Type of read: Commuter Read.

What made me pick it up: I stumbled across the Black Dagger Brotherhood in early 2024 with Darius (Book 0), and I got sucked into this crazy, cracked-out, sexy, throwback-feeling world of vampires fighting something more evil than themselves.

Overall rating: Zsadist's story was one of my favorite of the series so far ('Lover Awakened') and I'm happy that Ward wrote a novella to help bridge the gap between what's happening in the series and what's happening in the Zsadist/Bella saga. I had wondered after reading 'Lover Enshrined' with them talking so much about Bella's pregnancy how they would connect that to the world but not make it a main focus of 'Lover Avenged.' 'Father Mine' was an easy, quick read that further builds the world of the Black Dagger Brotherhood and I'm all here for it.

I know I've said it before in previous reviews for this series, but I feel like I just have to say it with each book, this is just a good escape read. You don't have to think too much about it, you don't have to try and keep things straight (Ward does a great job dropping little reminders at the beginning of each book and throughout so you keep the characters and their traits straight), and you can just dive into a (slightly dated) world of sexy vampire warriors. I'm here for it.

Reader's Note: 'Father Mine' includes themes of death; dying; consensual sexual activity; violence; kidnapping; torture; murder; sexual assault; and character recollections of physical and sexual abuse. I also have to add that there are some audio narration inconsistencies between this and previous books.