The Golden Haired Boy: An m/m vampire romance by Scarlet Blackwell

The Golden Haired Boy is a short(ish) vampire novel spanning 16 years in the immortal life of Johann and Lucas.

From the blurb:

He was nothing but a beast in heart and mind, pretending at love when he knew not the first thing about it.

When Johann, a two-hundred-year-old Austrian vampire meets Lucas, an English student at the turn of the twentieth century, it’s love at first sight. The golden-haired beauty is nineteen and bewitches him,
becoming an all-consuming obsession. But Johann has vowed never to confer his dark existence on anyone and so he is cursed to walk his immortal path alone, no matter that Lucas returns his feelings.

The two continue to meet once a year and their love remains unrequited until they, and the world, are shattered by war, and life will never be the same again.

A sweeping novella of love and loss taking the reader from the slums of Whitechapel to the battlefields of World War Ⅰ and beyond. HEA guaranteed.

Possible spoilers:

Themes: hurt/comfort, angst

Genre: Historical vampire romance

Warnings: Harrowing scenes and death. Suicidal ideation.

Sheena's Review:

This is a short(ish) story but packs a huge emotional punch - as I've come to expect from Scarlet Blackwell. It's a vampire story, spanning 16 years during which time the protagonists meet only a handful of times, really, but each time it feels meaningful and I really felt the connection between them.

Johann first sees Lucas when he's a student and is struck by his golden hair and the fact he can seem to sense Johann even when he's hiding from him. Johann has been a vampire a long time, and is unwilling to compromise Lucas and turn him so they be together. Even for such a short story, it's packed full of everything a great vampire story should have - yearning, a little danger, perhaps a little mild obsession, and soulmates because make no mistake, that's what these two absolutely are. Even if both are unwilling to admit it at the start.

I loved this story so much, I wasn't sure what to expect going in and it was much more than anything I'd thought it would be.

Rating: 4.25 Stars

The Golden Haired Boy is available to buy as an ebook.