The Darkside Series books in order are:
Book 1: Four Psychos
I’m not so different from most people.
Like everyone else, I have life goals.
Goal #1: Become a real girl instead of this invisible ghost thing I currently am.
Goal #2: Convince the four men I’ve been haunting for the past five years to pick me to be their new toy after goal one is complete.
Goal #3: Figure out who/what I am and why I can’t remember anything past the five years I’ve been haunting this quad.
Goal #4: Eat popcorn.
See? Perfectly normal. Sort of.
Gotta start small, after all.
It’s not like anyone else is perfect either.
Book 2: Three Trials
So, I’ve checked off some life goals and added a few new ones to my list.
Goal #5: Get out of hell’s belly without letting my ungrateful charges die.
Goal #6: Get a new name that’s more badass.
Goal #7: Stop wasting my breath on lectures and start annoying the quad hell squad every time they annoy me. Fight fire with fire. Ha! Another hell pun.
Goal 8: Find out who the hell killed me.
I’ll add more. I don’t want to overwhelm myself before I even finish checking off my old goals. But seriously, I really do need a more badass name, considering how much I have to keep saving my damsels in distress.
I probably shouldn’t call them damsels, since they’re a little murderous and all.
Maybe I should add seeing a hell-certified psychologist to my list of goals.
Book 3: Two Kingdoms
I’m getting a little tired of completing my goals, only to have the bar raised too substantially for me to transition at a productive pace…
I started off as a sad little ghost with an impossible crush on four really hot, Gothic guys with some attitude problems. Now I’m The Apocalypse, they’re the Four Horsemen, and Lucifer is my fucked up daddy. Now my additional goals look like this?
Goal #9: Make a deal with the Devil without getting cheated, manipulated, or tricked.
Goal #10: Make my boys love me and take over the world…okay…so maybe just that first part. That second part sounds like it could take too much ambition, and I just don’t have the drive for that.
Goal #11: Make cookies.
Goal #12: Call dibs on my favorite color.
Goal #13: Find out if my siblings or my father killed me and my boys…
Book 4: One Apocalypse
The life goals have stacked up since I started this journey as a sad, lonely little ghost. I’m not sure how things escalated so quickly from trying to be seen and heard, to bearing the weight of the world on my vain little shoulders.
As a result, my goals have gotten a little more serious…
Goal #14: Learn to take a hit without breaking or suffering some type of death.
Goal #15: Decide once and for all if I’m going to save or destroy the world. I’m not sure why people put this sort of responsibility on hell-spawn like me.
Goal #16: Practice my evil laugh, because all hell-spawn need a good evil laugh.
Goal #17: Find and kill all the unicorns. Mwahahahahaha.
Goal #18: Live to enjoy forever with the guys I sacrificed all my memories to save.
Goal #19: No matter what, they don’t get to die. Or I really will be THE Apocalypse.
We’re the most screwed up collection of antiheroes the world has ever seen, because the only thing that makes me want to save the world is knowing I could lose my boys forever if I don’t. It’s one HELL of a love story, you know?
NB: Kristy Cunning is a pen name of C.M. Owens.
Four psychos? I think we better make that five, including the FMC…
It’s a paranormal reverse harem/why choose story with a spectral heroine, who’s been haunting four guys who can’t see her. Until they can.
It drew me in by steering clear of all my usual RH/WC pet peeves: no special snowflake heroine, no insta-love, no tragic backstory, no fabricated drama.
And though I thoroughly enjoyed the dark, sarcastic humour in it, there were some issues.
Like the covers suck, but I can live with the copy-paste look so long as the book is enjoyable. Which these are.
And the thing that hooked me into reading were the unusual blurbs, which are very reflective of the tone of the whole series.
Keyla, who remains nameless for a good while, is ridiculous and hilarious, has no filter from her brain to her mouth and is a massive brat.
Her antics were one thing that kept me laughing so hard throughout the series. And while she’s in her ghostly form, the guys can’t touch her (in good and bad).
The first book starts off with a bang – a gang bang – but then keeps it clean for the rest of the book. They do get it on eventually, but it takes a while to build, and doesn’t happen in book one.
Jude, Ezekiel, Kai and Gage do treat her like shit from the start and she’s unable to leave, but that didn’t really bother me so much as some other books where the person being treated badly has the option to walk away and doesn’t.
I will say thought that this is basically TNMT if it was a reverse harem/why choose from hell (literally). You’ve got four pizza-guzzling dudes with weapons like cartoon characters.
Does the constant 90s referencing get old? God, yes.
But I can see someone who loves that stuff vibing with this book. I just tended to zone out after it became incessant.
It isn’t a dark romance, though it definitely is infernal and very sarcastic. Which just makes it terribly funny.
Are the characters kind of so-so? Yes. Is the plot overly convoluted with a lot of shoddy world building? Also yes. But if you don’t take it too seriously, this story will take you on a good ride.
Keyla is an fascinating character – fun, kind of naive, very frustrated with her situation which makes her impulsive – and we don’t know why she is a ghost.
The origin of the four guys is also a mystery that slowly reveals itself as the story unwinds.
This could easily have been a three book series if you just cut out a lot of the world building and exposition that bogs down the pace while adding little to the story.
A duology if you wanted to be really ruthless and have a story as sharp as a knife with a fresh edge on it.
Did I enjoy it?
Yeheees, bestie. This series lives in my trash pocket.
So despite all the aforementioned issues, I still love this series, the first two books especially.
I cackled out loud like a heathen while reading because the snark and sarcasm just warm my little gremlin heart.
So long as you don’t take it too seriously, it’s a fun ride – and this is one of those books where I was able to just overlook the bad things and just go with it.
It’s not like deep or anything, it’s literally just for shits and giggles.
Rapid-fire round:
- Did the book meet your expectations? Better than I expected based on the covers.
- Who was your favourite character in the book and why? Jude. I like broody.
- Who was your least favourite character in the book and why? Kayla was so annoying. Funny, but annoying af.
- Did you relate to any of the characters? I think it was unintentional (put in more for the mystery/cockblocking) but Kayla’s invisibility and inability to leave her relationship in the beginning is a very feminist take on gender roles.
- What themes or messages did you take away from the book? It doesn’t have to be that serious to be fun.
- Was there anything in the book that surprised you or that you didn’t expect? The attempt at a plot was trying way too hard and could have just cut down considerably.
- What did you think of the ending of the book? It was lukewarm.
- What do you think the author’s intention was with the book? What message or theme do you think they were trying to convey? Yeah, no theme, just smutty fun times.
- Which part of the book did you find most memorable? “Hide better.” Iykyk.
- Did you find any aspects of the book confusing or unclear? Flimsy plot with too much going on. I remember none of it.
- Were there any moments in the book that made you emotional or had a strong impact on you? Kayla tormenting them with the outfits was fun.
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