Serra Swift

author of Kill the Beast

About Kill the Beast

The Witcher meets Howl’s Moving Castle in this debut original faerie tale of revenge, redemption, and friendship—for fans of T. Kingfisher, Naomi Novik, and cozy fantasy with a dash of gritty adventure.

The night Lyssa Cadogan’s brother was murdered by a faerie-made monster known as the Beast, she made him a promise: she would find a way to destroy the immortal creature and avenge his death. For thirteen years, she has been hunting faeries and the abominations they created. But in all that time, the one Beast she is most desperate to find has never resurfaced.

Until she meets Alderic Casimir de Laurent, a melodramatic dandy with a coin purse bigger than his brain. Somehow, he has found the monster’s lair, and—even more surprising—retrieved one of its claws. A claw Lyssa needs in order to forge a sword that can kill the Beast.

Alderic is ill-equipped for a hunt and almost guaranteed to get himself killed. But as the two of them search for the rest of the materials that will be the Beast’s undoing, Alderic reveals hidden depths: dark secrets that he guards as carefully as Lyssa guards hers. Before long, and against Lyssa’s better judgment, an unlikely friendship begins to bloom—one that will either lead to the culmination of Lyssa’s quest for vengeance, or spell doom for them both.

Review

Kill the Beast follows a young woman who has been hunting and killing fae creatures for years. As a child Lyssa watched a magical beast kill her brother. After that her path was set. She would kill the beast that killed her brother or die trying. Well, life has never been that simple and no book has either. Lyssa can’t find the beast to kill it, and when she does get put on it’s trail, she has other problems pop up. Namely a cute aristocrat named Alderic.

I read this book in one night. The next morning my husband was so confused about why I looked like I had been crying all night and in fact i had been. The book made me laugh and at parts made me ugly cry with snot and everything. The angst Lyssa feels throughout regarding her brother is devastating. Swift pairs the awful with moments of wonder (primarily through Alderic) that a give the reader a break from the depressing story. I loved the world that Kill the Beast inhabits. There is magic, but because there is a looming industrial revolution the magic is slowly going away. This isn’t a huge thread in the book and if Swift had spent more time on it, I likely would not have been so engaged in Lyssa’s story, but there is more there that could be explored.

I loved the book.