This is the third witch and witch hunter type of romantasy I've read, and if you're looking for one, then this is a great candidate. Compared to Serpent & Dove, this felt more elevated and mature, but I actually liked how silly and fun Serpent & Dove was. This was more comparable to Night of the Witch in terms of the tone and writing quality, but while that one kind of tosses the enemies side of the relationship out quickly, this leans much more heavily and consistently on the enemies and deception aspect of the witch/witch hunter dynamic. I personally liked Night of the Witch more for my tastes, but I think people who want to really simmer in the dark angsty aspect of that dynamic will prefer this. 

I was not really in the mood for this level of angst, which hurt my overall experience of the book, but I can acknowledge that it was very well written in terms of the prose, plotting, and characters. This seems like a really promising start to a series and Kristen Ciccarelli seems like a talented author. The audiobook narrator was also fantastic. 

I predicted 90% of the reveals, but I think that's just because I'm overly genre-savvy and was reading this from a more cynical perspective because I wasn't in the mood for it. For someone who is properly along for the ride, I think they'll enjoy all the twists and turns. Some did catch me by surprise and were very satisfying, and the author makes fantastic use of the dual perspectives to keep things mysterious and suspenseful. 

Spoilery thoughts: 

After that ending, I have no idea how this can possibly turn back into a romance? I don't see how a romance is viable after all this deception and misunderstanding. How could these two people possibly trust each other again? It seems like they both f**ked up really really badly and they have every reason to hate each other, honestly. Yeah there are some misunderstandings that could be cleared up,  but also the truth of the matter is they were both working on opposite sides and directly sabotaging the other. Some witches are bad, and they need to be stopped, but also torturing and killing innocent women who are just normal people who happen to be witches is bad and that needs to be stopped. They both leaned so hard into fixing one problem that they contributed to the other. It's a very well written conflict, but it will be an impressive feat to swing their feelings back around in a way that feels earned.