The Poisoner, by I.V. Ophelia | Free Audiobook
18 June 2026
What Are the Odds? (Phil-U, Book 1), by Madi Leigh | Free Audiobook
18 June 2026
Audiobook details
Buffalo was supposed to be far enough from London
Two years and an ocean away from the life she burned down in London, Alina Lis has finally built something steady: a refuge for women like herself, hidden in the quiet edges of 1890s Buffalo, where she studies the Vipera she once hunted instead of poisoning them outright. The work gives her purpose, and the distance has, for a while, felt like enough to keep the past from catching up.
It isn't. Silas Forbes never stopped looking for her, and when he finally tracks Alina down, he doesn't come alone. Luka Novikov, a man whose betrayal still marks her skin and her trust, arrives bound to Silas by debts neither of them can walk away from. Old wounds reopen fast once the three of them are in the same room again, and Alina has to decide how much of her careful new life she is willing to risk to keep all three of them breathing through what comes next.
As the human world she is protecting collides with the Vipera world she can never fully escape, loyalties start shifting in directions nobody saw coming. Some debts get paid in blood. Others get paid in something far harder to give up.
The first book sold me on the premise. This one sold me on the series. I went into The Arachnid expecting more London streets and gaslight, and got something rougher and far more interesting instead: a commune in upstate New York, a vampire who never stopped hunting, and a third voice in the mix that changes the whole dynamic.
Two years after the events of the first book, Alina has rebuilt herself far from London, leading a group of women who understand exactly what she survived. Ophelia spends real time on this new life before tearing it apart, which makes the eventual collision with Silas land harder than it would if the book rushed straight back to the old dynamic.
The addition of Luka Novikov is the biggest swing this book takes, and it pays off. He arrives as neither a clean rival nor a dependable ally. His own debts to Silas and his own history with Alina turn the triangle between the three of them into something that never settles into anything predictable.
Where the first book kept its focus tight on Alina and Silas, this one widens the lens to the larger conflict between humans and the Vipera, and the politics of that world get genuinely tense in the back half. Ophelia also leans harder into the feminist undercurrent that was only hinted at before, particularly through the women in Alina's commune.
I won't pretend the ending doesn't sting. This is a cliffhanger in the true sense, not a soft pause before book three, and I closed it out wanting the next installment immediately.
The biggest change here is the narration itself. Stephanie Willis and Matt Sykes return as Alina and Silas, joined by Sebastian Brown as Luka, and the three way dynamic in the audio is where this format earns its keep. Brown's entrance reshuffles every scene he is in, and the overlap between the three performances during the tensest confrontations makes the audiobook genuinely tense to listen to. At 13 hours and 33 minutes, it never once feels padded.
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The Arachnid by I.V. Ophelia picks up two years after the first book, moving the story from London to a hidden refuge in 1890s Buffalo, where Alina Lis has built a new life among women like herself. That peace doesn't last once Silas Forbes finds her again, and the arrival of a third character, Luka Novikov, complicates the bond between them all in ways the first book never hinted at.
The free trial, cancellable at any time, gives you full access to all 13 hours and 33 minutes, narrated in a three person cast by Sebastian Brown, Matt Sykes, and Stephanie Willis. Brown's addition as Luka shifts the dynamic of nearly every scene he enters, building on the duet style that made the first book stand out.
The audiobook remains yours forever, even after the trial ends. The free trial also gives you access to thousands of other titles, with no commitment. Start listening now.
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