Review: The Mephisto Mark - Trinity Faegen

Orphaned at six and sent to live with abusive relatives in Bucharest, Mariah learned early in life to box up violent, agonizing memories and put them in permanent mental storage. Now almost nineteen, she has a paying job, a tiny apartment, and a plan to attend university. She loves her independence and is steadily overcoming her past, but when an enigmatic stranger walks into the pub where she works and the trajectory of her life changes yet again, she begins to wonder if she’ll run out of mental shelf space.

The only females unafraid of the Mephisto brothers are the extremely rare Anabo, born without Original Sin. Over one hundred years ago, Phoenix was first to find one, but he made a fatal mistake and she was murdered by his oldest brother and enemy, Eryx. Phoenix soldiered through the next century wrapped up in grief and guilt, his only outlet planning takedowns of those who pledged their souls to Eryx. When one of his brothers brings Mariah to Mephisto Mountain, he’s torn between his instinctive, powerful need to pursue her, and his certainty that he can never have her.

Drawn into the world of the Mephisto, Mariah sees the pain and misery Eryx unleashes on humanity, and the boxes in her mind begin to fly open, one by one. All that keeps her from slipping off the edge is her unlikely, sexually charged friendship with Phoenix. He’s incredibly screwed up; she’s completely broken. It would take a miracle for them to find happiness. Then Eryx brings the war for Hell to a whole new level, forcing Mariah and Phoenix to make a choice that will bind them together for all eternity, or rip them apart forever.

 

Some people are just broken.

 

Mariah is one of those people. Sacrificing herself for her sister at a very young age, then being tormented for the majority of her life, she is the prime example of broken. There’s something special about her though, I mean she’s obviously got a lot of fight in her if she’s been able to pull her life together some kind of normal.

 

That is until a world that she knew nothing about pulls her in & wants her to help them fight against something very evil.

 

For me this book was great, but I couldn’t help but think BDB (Black Dagger Brotherhood) numerous times while reading it. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mean it in a bad way, there were just a lot of similarities between the 2 series. 
A band of brothers all living in a huge mansion each with a different quirk, one of  their own turns evil & recruits minions, the brothers are hell bent on destroying the evil ones minions, but after that the purpose and plot lines were different. I kept wanting someone to help Mariah in all her broken-ness, but as I read the realization hit me that Phoenix was meant to help her. No one else in this world was meant for Mariah, and the same goes for Phoenix , because he’s his own little ball of screwed up as well.

 

Tormented by his past, the loss that he’s burying & the betrayal he knows he’s committed only makes Phoenix a ticking time bomb. Everyone walks on egg shells around him except Mariah, and I LOVE that. She tells him he’s acting like a baby, that he needs to accept what’s happened and go forward. There’s nothing she doesn’t say to him that didn’t have me completely smiling and mentally yelling, ‘You go girl!’.

 

Overall this book really balanced itself out between love, fighting, and life changing obstacles. Don't be afraid to pick this book up if you haven't read the rest of the series, that's what I did and it complete stood on it's own 2 feet!


4/5