Promises and Pomegranates: Monsters & Muses, Book 1

**REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS**Promises & Pomegranates by Sav R. Miller is Book 1 in the Monsters & Muses series which is a series of six interconnected standalones and is a follow on from the Sweet Sin prequel novella. It is not required but advised to read the novella before Promises & Pomegranates as it gives us an introduction to the FMC & MMC as well as some secondary characters that are pivotal to the characters and plot.The story itself begins with Kal and Rafael chatting in the latter’s office as it has come to their attention that the security feed all over the Ricci’s home has been infiltrated and the tryst between Elena and Kal are now on a flashdrive that Rafael is now watching thanks to Kal showing it to him. Believing there’s a blackmailer out there intent to bring down his already crumbling empire  Rafael needs Kal’s help and knows he doesn’t work for free so when he asks what his price to help ensure the blackmailers stay quiet, the answer is simple: Elena’s Soul is the price to be paid.Elena Ricci’s wedding day, around 8 weeks after the events of Sweet Sin. She is betrothed to Mateo De Luca who isn’t a nice guy and their marriage is more of an agreement between their fathers more than love. Elena is not a fan of Mateo and he is abusive and degrading, however, she gives him as good as she gets – she was taught to fight and she’s good at it, even if it is a man that is hurting her. Whilst we don’t see the abuse on page it is implied in the FMCs POV after the fact. She’s so deeply infatuated by Dr Kallum Anderson who she freely gave her virginity to on her 20th birthday 8 weeks prior to her wedding.   Dr Kallum Anderson is 32 years old, has a medical degree and is the enforcer/fixer for Rafael Ricci and Ricci Inc. Kal was only 13 when he met Rafael and his wife Carmen while he was at hospital with his mum who was dying of an aggressive form of cancer. When she succumbed to her disease, Kal reached out to his biological father who wanted nothing to do with him and he ended up in the foster system and soon he was picked up by Rafael from the street and groomed into being a fixer/enforcer by Rafael and groomed into a relationship with Carmen – the relationship is not depicted but it is implied and discussed.On the wedding day, Elena is dreading the whole thing and she’s told she will learn to love her husband and as they are about to leave, he requests to see her and she’s trying to avoid it but she goes to see him anyway. When she arrives at his room, she sees him on bed looking very ill and throwing up and she is just watching him and then as the life slowly drains from him, she hears the voice of the person she has been longing for – Dr Kal Anderson – who makes no attempt to save Mateo’s life. We then realise that he is responsible for the demise of Mateo and they are soon joined by a priest and Rafael and Kal then forces Elena to marry him instead under the guise he is trying to help her – he is, but he is also trying to help himself.Once the ceremony is over, they are back in the Ricci home and Kal is being grilled by Elena’s younger sisters while Elena is packing to leave. He decides to cut the interrogation short and goes to Elena’s room, hearing voices inside and he enters the room seeing her mother Carmen but no Elena. Carmen begs him not to take her daughter by trying to use her manipulation tactics on him so give Elena time to flee but Kal simply breaks her hand and finds Elena on the balcony of her room. She resigns herself to her fate and allows him to inject her neck with a substance so she passes out and when she comes around, she’s on a plane and confused as to why they are there and where they are going.She soon finds herself on Aplana Island off the mainland of Boston which is going to be her new home. The home she finds herself in is a remodelled hotel that is now the home of Dr Kal Anderson and she soon feels like a captive in the marriage and her life, realising she was freed from one prison to another.Luckily, the relationship between Kal and Elena starts to develop more, both are infatuated by each other and the sexual tension and chemistry between both characters is electric and you can feel it as you read through the pages. Whilst on the island, Elena and Kal find out that her parents are pushing the narrative that she was kidnapped by Kal (technically she was but Rafael agreed to it). They feel betrayed by Kal as he wanted to leave the mafia side of things and you don’t simply just get to leave. The marriage to Mateo was going to secure Rafaels future but as the wedding didn’t go ahead he had to pay out a small fortune to the Bollente family to ensure that he and his family remain safe and he blames Kal for this. Carmen on the other hand is just jealous that Kal is with someone else and that someone else happens to be her daughter.As they navigate through their marriage and start to explore the island, Kal is hellbent on trying to get a relationship with his long lost sister and believes if he has a wife and