Review of a Fairy Hunter’s Guide to the Recently Undead by Cynthia Prith
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review.TW’s: death, violence, toxic marriage/borderline abusive, sexual content.My rati
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review.
TW’s: death, violence, toxic marriage/borderline abusive, sexual content.
My rating: 3.25
So this is going to be brief and rushed a bit-I’m in grad school, and the semester sucks, so I’m gonna try my best to pull some stuff out from memory but it’s going to suck. Sorry.
Okay. Here’s the thing. I think if I was in the right mood-I would’ve LOVED this book. But I unfortunately read this while I was in grad school. Honestly. It never gripped me, never. And that’s not to say I think it never would’ve, but it just didn’t feel fast paced and honestly the pace reminded me of the books I was reading for my classes.
It just wasn’t super memorable. The main character was okay, and I did like the plot of her husband and his weird lover-friend-assistant guy (what even WAS he?) and I liked the romance between her and her knight. I also think the world-building did a fairly good job.
For me, for when I read it, it was just underwhelming, very much so. The plot dragged, the pay off wasn’t that great, and I just think there could have been more to it.
Book Review for the Notorious Virtues by Alwyn Hamilton
4/5: I received a free e-galley/ARC in exchange for an honest review. My Rating: 3.5 CW’s: mentions of death and murder, loss of a par
I received a free e-galley/ARC in exchange for an honest review.My Rating: 3.5CW’s: mentions of death and murder, loss of a parent, violence
I received a free e-galley/ARC in exchange for an honest review.
My Rating: 3.5
CW’s: mentions of death and murder, loss of a parent, violence, murder attempts, toxic family dynamics,
So, off the bat, this wasn’t a bad book. There was something whimsical about it. I like the setting, the magic system, and how the book began. I will note that the format this was sent to me in what disjointed and badly formatted. But I don’t really plan to hold that against the book or the author.
Hionora (Nora) was flawed from the jumped. But in a realistic way. She’s a teenage girl who has just lost her mother to murder. But aside from that, a teenage girl raised in wealth and affluence. It makes sense that she’s a bit of a brat, smug, and spoiled. That is literally was she is built to be. Lotte is the opposite, because she isn’t raised in that same environment. I think Hamilton did a really good job here of having her characters (including Knight Theo) be realistic to the world and situation they grew up in.
The world feels realistic too. The magic system is unique and I liked the idea of “Knights” becoming body guards in this urban fantasy type world. But as the book fleshes out, there are some realistic portrayals of how women are treated. Exploitation still exists. And I think that’s realistic and handled well. I do think there is some lacking in the development of why this world isn’t ours but has many of the same turns of phrase (”damsel in distress” and “fairy takes” are two that come to mind). But I think I can allow for some wiggle room on that.
I will admit, I was a little disappointed Lotte was Nora’s cousin. I think this concept would’ve been great as an opposites attract/Romona and Juliet kind of deal. Like a sapphic star crossed lover story with a really cool magic system.
I think the development of the “trials” plot was pretty okay. It took a bit to get started, I think the author wanted to develop the characters and create a baseline for who would be competing and the history behind it with the folktales/fairytales.
I think the author did a good job of establishing the world building AND the characters’ motivations at the same time. She did an amazing job of building and fleshing out the mythology while making the motivations of the characters work. Each of the characters had qualities to them that were still redeeming, their motivations made sense with how they were raised and their characterizations. It felt consistent throughout the book.
The build up of the plot, the mystery, and the central climax was pretty good. I like the way the relationships developed. Both the familial ones and the romantic ones. I think the author did a pretty good job of building those outs and fleshing them into a developed relationship. The complex motivations involved in those relationships were well done.
I think the way the plot and mystery worked out was good too, not super shocking series of twists, but relatively good.
4/5: I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review My Rating: 4.25 stars CW’s: nothing major, some mentions of death, so
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review
My Rating: 4.25 stars
CW’s: nothing major, some mentions of death, some mentions of obsessive relationships, some mentions of disability (off page, happened prior to book’s beginning), talks of infidelity/affairs.
Honestly, with the state of the world, I needed something cute and fun, something a bit weird with a gothic twist. This book honestly fits that perfect. I liked the narrative (and Andi) right from the start. Also, a MMC named Hugo (romantic) and a cat who “like to go by ‘The Master’”? That’s iconic. I love a house ruled by a cat.
