Immortal Dark - Tigest Girma

Vampires and humans live "peacefully" in Immortal Dark by Tigest Girma. And yes, "peacefully" earns those quotation marks — because damn, there's some inner turmoil. What in the ever-loving hell. People, vampires, and everything in between are so complicated here. Sure, life isn't black and white. But it's not gray either. This book is reds, purples, dark blues — a whole rainbow of inner pain.

For the squeamish: it is NOT too gruesome. For how dark it gets, it never glorifies or drags out the violence.

I had friends read this one too, and here's the wild part — there are twists, and nobody, I mean NOBODY, experienced them the same way. No two of us anticipated them alike, and not one of us predicted everything.

Dark academia at its finest. The darkest grey cast of characters you'll ever meet — good luck deciding who to love or hate the most. And speaking of love and hate: I hope you like enemies to lovers. For most of the book I genuinely could not tell if the main character was fun-crazy, crazy-crazy, or crazy-for-a-good-reason. I warmed to characters, cooled on them, and warmed right back again.

So take the journey. Girma spins so much Ethiopian folklore and East African myth into this world, and it's a vampire book with an all-Black cast — Black immortals, front and center. I hope it makes waves, and I hope more books reflecting different kinds of humans keep hitting the mainstream. There's real power in seeing parts of ourselves in stories — in a character's looks, heart, behavior, or history. Some people read stories; some people experience them. No matter what SPF you use (or don't), this is a story to find the hard parts of yourself in. The hard moments that make you hard. Life is ugly, and you do ugly things. It's reluctant villains and dishonorable heroes.

Good news if it sinks its teeth in: it's the first of a trilogy, so there's more where this came from.

Tropes & themes: vampires, Ethiopian folklore & East African myth, enemies to lovers, dark academia

If you liked this, try: An Academy for Liars by Alexis Henderson