familial unit it will help the relationship and also give him access to his grandfathers trust so he can pay his sister. We meet Violet and she’s very similar in personality to Kal and while they are talking outside Kal’s bar, he had given Elena strict instructions not to leave and ensured that his staff would keep an eye on her. As she goes to leave, Vinny, a staff member tries to stop Elena and insults and assaults her and she fights back, leaving him a crumpled mess on the floor but not enough to stop him injecting a substance into her leg. Realising people are paid to mind their business Elena leaves and finds she’s gone out the wrong door.Unsure of her new surroundings and trying to get somewhere safe before the substances takes effect we see Elena stumble across a bus station and she settles on a bench waiting for staff to comeback so she can try and leave the island but she is soon feeling the effects of the substance and when her husband calls her to try and find out where she is, she is barely able to hold the conversation and just as she passes out we hear that strange men are approaching her.Kal finds his wife and sees her bloodied and bruised – most of which have come from her fight with Vincent and a business card next to her bearing the logo of Ricci Inc. on it. The men were sent by her dad to rough her up to scare Kal and Elena into having Elena returned to Boston. We start to see a caring side of Kal as he helps Elena recover after her ordeal and part of that is allowing her to watch as he makes Vincent pay the ultimate price for his part in hurting Elena.The story moves quickly and the timeline jumps a few weeks and we soon see Elena and Violet meet for the first time, neither one knowing who the other is and Elena feels Kal is being unfaithful so storms into the bar, the first time since her attack and demands to know who the girl is. The rippling tension between Kal and Elena is a constant throughout the story and it just keeps you hooked on finding out if they are both in this for real.We soon see them return to Boston to go to Elena’s sisters recital, however, when they arrive home, everything crumbles. Carmen drops the bombshell that her and Kal had an affair and makes Elena feel small and ridiculous. Elena flees the dinner and Kal tries to stop her but she still leaves with her sister and he then goes back to confront Carmen where he gives her a few home truths, fires a blank at her to scare her and then he goes after Elena.At the recital, they find they are seated next to her parents box and so Elena still really angry and hurt uses this to have sex with Kal one last time not caring who sees or hears and when they finish their intimacy she excuses herself and leaves. She runs out of the theatre and goes to a secure apartment her parents know nothing about. She stays there a few weeks and goes home to pack some of her things as she wants to be away from her parents and while she’s packing she finds her mum in her room and she gives her a few home truths and seals it with a punch. As she leaves, she drops a bombshell of her own as she sends an email containing all of the details of the illicit activity her parents have been involved in throughout the years to the police, knowing that being a rat is the very worst thing you can do.During their time apart, Kal has decided to dissolve the trust and to stop trying to pay his sister and used the money to buy his way out of Rafael’s grip and ensure no fallback can come his way should anything ever happen to Ricci Inc. He also decides to give Elena a true choice by giving her the space she needed to process things and drew up annulment papers citing fraud as the reason for the annulment. This is what brings Elena back to him, she is angry he served her annulment papers, knowing he knew where she was the whole time and didn’t look for her. They then confirm that they are in love with each other and when she tells him what she did to her family and realises that Kal was just a pawn and groomed by her parents she forgives him and they decide that there will be no annulment. Kal also then finds out who was sending him the grainy images of him and Elena and it was none other than 18 year old Riley Kelly who needs to disappear and needs Kal’s help – we find out more about her and her story in the next instalment – Vipers & Virtuosos.All in all this book was a great read from start to finish and the character development for both Kal and Elena is fitting and they are perfectly suited. There is a lot of love and passion between the two and it just explodes through the pages and it is a really good page turner. I struggled to put this book down and I am excited to see where the series takes me. I liked the fact that it is loosely based on the Greek myth of Hades and Persephone and they are referenced throughout the book.As always, with a dark romance, always check the trigger warnings/content warnings on the authors website before reading but if you like a good dark mafia romance with a morally grey MMC and a feisty and strong willed FMC then this is the book for you