I’ll be honest, some of the character development is slow. But I think it works for the book. The book feels cozy in that lazy-sunday sort of way. So things are slow going because that’s sort of the part of the book. But the book doesn’t feel like a slog to get through, it doesn’t really feel like it’s dragging. The book makes the laziness work, it makes the slow plot and character arcs work without the book having to be fast paced. It strikes this balance between being a book with a thriller/spooky aspect to it (the ghost/mystery portion of it) to a book with a softer cozy rom-com aspect to it, with a splash of book-nerdiness.
I think the family dynamic was done really well, especially between Hugo and his mother, and then Jasper. Their identities and gender expressions (Jasper is gay and Hugo likes wearing dresses, heels, wigs, and make up, but is straight) were really interesting explorations. I think the focus on that for male characters was done really nicely and tastefully, and avoided a lot of stereotypes. The salacious angle of their mother being the grandfather’s former mistress who then married their father after her lover died was a fun spin and so juicy. I loved it. The author did a good job of not only setting that up, but finding humor in it.
Andi’s family dynamics were fleshed out well, bits and pieces were dropped in a way that felt organic. And it kept going as plot was revealed. And it all worked well. To me, it didn’t feel like anything was outlandish. Sure, the family’s weird (weirder as the book goes on, especially in the last third) but the author does a good job of setting up and fleshing out character and their relationships that nothing in the family seems out of the blue or like it didn’t make sense with the story. They were eccentric, but in the context of how they were each raised and their life circumstances, it makes sense.
As for the development of the story, while the development is pretty slow and drawn out, something about the writing just made that not awful. I think when a book doesn’t have much plot, and the book drags, it’s up to the author’s writing and characters to make up for it. And Lovering accomplishes that with the Tanith family, Jay the gardner, and Andi. And as one particular plot twist is revealed, more of the book makes sense, and characterization is both justified and shifted. The reveal doesn’t seem out-of-the-blue upon reflection. I thought “oh yeah, I can totally see this about that character” and the reveals land because the narrator has no reason to suspect different, but the observed behavior works with the reveal. And Andi, our narrator, justifiably has the back story that would make sense with how she analyzes the people around her.
The ending was really nice. It wasn’t too low stakes or too highstakes. It didn’t feel like a bunch was being packed in to a short number of pages. And best of all, it felt like an organic end. I felt like yes, the end was a BIT convenient. But I kind of liked the route the author took even if it was.
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest reviewCW’s: Violence, some bigotry.My Rating: 3.5 starsSo Orbit has produced a lot of b
4/5: I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review CW’s: Violence, some bigotry. My Rating: 3.5 stars So Orbit has produced
CW’s: Violence, some bigotry.
I recieved a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review
My Rating: 3.5 stars
So Orbit has produced a lot of bangers for me, and one dud (Once Was Willem) and I read this book coming off of Greenteeth, a five-star read, so that’s the context for when I read this book.
It wasn’t bad to start. It did feel very generic initially but got better as it went on, and I didn’t quite feel that same electric grab-your-attention feeling as I did with Harvest of Hearts, Lucy Undying, and Greenteeth. But it wasn’t bad at the beginning either. And it wasn’t really boring either, not quite.
It was actually pretty entertaining as the book went on. I really like Naila’s chapters. Her development was a bit cliche, for sure, and it was kind of run-of-the-mill fantasy in a lot of ways. But I definitely didn’t see a lot of copy-paste stuff from other books. I liked the more scholarly aspect of the magic, and I thought the “linguistic” aspect of magic (that doing magic was about memorizing phonemes). The magic system was really cool, and I liked it a lot. I think Naila really was a good and realistic character in that aspect.
Small detail I liked, the endearment “habibiti” which is an arabic/middle eastern term of endearment. Which, as a woman of Middle Eastern descent (my dad’s persian) I loved! And there did seem to be some of that influence in some of the naming conventions.
