Soulless

Alexia Tarabotti has no soul, an unmarried twenty-six year old, and half Italian, all very unfashionable things to be in Victorian England. When she accidentally kills a vampire, she gets tangled up in local supernatural politics.

I'm not usually one for steampunk or paranormal romance and yet somehow Soulless charmed me. Part of that was erotic scenes that were erotic without devolving into musky pounding and improbable contortions. Victorian social constraints give the perfect reason for characters to hold themselves back and make it feel all the better when they give in just a little bit.

On top of the romance plot, I found the rest of the plot fairly interesting, though the villain was a cardboard cutout of a mustache twirler. I am definitely going to be moving on to the next book, hoping that Alexia will have a villain to match her intelligence.