After reading the prequel, Sweet Sin, (and devouring it) I was very excited to get into book #1 of the Monsters & Muses series. The prequel began an immense, deep-rooted relationship between Kal and Elena and we definitely got more than 'promised' in Promises and Pomegranates.There was so much tension in this book, I couldn't stop reading once I picked it up. The tension lay in both the strained relationships and in the plot. There was so much underlying pain between Kal and Elena's family, it was pretty emotional to read. I feel like the plot could have been developed more, for instance the kidnapping section. Also I would've enjoyed learning more about Kal's relationship with his sister but perhaps this is in a future book in the series?There is no doubt that some of the scenes between Kal and Elena were the spiciest I've ever read! This is a great read if you are into dark romance. This was helped by Miller's writing style, in particular her exaggerated, detailed descriptions which were rich and delectable. Vipers and Virtuosos has of course been added to my Kindle TBR and I'm excited to see what's next in store.4/5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I thought this book was alright, we get a speckle of everything, a little bit of plot, a little bit of character, but only a little bit because i thought the female character was a little too one dimensional for me and whole lot of smut if that's what you want!!! I enjoyed it but sadly as i was reading the book pages were falling apart!!! i'm not sure if it's because the glue had dried and it is not holding much together so i tried not to apply too much pressure on it and also tried to listen to the audiobook for the most part because i really love the cover and i didn't want the whole book to fall apart!!PS: Had same problem with the second book in the series, so Sav R Miller, please girlie, check with your indie publisher!! Because as soon as the spine is a tiny bit cracked the pages will start falling apart!!

This is book one of the Monsters & Muses series and one of my favourite books 𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑. It has been on my tbr for a while now and it didn’t disappoint. This is dark romance at its best, the mafia, age gap, forced proximity and Hades & Persephone retelling elements are just 👨🏻‍🍳💋 Sav has a way with words and I love her writing. It is beautiful, poetic and spicy af. Before you dive in, I highly recommend you to read the prequel Sweet Sin as it helps set the scene.Elena was brought up to be the perfect mafia princess and the day has come for her to marry Mateo, to strengthen the alliance between two families and power in the mafia world. She had no say in anything and for once, she wanted to make a choice of her own, for Kal to take her virginity. Elena is a total badass, she has no issue telling you what she wants and she will happily take it from you. She is honestly the perfect match for Kal, on every single level.Kal, also known as Doctor Death, works for Elena’s father. He was saved from the streets at a young age but he had been secretly planning to get out. He is composed, calculative and deadly. He doesn’t have a caring bone in his body but he turns into this “touch her and you die” madman when it comes to Elena. The sex is next level oof the dirty talk, the knife play, the theatre scene 😮‍💨I am so far gone for this villain, just like Elena. I also love their emotional connection, them sharing their feelings, showing their vulnerability and embracing one another’s darkness. I am utterly consumed by their chemistry, passion and love. I cannot get enough of these two and I cannot recommend this book enough. A million stars from me.

Excellent read. Page turner from the beginning. Tad bit on the darker side of love, but engaging. I found myself putting my phone down looking around to see if anyone was behind me noticing my blushing.

Fue un regalo y me gusta

The book came in perfect brand new condition. I love the story itself, I find it’s the best retelling of the Hades and Persephone story, at least sticking to the actual kidnapping and forced marriage plot from the original story.

I don't write reviews often (mainly because I don't know what to say), but this book got me hooked from the first page and I just wanted to say a huge THANK YOU to the author. Honestly, I'm usually a very slow reader, but I couldn't put it down and finished it in less than 24 hours. Everything was amazing, the world-building was engrossing, the pacing was on point, both of the main characters were equally interesting (and I can't remember the last time a character pissed me off as much as Carmen), and the darkness surrounding it?? Omg, perfect!Although this is not a fantasy book, it definitely felt magical, thank you so much for letting us read about Kallum and Elena's story!

This was my first dark romance book and if you like a lot of spice in your books this one is for you. The writing style was absolutely lovely but if you are new to this genre i would recommend checking the trigger warnings. But if you can handle it a must read book!