I will say I was back and forth over who I shipped. In a perfect word, it would’ve been Naila and Ko’lani, but I suspected it’ll be Haelius and Naila, which I’m okay with too. My favorite dynamic is “pretty little cutie with weird little (big) freak” and I think I’m just in that mood for that dynamic lately. And this book was just a bit too…I don’t know normal for me. I like a little edge of weirdness or oddness to my books. I like a little eccentric-ness in my characters and I didn’t get enough of that from Haelius, Naila, or any of the other characters. And honestly, for me, Naila and Haelius were the only ones that felt developed enough for me to care about them. The other POVs more felt like set up for the political world building. Larinne and Dailem were more interesting that the others, and I think there was a really interesting angle the author used by creating a world with Ancient Rome vibes (with the Senators) but allowing women to be in those roles. The others, I just didn’t care that much about and they felt kind of flat to me.
I do have to praise the world building here. The magic system was cool (though I wish the phonemes bit had been focused on more) and I liked the political system too (which I also think could have been focused on more). The threat of war did feel real, as did the class divisions and divisions between factions and mages vs. non mages. I did feel some of Naila’s loneliness and this “hollow” vs. magic type of deal they had more viscerally.
I still can’t figure out where the romance is supposed to be going (or if there is a romance at all) by the 70% mark. The chemistry just isn’t there for me between anyone. And by 88% I guess Larinne and Haelius are a thing?? I don’t see it, honestly.
The ending was okay, I guess, eventful, fairly impactful, but it just felt rushed, honestly. I think it could’ve been spaced out more. In the end, I just don’t think I plan on picking up the sequel. I think it might be psychological because I tend to not really be into sequels and want sequels from stand alones.
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest reviewCW’s: era-appropriate sexism, religious trauma/hatred, involves witch trials, vio
5/5: I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review CW’s: era-appropriate sexism, religious trauma/hatred, involves witch tr
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review
CW’s: era-appropriate sexism, religious trauma/hatred, involves witch trials, violence, death, animal death (on page), death of a child (prior to book’s beginning, off page), mentions of blood, threats of violence against children.
My Rating: 5 stars
So this definitely falls into the cozier fantasy category in that it starts off pretty slow. The writing is engaging, so it doesn’t feel super boring per se. But it doesn’t make a big deal out of having a fast paced plot. I actually really loved the narrative voice. It was just somehow just engaging enough but not too much.
Also, right off the bat, Jenny was a little weirdo. I stan little wiggly weirdos with hunched little bodies and constant freakiness. Like Rumplestiltskin in Once Upon a Time. That little weirdo factor in a woman? Even better! A lady who’s a socially awkward, sort of crazy, spooky little freaky weirdo? An icon. A fave. O’Neil also managed to make socially awkward in a way that felt natural. Not a “ooh-ee I’m so cringe and random” type of way but a “I live in a bog and don’t see many humans” type of way.
Additionally, THIS is a good example of a historic fantasy. It’s not overly boring, the character aren’t mind numbing, and it doesn’t feel like the historical setting is just an excuse to put little effort into fleshing out women characters. Jenny and Temprance have barely been on page and they’re already being well developed.
Not only is she a freaky little weirdo, but Jenny is protective over Temprance, and they have this dynamic of “you’re my first friend in a long time” thing and I LOVE it.
The vibes are also immaculate, very much like Harvest of Hearts which was one of my favorite books of the year so far (and probably will be overall).
I also felt like the villain was an actually threatening guy, he was an actual menace, they combined this human persona with this Fae persona and both on their own would be menacing enough. But together? It made the stakes feel real.
Also, I love the little side characters. Brackus? Icon. Gwynn and his Queen? Iconic. The dog? Perfect. The fact that there are MULTIPLE Jenny’s? Absolutely a great decision. The world building and all the different creatures, from humans, dogs (Cavall my love!), Jennys, wisps, and other Fae, to menacing figures like the Erl King were really well done. The mythology felt well done and well understood while not occupying huge amounts of the narrative space. I didn’t feel like the author was spending loads of time developing the world, she did a good job of doing things gradually and efficiently without risking development. The creatures felt genuine in the way they acted and operated. They weren’t these smooth talking sex symbols that a lot of books about Fae make them to be. They’re awkward, weird, and have a variety of emotions, motivations, and personalities. But for the most part, they don’t know how to really human. Even the Erl King, the villain, who succeeds from disguising himself amongst humans, can’t be fully human. He’s still not genuinely “normal” and takes the form of a Witch Finder. He can’t help but being a sinister weirdo.
