Review: The Empires of Luxor City by Sasha Hope

In the aftermath of his father’s funeral, Dom Wesa, the new Alpha of Luxor City’s Central Empire, stumbles upon an Omega in desperate need of help. The Omega, Lin Vasiliev, wakes to find he’s been taken into Dom’s home to be rehabilitated. Dom thinks the young addict may have information about the illicit drug trade going on in his Empire. He gets Lin sober to question him only to discover that Lin is new in town and ignorant of Luxor’s laws.

Dom and Lin are both suspicious of each other at first for their own reasons, but as that wariness wears away a deep attraction develops between them. Dom dotes on Lin, leaving the once stone-broke Omega bathed in finery he never could have imagined. They start planning for Lin’s upcoming heat, when they will be driven together by their kindling bond and strong compatibility as an Alpha and Omega pair. However, in the midst of their swelling romance, Luxor’s most notorious Alpha reappears sparking a gang war that threatens to turn the entire city into a battleground.

Reading books and me haven't been seeing eye to eye lately. I've been devouring fan fiction in my free time. I've tried a good number of books in the interim but nothing stuck.

The Empires of Luxor by debut (published) author Sasha Hope however was one to finally catch and hold my attention. the blurb definitely is a SRAL magnet = ABO + mafia! Plus, the author is a fan fic writer so, it was a win-win-win on all fronts for me.

Overall, Empires is a solid story. We are thrown into a futuristic world where Alpha/ Beta/ Omega (ABO) society is supreme. The world is reformed after the great wars and Luxor City is the capital of New America. It's an island where gangster like empires run it in three different sectors, north, central and south. And we're thrust into the new leader of the central empire, Dom Wesa's reign. his asshole father just died and he tries to hold the empire together without resorting to drug use. And the illegal drug use leads him to a heroin addicted omega, Lin.

Dom and Lin were a cute pair. There was a little snark, some sass, a heavy dose of fluff with a little bit of action/illegal activity sprinkled in.

This read like fan fiction and I'm not hating on that all! I read lots of fan fic now, so it was super easy to jump into. But I can't rate this higher because I expected something more gritty with the world building and main characters and their positions. 

I had a couple of issues:

Lin - he's given the least amount of background. It's disappointing. We don't know nothing of why he left his home. Was he an orphan? Was he running from his troubles? What job did he have? We get the gist of why he turned to drugs for a brief time (kinda quick on shaking the heroin addiction btw) And once he's clean, he goes from shy to vixen? And the pole dancing? It read more gratuitous that helpful to the plot. 

The sex scenes between Lin and Dom - Lin has never had a heat partner. And yet he chose Dom, yet the knotting is glossed over and his first time was a bit lackluster. Again, it might be due to the author not fully laying out the ABO rules in this universe - knotting/mating seemed to be a big deal. The secondary couple's sex scene was way better than the main pair and they didn't even have half of the book to fully explore their plot.

The mafia - mmm...other than telling the reader about being gangsters and cool shooting scenes here and there, Dom wasn't all that bad. He was a teddy bear at the end of the day especially since he just took care of a random "junkie" without doing background checks, etc. My fave 'bad guy' was Jimena actually. 

Dom/Lin relationship - This is an issue I've read in a number of books. If a bad guy finally lets someone in romantically into their lives, there should be a good enough reason as to why the other person is THE ONE. Dom didn't seem so affected when he clapped eyes on Lin. And vice versa. Dom was kind of standoffish/cold and Lin sort of seemed reserved...why mate so quick if the passion wasn't at an all time high? I can ignore insta-love/mating if the passion each character consumes them (I've read a good number of stories where it's believable) But these two go from 0 to 60 then boom 100. Like the indulgent car or strip club scene? It read more for the reader and less for the characters, which sucks because I wanted to love the main characters. I ended the story being more invested in the secondary characters *cough* Jimena (who I couldn't stop picturing as Jidenna after reading the author's blog post)

Overall, the story is good. It reads lighter than it looks. Good world building, wouldn't mind more backstory about this version of omegas. I'd try this author's future works. They have great ideas.