The Lord of Misrule: Ritual (The Paranormal World, #1)
About
Reporter. Ritual. Revenge. One week until winter solstice—and Venice is hiding something ancient and deadly.
When ambitious journalist Alessandra Donati pitches an exposé on Venice's elite Saturnalia cult, she's betting her career on century-old rumors of blood sacrifice and occult power. What she finds is far worse than tabloid fodder—and it wants her dead.
The city's wealthiest gather each December for a festival that's anything but Christian. Seven days of debauchery. Bodies that vanish without trace. And at the center: Paolo Galvan, textile magnate, whose lovers have a habit of disappearing right before the winter solstice.
Alex plans to seduce him for the story. She doesn't plan on the intoxicating pull he exerts—or the shape-shifting killer wearing her dead friend's face who murders Galvan in front of her.
Fleeing a supernatural assassin through Venice's winter streets, Alex discovers the cult members aren't human. They're something older. Something that's been hiding in plain sight for centuries, buying power with ritual and blood.
Enter the Goodfellow twins: sharp, dangerous, and hunting the same monsters that are hunting her. Their mother died investigating this cult. Now they want revenge—and they need Alex's insider knowledge to get it.
To survive the week, Alex must infiltrate the Saturnalia festival itself. Navigate a world where masked revelers conceal monstrous faces. Where pleasure and sacrifice intertwine. Where three women who looked exactly like her have already vanished.
Because the winter solstice is coming. The festival's final night demands a blood offering.
And this year, Alex is on the menu.
For readers who crave: paranormal romance with bite • investigative journalist heroines • Venetian Gothic atmosphere • ancient cults in modern settings • supernatural conspiracy thrillers • shapeshifter villains • dual-POV romance • serial installments • Mediterranean dark fantasy
Ritual is book one in the five-part Lord of Misrule series—a paranormal romance serial where every installment escalates the danger, the passion, and the body count.