Rating: /10

Synopsis

In a cyberpunk future, an alarming disease strikes, dissolving the bones of those with cybernetic enhancements. Petya, a refugee, sells himself to a company experimenting with a potential cure and instead finds himself with a strange new implant… and a vampiric hunger for teeth. 

Petya only wanted a short trial with easy money, and now he’s at the mercy of a company hell-bent on market control, even if it means turning him into their personal pharmaceutical assassin. 

They’re out for political power, and Petya is out for an escape and teeth.

Quick Review

Toothsucker is a truly wild story with a unique mash-up of genres and tropes, with vampires born of cybernetic implants. I’ve never read anything quite like it.

Full Review

Kaden Love’s Toothsucker is a weird and fun genre-mashup of cyberpunk and paranormal. In it, we meet Petya, an immigrant to The Republic who came seeking an escape from his home—only to fall into the clutches of a scheming CEO. As part of his work with the company, Petya has been implanted with a cybernetic augment that makes him stronger, faster, and harder to kill—but at the cost of a disease that will consume him. The only way to prevent it, and maintain his strength, is to eat teeth. Human teeth.

That’s all explained (more or less) in the first couple of pages. Love doesn’t stop there, as the plot only becomes more wild and we learn about the CEO’s true goals.

I am of two minds with this book. On one hand, it is unabashedly fun. I truly enjoyed this, especially once we got past the first couple of introductory chapters and into the meat of the story. Love is exploring some really interesting things here, and a premise I’ve personally never even seen anyone attempt. In a world where everybody is recommending the same ten books on social media, Toothsucker feels different and I absolutely love that. And at no point is Love afraid to try something new—because let me tell you that I was not prepared for this book’s ending.

That said, a few things didn’t quite land for me here. A romance blossoms partway through this book, and it felt extremely forced. I think it could have worked if Love eased into it and provided more of an arc, but the romance was never really given any time for that. Petya’s romantic interest also doesn’t really get to do anything in this book. Perhaps she will play a larger role moving forward, but she just kind of followed him around and helped give him confidence. These were very sweet scenes, but felt a bit unearned.

And then there’s the ending, which although very fun, struck me as a bit too silly. I won’t dig too deep into spoilers, but suffice it to say there’s a reveal which had basically no foreshadowing, and read unlike any prior scene. It was jarring, and while I think some people will relish in the action I do think it will make others bounce off of the whole series.

Ultimately, I really appreciate that Toothsucker is trying something different by combining genres and ideas this way, and I often read for longer than I was expecting whenever I picked the book up. At the same time, I think it needed to be a longer book to create a more convincing romantic subplot and better set up the ending. 

That said, it’s worth keeping in mind that this is only book one in the series, and having spoken with the author I know he has big plans for it. Book two, Chromatic Creep has already been announced at time of writing, and is coming soon—and out of sheer curiosity for what Love will do next—I am going to pick it up.

I recommend Toothsucker. At the end of the day, I had fun with this book, and it’s offering something that nothing else is quite doing. For those reasons alone, I think it’s worth a try.