 | Famine (The Four Horsemen, #3) by Laura Thalassa ★★★★☆ Read: May 15, 2026 512 pages |
Of the three Horsemen I’ve met so far, Famine might be the cruelest — and somehow one of the most affecting.
Where Pestilence stumbled into love almost against his will, Famine resists it with his entire being. He doesn’t just kill; he believes in it. His indifference to humanity feels ancient, absolute, and immovable, which makes watching that certainty slowly crack the entire engine of the book.
Ana is exactly the kind of heroine this story needed. She arrives with justified rage, a knife, and scars that run deeper than the visible ones, but she never becomes one-note. She’s sharp-tongued, stubborn, funny, and empathetic in a way that feels almost inconvenient. Not soft because life has been kind to her, but compassionate despite the fact that it hasn’t. That distinction is what makes her so compelling.
The slow burn here is thornier than the previous books. Famine doesn’t soften easily. He resists, deflects, misunderstands, and makes horrifying choices even when he’s trying to adjust. But that’s also why the intimacy, when it finally comes, feels earned. This isn’t a clean redemption arc. It’s messy, brutal, and emotionally complicated — which is exactly why it works.
Thalassa does a great job balancing apocalypse, banter, horror, and tenderness without letting the romance erase the violence of the world around them. The Brazilian setting gave this installment its own texture, and Ana’s backstory added real emotional weight without pulling focus from the central dynamic.
The ending definitely makes the next book feel bigger and more inevitable. I’m not rushing into Death yet, because these books are heavy slow burns and apparently I value my emotional stability a little, but I am very curious to see how everything ends.
One production note for GraphicAudio listeners: the performances were good, but the sound design was too heavy-handed for me. Music and ambient effects often overpowered the narration, especially during emotional, intimate, or travel-heavy scenes. If intrusive production bothers you, the standard audiobook may be the better choice.
Pestilence still holds the top spot for me, but Famine pushed War firmly into third.
Tropes: apocalyptic romance · enemies-to-lovers · forced proximity · captor/captive · morally grey MMC · Sex worker FMC · divine being/human romance · slow burn · revenge · reluctant protector · touch-her-and-die energy · emotional caretaking
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