Published 22nd October 2026 by One More Chapter.
From the cover of the book:
In the gaslit dark, love is never tender. It’s teeth at your throat. Blood on silk. It is the sweetest surrender – and the most exquisite damnation.
By day Lady Euphemia Butterworth is a dutiful daughter – corseted, perfumed, and groomed to marry a lecherous duke twice her age. By night, she dreams of freedom, the dangerous thrill of adventure and a life not dictated by men with money and cruel smiles. But when a vampire attack shatters her world, Effie is branded hysterical, locked away and desperate to escape and prove what really happened.
Liam Rafferty has ghosts of his own. Orphan, ex-boxer, ex-patient of the asylum, he stalks the shadows as a reluctant hunter, his body inked with sins and his soul fraying at the edges. He finds refuge in a travelling circus, but it cannot silence the devil whispering in his ear – or the fangs waiting in the dark.
When Effie’s gilded cage collides with Liam’s world, the sparks are as dangerous as the bite of the monsters they hunt…
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Lady Euphemia Butterworth longs to be free of the privileged cage that surrounds her in The Gilded Bay. She dreams of pursuing her love of fossils and geology, and to be able to decide her own fate, Instead she is doomed to marry to a lecherous duke more than twice her age - the wealthy friend of her cruel father, Earl Titus Butterworth.
But Euphemia has other ideas. Fleeing from her father's palatial home to seek solace in the fossil-rich caves near-by, she and her brother Cedric are attacked by a vampire. Barely escaping with her life, no one will believe the truth that a vampire has appeared in The Gilded Bay after all these years, and killed her brother. She is branded hysterical, drugged and locked in her room.
In the slums of Redchapel the poor eke out an existence, at the mercy of thieves, cutthroats, and vampires. Liam Rafferty and his sister Nora have taken refuge in the circus, and alongside their performances they hunt the vampires hiding in the shadows. For ex-boxer, and former asylum inmate, Liam, it comes with the burden of a secret gift he considers nothing but a curse from the Devil - an ability to see ghosts.
Euphemia escapes and heads for Redchapel, looking for help with the vampire problem in The Gilded Bay. She bumps into Nora, and under the name Effie Smith, hides out in the circus. She is determined to track down and kill the vampire that killed her brother, and Liam is the perfect person to train her in the skills she needs. Liam is reluctant to get close to Effie, but the more time they spend together, the more difficult it is to ignore the spark that has ignited between them...
Michelle Maxstoke's darkly delicious tale of passion, horror, and vampires is set in an alternate 1800s, where the elite world of The Gilded Bay sits uncomfortably alongside the slums of Redchapel. The two worlds collide when Effie escapes the fate carved out for her by her occult-obsessed father, befriends Nora, and hides out amongst circus performers. Fortuitously, the little circus band also know how to deal with the undead, giving Effie the opportunity to learn the deathly skills she needs to dispatch the vampire that killed her brother - and a chance to fall desperately in love with the brooding, tattooed Liam. Hurray!
The story barrels along at a good pace, with luscious gothic atmosphere in a Redchapel backdrop filled with shady characters and dark deeds, and occasional sorties into the equally hostile, but much cleaner environs of The Gilded Bay. There are a fair number of monsters stalking both, so you never really know who to trust, and they are not all vampires, which makes this lots of fun. Throw in a lovely bit of found family in the circus arena, ghosts galore, oodles of secrets to be revealed on the way to a cracking finale, and an electric love story full of perfectly pitched spice.
The pages of this paranormal historical romance flew by, and Maxstoke's brave little gang of warriors around Effie and Liam absolutely captured my heart. There are some original little twists on vampire lore, and oodles of scope for this to be the first in a very entertaining series. I hope there is a sequel in the wings, because I want to know what happens next. More please!
A Lady's Guide to Vampire Hunting is available to buy now in hardcover, ebook and audio formats.
Thank you to One More Chapter for sending me a review copy of this book.
About the author:
Michelle Maxstoke was born in Solihull but has lived in Leeds for the past 15 years. She worked for the NHS before completing a PhD in nutritional epidemiology and working as a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Leeds. She lives with her husband, two sons, and a hyperactive Labrador. As a scientist and mum, her hobbies include mulling over the complexities of the universe, treading barefoot on Lego, and chipping dried Play-Doh from fabric surfaces.
Michelle also writes contemporary romance under the pseudonym Sasha Lace.
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