reverse harem – Past Midnight Book Reviews & More

My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Spice: 🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️🌶️

Title: The Never List (Never List, #1)

Author: Jade Presley

Format: ebook (kindle unlimited)

Pages: 417

Publication Date: 4/1/25

Categories: Fantasy, Romance, Reverse Harem, Why Choose

The four princes of Lumathyst need a mate, and everyone wants a chance…except for her.

Threatened by invaders, the kingdom of Lumathyst is on the verge of chaos, and no one can stop it. Unless the four immortal god-princes find their fated mate―and safeguard the throne―Lumathyst will fall.

Five women have tried. Five have failed. And tonight in the royal city, the princes need to find their Chosen and hope she can survive the transformation that will make her immortal.

Only Rylee Gray wasn’t supposed to be here. She snuck in for her own dark reasons―and now they claim they’ve found their perfect match. Her. Of course, they have no idea she’s concealing a secret big enough to damn them all.

The four princes have no choice. They’ll use every delectably wicked skill they have to make Rylee fall for all of them…or watch their kingdom collapse.

Content Warning:

+ One woman, Rylee Gray, is chosen by one of the four Lumathyst princes, to go through a trial and see if she can survive turning immortal. Though this had more smut than plot, I did appreciate that Rylee did face some challenges on her journey to becoming the chosen one.

+ If you like smut, this one has a lot of it. It’s a “why choose” trope or basically reverse harem. There is one of her and four of them and Rylee enjoyed ALL of them. Literally. Sometimes two at the same time. So smut lovers this one is for you!

+ I did like the twist at the end. Throughout this story Rylee is sort of looking for her lost sister. I say sort of because it’s the princes who are supposedly looking for intel on her. There is more information about her at the end of the story.

~ I think Rylee spent the most time with Kal, who became my favorite only because she took time bonding with him and I felt out of all the guys – the romance between them is genuine. All the other guys were rushed. I think her favorite is Jax, but though there was tension between them from beginning to end, her moments with him (and the others) were rushed.

~ This was heavy on the spicy scenes and I thought the world-building was too light. Also she’s going through a trial with each prince to see if at the end she is “the one”. She’s with them for a mont but she fell for each prince fairly quick and there were no challenges there except for Jax and his dad, who constantly gave her problems. I mean I’m glad they all love to share her and she loves to be shared – but I wanted a bit more depth with the story.

~ I didn’t really connect to Rylee, i just wanted more from her character but I did think Mirren was a fun character. Would have liked to know Rylee’s friends bit better too.

Final Thoughts:

Even though this was more smut than plot, I read it fairly quick just because I wanted to see the difference in the princes and how she interacted with them. Unfortunately she didn’t spend lots of time with them equally – which is why I like Kal the best but I feel like that wasn’t fair to the other guys. I would have loved more world-building, more time with each prince and more from Rylee’s character. If you like spicy, reverse harem romances without heavy world building, then you will enjoy this one.

Book Links:

Goodreads | Amazon | Barnes & Noble

My Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️💫

Title: Thorn Kissed and Silver Chains (#1)

Author: Shannon Mayer and Kelly St. Clare

Format: ebook (KU)

Pages: 271

Publication Date: 11/28/22

Categories: Romance, Fantasy, Series, Faerie, Reverse Harem

A continuation in the world of Honey and Ice . . .with new characters, new loves, new enemies . . .

Underhill is my ruthless mother. Her realm is my deadly home. The brutal creatures here are both foe and friend.

But the group of fae that just attacked me? They’re all foe. Dragged from my game of hide-and-seek with a dragon, and my home of twenty-one years, I’m thrust into a weak, ugly realm.

Earth.

Something is taking the fae children of the Irish court, and an Oracle has declared I must find them. Nope. Not my problem. Bye. Except a three-year-old girl they suspect is the next Queen of All Fae was taken too. She’s crucial to the success of my mother’s work and the wellbeing of all, including these simpering fae who’ve forgotten who they are.

Now they have my attention.

The child-snatching darkness flickers in and out of sight, spreading in secret, reaching through cracks and fissures to seize and steal the innocent. Yet I earned each breath in my life by understanding that which seeks to kill me. I will learn the ways of this enemy and find its lair, ideally without the Seelie and Unseelie males who only slow me—even if they’re not quite as stupid as most Earth-dwelling fae.

All I’m sure of is that Underhill is testing me. My mother is testing me in her typical, brutal fashion. And I will not fail.

Well, I wasn’t planning on reading this spin-off but I was bored and wanted to make use of my Kindle Unlimited subscription so why not! Plus I did enjoy Honey and Ice series a lot. So here is what I thought:

+ Our main character is nameless until one of her potential love interests names her Silver. She is feral and her mother is Underhill. If you read the Honey and Ice series you would know who/what Underhill is. Anyway, Silver is not anyone to mess with, she is powerful, strong, brave and reckless but it’s fun to see her kicking butt.

+~ There is a reverse harem situation or menage a trois thing going on with Silver, Aaden who is a Seelie Fae and Cormac, who is an Unseelie Fae. Honestly didn’t know this going into the story, because I was definitely rooting for bad boy Cormac but it seems like for now she’s vibing with both guys. Thing is, I’m not the biggest fan of reverse harem but at least there isn’t five guys for her to choose from, two I can deal with. I’m not sure how I feel about the ending of this book yet – but it’s definitely not what I expected.

+ This is a very quick read at under 300 pages long. It’s definitely pure escapism especially if you love the world of Faerie. By the way I loved her bat companion Orry, she’s funny, she’s my favorite character I think.

~ I really need to know what the deal is with the thorns. There are so many questions and no answers yet.

~ Silver is feral and speaks that way. She doesn’t speak in long sentences until later in the book when she all of a sudden does? I kind of felt like that was distracting because then she reverted back to simple speech. That threw me off.

~ If this is a reverse harem/menage give us some steam. This one definitely is only a teaser of things to come. But there was always something stopping these three. Aaden is okay – he doesn’t intrigue me much. Cormac, definitely is the one I wanted her to end up with but I guess the theme of this book is “balance”…so we will see what will happen with this threesome.

Tropes: feral girl, reverse harem

Why you should read it:

you liked the Honey and Ice series
there is a reverse harem romance brewing with a feral girl, alpha male and a sweet male

Why you might not want to read it:

not into any mentioned above

My Thoughts:

I found the start of this series quite entertaining but I’m not sure how I feel about the romance aspect of it yet. I like Silver and her being feral, but it would be nice if she stayed in character especially with her speech. Orry was my favorite part of this book for sure. I’ll definitely give book two a try and see what happens after the cliffhanger ending we got in this book.