📚💪🏼Books and Biceps Review: Empire of the Damned by Jay Kirstoff📚💪🏼 Well hello beautiful friends of HDD. It’s been awhile since we last spoke. I had been in a reading rut after finishing Joe Abercrombie’s First Law trilogy on audiobook. Wow, hard to believe my review of Empire of the Vampire was from December 2022… where has the time gone? I had been counting the days until Empire of the Damned was released, eagerly awaiting to pick up from where the Black Lion had left off. When we received an ARC of EoTD in the mail, I was surprised (thank you my sweet Hello Darkness Darling!) and shocked. My initial reaction was that Jay Kristoff enjoyed my original review so much he wanted me to follow up with EoTD.😉  In my opinion, it’s hard, or nearly impossible, for an author to achieve the same, if not greater, quality for a sequel when the bar has been set so high, as it had been in EoTV. I will be honest, I was a bit reluctant, or hesitant, as the book began — thinking there was no way it would outdo EoTV, that my expectations were too high and that I would just end up disappointed… that couldn’t be further from the truth. Jay Kristoff is a master storyteller in his own right, and I am honored and grateful to have had the chance to read the ARC. The only disappointing thing is the fact I now have to wait a while to see how this tale ends. Empire of the Damned is Damn Epic.  bookreview bookrecommendations bookrecs bookstagram menwhoread fantasybooks empireofthevampire