Seraph by Lily Mayne (Monstrous Book #6)

Title: ⟫ Seraph (Monstrous Book #6) 

Author: ⟫ Lily Mayne 

Rating: ⟫ 5/5 

Blurb: ⟫ I’ve already mentally prepared myself to kill the screaming, murderous monster in the cage outside our camp. 

I’m used to it. It’s what I do here. Kill monsters and other people. And this monster, Seraph, is particularly unstable—has been since the moment he arrived from Collector Mary’s monster menagerie to the west, where the military stashed him away. 

He’s in pain. I can see it. But he’s not a mindless beast. Not like some of the others think. 

When I start guarding him in his cage every night, I begin to see the person beneath the agony that tortures his every waking moment. I begin to see who Seraph could have been if he hadn’t been twisted into this monstrous creature. I realise that I wouldn’t be able to bring myself to kill him, even for his own sake, but it doesn’t matter anyway. He’s already dying, and there’s nothing I can do to stop it. Not even when new visitors at our raider camp bring with them secrets about Seraph. 

Secrets the military has tried to hide. 

Secrets that reveal the true extent of the horror he’s been put through. 

And now… 

Now, I will kill anyone who tries to hurt him again. 

Seraph is Book Six of the Monstrous series, a post-apocalyptic m/m fantasy series that features monsters and human men falling in love. It is best to read the series in order. 

Warning: This m/m love story contains explicit sexual content and is not suitable for young readers. It also contains non-human genitalia, depictions of violence, serious injury, death, and one instance of violence between the MCs. 

Review: ⟫ I cried a lot with this one. I didn’t expect to – I have loved Lilac from the first time we met him, and I wanted him to have an epic love-story and an epic monster, but I didn’t expect Seraph. In fact, I don’t think anyone could ever really prepare themselves for Seraph – all I can say is to have the tissues ready. 

We got to spend a lot more time with our previous monster-human couples, with a heavy dose of humour incorporating Wyn of all people. And I hadn’t expected Gloam to be such a ‘dad’! 

There is so much that happens in this book, but even talking about my favourite bits feels like too much of a spoiler so I won’t say much. I will say that the monster-sex in this was hot in the extreme – not quite tentacles but very close! Rig is still a complete and utter sweetheart, and my love for him has not dwindled. But then, in each of these books it has been easy to fall in love with the protagonists. 

This is more than Lilac and Seraph’s love story – this is once again more about learning that humans can be far more monstrous than anything that should be terrifying as it swoops down! Once again, the monsters show more compassion and caring than the humans themselves do. I don’t envy Anchor her job of keeping the camp happy – the raiders do have the right to feel safe, and living with monsters is not what they signed up for. But the monsters who have joined the Raiders camp bring so much with them that surely they should be considered on their own merits? 

Sorry, this is meant to be a review, not a debate. I have been looking forward to his book for so long and it more than satisfied me – I sniffled through the ending and shed a few tears of happiness at the end. The path is set up for what is happening next, and I look forward to the next two books in the series that Lily Mayne mentions in her author notes at the back.