Dating & Dismemberment

I received this book for free from the publisher. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

Dating & Dismemberment by A.L. Brody
Narrator: Eva Kaminsky
Series: Mating and Monsters #1
Published by Entangled Publishing on October 8, 2024
Genres: Fiction / Fantasy / Humorous
Length: 9 hours 6 minutes
Pages: 352
Format: Audiobook, Paperback
Source: Publisher, Purchased
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Emily Henry meets Grady Hendrix in the funniest and most original romantic comedy of the year: a monstrously feel good cozy fantasy full of love, laughter, lore, and limbs... Now with brand new bonus content!

Darla Drake, Duchess of Death, is a legendary monster who has haunted the woods around Camp Clear Creek for years. Until an existential crisis forces her to take a sabbatical from wreaking havoc on pimply teens while she figures out what she really wants from the rest of her (possibly infinite) life. But what does a monster do when her malevolent days are over? For Darla, it’s spending time with the decapitated—yet still overbearing—head of her mother, reading romance novels she steals from campers, and struggling with one monstrous case of melancholy. Until Jarko Murkvale arrives in Clear Creek and turns Darla’s life upside down.

Jarko is a conceited, arrogant, infuriating, and unfortunately for Darla, kind of hot. And with the Duchess of Death on the shelf, Jarko has staked his claim on Camp Clear Creek. But Darla refuses to go down without a fight, and so in order to reclaim her territory she challenges Jarko to a series of hunts to see who the most fearsome monster really is.

But the more mayhem they cause, the more Darla begins to realize there’s more to this brash monster than she believed…and that Jarko may just be the antidote to her ennui. But there’s a reason Jarko came to Clear Creek, and in order to fill her nine-chambered heart, Darla will have to unravel the mystery of who this closed-off monster really is. And if they can manage to not literally tear each other limb from limb, Darla and Jarko just might find that couples who slay together, stay together.

This was fun! I loved that this book didn’t take itself too seriously. I think I had a smile on my face the whole time I was reading it because this book is funny. I enjoyed this imaginative world of monsters who terrorize humans dealing with their own issues, just small things like finding your mother’s body, supporting your friend through her incredibly long pregnancy, and feeling the energy to hunt wayward campers in your territory. I couldn’t help but root for Darla and she worked to find the answers to her problems.

During the past year, Darla took a break from hunting her territory because she just wasn’t feeling it. This gave a new monster the opportunity to make a claim for her territory. Enter Jarko Murkvale. Darla Drake, the Duchess of Death, is not going to give up her territory without a fight. As they spend some time together, she finds that having him around isn’t as bad as she first thought, especially when you consider her main source of company has been her mother’s severed head. I really enjoyed getting to watch these two get to know each other and figure things out.

Eva Kaminsky does such a good job with this audiobook. While she has an impressive catalog of books she has narrated, I believe that this is my first experience with her narration and I was impressed. She brought the cast of characters to life in this story through the use of various voices and just the right amount of emotion. She delivered the humor of the story in a way that only heightened the experience. I am certain that her narration added to my enjoyment.

I would recommend this book to others. I thought that this was a fun peed into the monster world and I couldn’t wait to see Darla and Jarko find their forever together. The bonus story included in the trade paperback and audiobook added a lot to the overall story so I would recommend that readers not skip over this extra. I can’t wait to read more of this entertaining series!

I received a review copy from Entangled Amara.

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