expecting at all and didn’t totally love. It’s interesting, for sure, but I thought it was strange why it had to happen that way. But Eléa and Logan do have some fun chemistry and flirting, plus a few steamy scenes.

+ Eléa and her friends are trying to find ways to take down Wraiths and she learns something is different about her magic. There are some secrets about her family and betrayal, with some action here and there.

Final Thoughts:

Overall, I didn’t expect that book two would be an academia storyline and it did help me explore Shadowcraft but I think I still liked book one more than this one. I did like the diversity in the cast, and the flirtation in the romance, but overall I think this one fell a little bit short for me.

Read if you like: