The Amalfi Curse

Powerful witchcraft. A hunt for sunken treasure. Forbidden love on the high seas. Beware the Amalfi Curse…

Haven Ambrose, a trailblazing nautical archaeologist, has come to the sun-soaked village of Positano to investigate the mysterious shipwrecks along the Amalfi Coast. But Haven is hoping to find more than old artifacts beneath the azure waters; she is secretly on a quest to locate a trove of priceless gemstones her late father spotted on his final dive. Upon Haven’s arrival, strange maelstroms and misfortunes start plaguing the town. Is it nature or something more sinister at work?

As Haven searches for her father’s sunken treasure, she begins to unearth a centuries-old tale of ancient sorcery and one woman’s quest to save her lover and her village by using the legendary art of stregheria, a magical ability to harness the ocean. Could this magic be behind Positano’s latest calamities? Haven must unravel the Amalfi Curse before the region is destroyed forever…

Against the dazzling backdrop of the Amalfi Coast, this bewitching novel shimmers with mystery, romance and the untamed magic of the sea.

• The Amalfi Curse by Sarah Penner
• Published by: Harlequin Audio on April 29, 2025
• Genre: Mystery, fantasy, romance, historical fiction
• Listening length: 10 hours 1 min
• Dates listened: 6.18.25 – 6.26.25 (9 days)
• Format: Audiobook
• Narrators: Saskia Maarleveld, Carlotta Brentan, Chris Andrew Ciulla, Eric Yang
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• ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
• 🌶🌶

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Look, I’m a little late to some of the amazing authors that are out there currently. I’ve heard many, many people rave about The Lost Apothecary, and I even have it sitting on my shelf right now, just waiting to be read. But I had no idea that Sarah Penner was such an amazing storyteller! This was what I needed to kick my rear into checking out her other book. Because if it’s even just half as good as this one…then I am excited for it!

Holy Toledo, Batman, this book had it all!!! The physical book is 336 pages, and the audiobook is just a smidgen over 10 hours long, and I have no idea how Penner managed to do the things that she did in this book, in that amount of time! It literally had almost every genre you can think of. There’s the mystery of the Amalfi Curse and why so many ships seem to sink in this beautiful place. Does it have anything to do with the rumored stregheria, sea witches who have powers that let them control the sea? Why has Haven’s mentor, a man who was best friends with her father and also saved her life once, suddenly shown up? Does he know about the sunken treasure her father, on his deathbed, made her promise to find?

Inhale, he’d taught her, and count five or six stars. Imagine they form a shape, that they are something altogether different than stars. Just as you are different than your feelings, your pain. They do not make you who you are.

There’s adventure as Haven scours her father’s journals and the local archives, trying to piece together the mystery of where the sunken treasure is. You’ll find history as Penner takes you on a trip to explore the Amalfi Coast. You will feel the sea spray on your face and smell the brine of the ocean air, as she pulls you back in time and tells you the story of a young woman living in Positano, Italy. You will love the dual romances, as you ache for Mari and Holmes, and pine for Haven and Enzo. The story is told in two timelines, present day (Haven and Enzo) and the past, 1820s (Mari and Holmes), but Penner does such an amazing job at intertwining both of these timelines. I sometimes have a love/hate relationship with multiple timeline books. I either love it, or I end up lost…in time! Haha No, but seriously. I have noticed that sometimes in some books that have multiple timelines, it’s done in a way that I can’t really tell which timeline I’m reading, and I get confused. This book’s timelines were done perfectly! And I enjoyed the multiple POVs, primarily told from the two FMCs in the book.

So if you’re looking for a book that has mystery, suspense, romance, supernatural, fantasy, adventure, and beautiful descriptions of places you want to go…then this book has it all for you! Spoiler/triggers: closed-door romance, kidnapping, murder, death of a family member, HEA.