Title: Soul of ShadowAuthor: Emma Noyes
Pages: 352
Publication Date: July 29, 2025
Publisher: Wednesday Books
Genres: Fiction / Romance / Paranormal
Synopsis:
Charlie Hudson just wants to get through junior year. Since the death of her twin sister two years earlier, she’s drifted through life, going through the motions at school and parties and even at home. The spark that once burned so brightly within her has all but flickered out.
Until her classmate goes missing in the forest, leaving nothing behind but a pair of shoes and strange symbols carved into a tree.
Drawn to the disappearances by forces she can’t explain, she finds herself investigating the mysterious, alluring newcomer in town, Elias Everhart. With piercing eyes and sharp wit, he dances around her questions, only intriguing her further. Elias has a secret. More than one.
But what Charlie doesn’t know is that those secrets will lead her to a place she never a world hiding in plain sight, made of magic, gods, and monsters – and a first love fated to fall apart.
In Emma Noyes’s Soul of Shadow, truths and temptations lurk in the darkness, and for Charlie, the only thing more dangerous than facing her past, is the boy with the power to change her future.
My Thoughts on Soul of Shadow:
Soul of Shadow is the first in a new YA romantasy by Emma Noyes. I was excited to read this when I learned it was inspired by The Vampire Diaries and included Norse mythology. It’s clear from the start that TVD is a favorite of the author. The main character reminds me so much of Elena, and her two closest friends are really similar to Elena’s BFFs, too. There are even some places and events that are clearly based on TVD. I found myself comparing so many elements of the book to TVD, as well as Twilight and Loki, and it sometimes got in the way of my enjoyment of the story.
The MMC is a dark and morally grey mystery, and the romance between him and Charlie was riddled with conflict and tension. They definitely had chemistry, but some of the things he said and did bothered me. I don’t know if I’d label this a romance, though I have a feeling that as the story progresses, it will develop into a more romantic relationship. Right now, it feels manipulative and abusive. I guess it ran just a little too dark and twisted for me. I was actually more interested in the romance between two of the secondary characters, the relationship between Charlie and her siblings, and the friendships.
The integration of Norse mythology was interesting, and I liked the fantasy elements. That being said, the story was slow at times, and I never got fully invested in it, the characters, or the love story. I don’t know how Charlie could fall for Elias after some of the things he did to her and made her do. The threats he made and the things he said… he’s going to need a massive redemption arc in the next book.
Thanks to NetGalley and Wednesday Books for providing me with a copy of the book. All thoughts are my own.
“The world had deceived her, had taken away the one person who should have been by her side her entire life-and she would deceive it right back.”
- Fake Dating
- Norse Mythology
- Shadow Daddy
- Morally Grey MMC
- Small Town Vibes
Emma Noyes is the author of HOW TO HIDE IN PLAIN SIGHT, GUY’S GIRL, and the Sunken City trilogy. The first book in her next YA romantasy series, SOUL OF SHADOW, comes out July 2025. She lives in Chicago with her Swedish husband and their accident-prone Pomeranian.
