User Profile

Katherine Villyard

kvillyard@bookwyrm.social

Joined 8 months ago

Katherine’s parents met singing opera and started taking her to choir practice when she was six weeks old. She attended four elementary schools and four high schools before getting master’s degrees in art and library science. So naturally she works in IT, abusing SQL Server for fun and profit. When she’s not working or writing, she’s probably playing the Sims or spoiling cats. Her greatest ambition is to rule the world.

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Katherine Villyard's books

Currently Reading

Ariel Kaplan: Republic of Salt (2024, Kensington Publishing Corporation)

Ugh, cliffhanger!

In general, I like this book a lot. It loses a star because I feel it doesn’t have a proper ending.

This and the previous book in the series feel a lot like a longer work hatcheted into separate books. I thought it was a longer work chopped in half; apparently it’s thirds?

I finished this on the plane back from Thanksgiving and was apparently grouchy. 🤣 I do love this book. Just not the “to be continued!” non-ending.

Grady Hendrix: The Southern Book Clubs Guide to Slaying Vampires (AudiobookFormat, 2020, Blackstone Publishing)

4.5 stars.

I had a lot of strong emotional reactions to things in this book, which is a good thing. No really, a lot.

I think my favorite part of the book is a trope I really enjoy: what is a monster/the humans are the monsters. Don’t get me wrong! The vampire is evil and scary and menacing. But the husbands! Especially Patricia’s and Grace’s husbands.

Grace’s husband: wife beater. ‘Nuff said. But Patricia’s husband, Carter? Oh my $DEITY.

Carter doesn’t beat his wife. He’s not overtly cruel. The vampire says Carter is cheating on Patricia, but I don’t know if that’s true and am not sure if I care. But his gaslighting and medicalizing his wife and children are horrifying. He manipulates his wife into taking Prozac. He tells her children she’s crazy and they don’t have to listen to her, and as a result they treat her with contempt. He …

Isabel Cañas: Vampires of el Norte (2023, Penguin Publishing Group)

As the daughter of a rancher in 1840s Mexico, Nena knows a thing or two …

Comp Title!

I read this when I was preparing to query [book:Immortal Gifts|215955948]. This ended up being one of my query comps.

This book is a fun horror/romance mashup with a historical setting. I really enjoyed learning about Mexican history as part of reading this book. Despite really enjoying it, it does include my least favorite romance trope, the one where if the lovers just sat down and talked it out everything would be okay. I mean. I get the reasons why they weren't talking, but also... anyway.

Also the vampires are legitimately scary!

I did use this as a comp, because my book is also kinda mashy and has a strong historical element and a married couple at the center. But also, this is just a good book.

reviewed Immortal Gifts by Katherine Villyard (Immortal Vampires, #1)

Katherine Villyard: Immortal Gifts (Flower Feather Press) No rating

He lied about his identity. Two hundred years later, he’s still paying the price…

Prussia, …

I wrote this

No rating

I have a link to content warnings here, if that’s your thing: www.katherinevillyard.com/202...

So, this book. It’s kind of what would happen if you took Interview with the Vampire and crossed it with When the Angels Left the Old Country, perhaps with a dash of The Time Traveler's Wife. Other people mentioned A Discovery of Witches, for the female witch/wiccan character with two moms who is married to a vampire.

Instead of poor depressed Louis, I have an undercover Jewish violinist with a wry sense of humor. His patron, a Bavarian noble second son originally destined for the church, embodies “Immortality is awesome!” Who wants to live forever? The patron, that’s who! The violinist’s mortal wife, that’s who doesn’t!

Death and grief aren’t unusual topics for a vampire book, but if you’ve lost someone it feels like you’re a member of a super sucky club, doing your secret handshakes …

Shelly Jay Shore: Rules for Ghosting (2024, Orion Publishing Group, Limited)

Ezra Friedman sees ghosts, which made growing up in a funeral home complicated. It might …

Did you like my book? You'll like this one!

Deep dive into Jewish customs? Check. LGBTQIA rep? Check. Wholesome romance? Pets? Grief? Check.

Didn’t read my book?

Well, you’ll still like the sweet romance between a Jewish trans man and the cute boy next door… who is also his rabbi’s son’s widower. When Ezra is furloughed and his family’s Jewish funeral home is unexpectedly short-handed, Ezra has to pitch in… even though he can see ghosts. Awkward!

Tim Pratt: The Knife and the Serpent (2024, Watkins Media Limited)

After her grandmother is murdered in a home invasion, Tamsin Culver leaves her cushy programming …

Weird but fun

This was a weird book. Space opera, very Buck Rogers but with kink. It was odd enough that I didn’t fully commit to it and kept setting it aside and reading other books, but… overall, fun.

If you’re looking for deep or heavy, or are offended by sexual content, this is not for you.

If you’re looking for silly metaverse adventures with two dommes fighting over the California grad student sub… 🤷🏻‍♀️ Honestly, it’s weird enough that I hesitate to recommend it to EVERYONE. Hopefully it’ll find its people. (Are YOU its people? I hope so!)

reviewed Prince Lestat by Anne Rice (The vampire chronicles -- bk. 11)

Anne Rice: Prince Lestat (2014, Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group)

"The novel opens with the Vampire world in crisis ... vampires have been proliferating out …

Prince Lestat

I struggled to really get into this book. I ended up liking it a lot! But also she introduced A LOT of new characters with little five to ten page chapters dumping their backstories. So many characters! So many backstories, before I’ve grown to know them!

But in general, if you’re the kind of fan who will squee that Antoine finally gets a chapter of his own… you’ll like it.

S. T. Gibson: A Dowry of Blood (EBook, 2022, Orbit)

None

I know I wrote a review!

So, I love epistolary novels, and do appreciate An Attempt To Be Art, so stylistically I’m down for this! I also enjoyed the historical periods, and the casual reference to “the Harkers.” Also, I do like the concept.

But psychologically…

1. Too much insta-love. Honestly, it’s off-putting.
2. As someone whose parents are both dead, I would have expected more grieving from Constanta.

The emotion Constanta is feeling when Dracula rescues her and enables her to take her revenge? That’s gratitude, or should be, rather than love. Am I supposed to read this as Dracula’s gaslighting? He’s manipulative enough, but I expect more self-awareness because this isn’t written in the moment, but after she’s murdered him.