Jenny was really realistic. She wasn’t this super good person off the bat. The longer the book went on, the more layered she was revealed to be. She struggled with her own morality, so did Temperance and Brackus. They all had their moments of making decisions that were legitimately difficult to make. Their back stories and motivations fit into their actions throughout the book. Temperance and Jenny in particular.
And best of all, all of them had real, actual and possibly devastating vulnerabilities that impacted their hopes at success. Even as a cozy fantasy, there was still a real conflict. There were realized stakes that made you worry about it not working out. The villain worked so well because the heroes had to face physical, magical, and more limitations. Temperance and Jenny in particular had to decide what was against their conscience or not and decide if they were willing to sacrifice one thing for their goal. They were allowed to make compromises and keep their conscience while still challenging themselves. Their core beings never changed. They made progress, they developed, they had a character arc, but their core values stayed strong.
The author also kept it consistent in terms of acknowledging how much time had passed. She made that apparent, directly referenced it, and made it impact the characters. Especially Temperance who had young children, months matter with young kids.
Like I mentioned, the historic setting was really done. It felt like it made sense and was realistic, including dialogue and narrative, but it didn’t do that at the sacrifice of entertainment or core message. It allowed the women to still be active players in the plot while facing era appropriate challenges, but didn’t make it detrimental to the portrayal of women. Women were allowed to be dynamic and well rounded, they weren’t the victims of excessive and unnecessary violence. and they could be flawed. Men weren’t centered but weren’t demonized either. There were good men and bad men, good women and bad women, it didn’t feel like Temperance or Jenny were “not like other girls” either.
And oh my god the last 25%. Oh myyyy goooooddddd I was locked in, horrified, terrified, scared, on the edge of my seat, grieving, screaming internally, all of it. The Erl King was a terrifying villain throughout, the tension in the book built him up masterfully and he delivered. The ending had me gasping and gripping my e-reader tightly. And the epilogue was so cute, I loved it so much. Props to Molly O’Neil for making as terrifying of a villain as she did making lovable protagonists.
Absolutely amazing. A definite contender for my top 5 books of the year.
Okay, from the jump, I was actually engaged. Sure, the formatting was a bit odd on my device, because of how PDF’s show up on Kindle (and allowing the format to be changeable when you upload it to Kindle messes with chapter layouts, whatever).
But formatting issues aside, the book was off to a good start. I liked the writing style, the narration, and the portal fantasy aspect of this book.
I do think there is definitely an aspect of this book that’s corny and clichéd, which, with the genre, is close to being a given.
I think the premise is interesting, and the portal fantasy aspect works nicely. But there isn’t a lot of uniqueness to it. Same old same old of a magical land with fae and other creatures. There wasn’t mich that was new in it. But I think it’s pretty difficult to be original with books anymore.
I do think there’s a unique element with the family dynamic. There’s this estrangement on multiple sides between her and her parents and her and her brother. it added an interesting element and I did feel like it was well done. It does feel like the sibling dynamic was written realistically and by someone who has a sibling or knows how they are.
Again, there is just some cliché aspect of the plot that doesn’t feel super original. And the sex scenes leave a lot to be desired. There’s definitely a compelling aspect to it, but it’s more similar to reality TV or a CW show than anything else. Which doesn’t mean it’s not as addicting, but I do think the quality does match it. And that does match it.
Honestly, the more the book progressed, the less interested I became. It seemed a huge chunk of this book was either sex scenes, Evie arguing with her love interest Kit, a bunch of different people with varying degrees of weird names with little personality. And honestly fairly boring world development. I think this book could have been really good if there had been more fleshing out of the world, the characters, and the plot. I think there was a lot of promise in this book and it just…missed a mark.
But god, I just wanted to shake Evie so bad. I wanted to throttle her. She was just SO stupid and reckless and annoying sometimes. She didn’t make any sense with her decisions half of the time. It was…aggravating.
I also had a hard time seeing the “bad guys” as anything but flat, cartoonish, and one-dimensional. There just wasn’t enough time devoted to development of these characters, the magic system, and the world. And that meant everything suffered and nothing really made complete sense.
It was also just riddled with clichés. This “chosen one” cliché, the super-special-super-gorgeous FMC who has this secret parent no one will tell her about and this great power that no one else has. And no one else is like her. But she’s, like, spunky and feisty too.
Not a bad book, just…disappointing. I feel like it could’ve been so much more.
CW’s: violence, a lot of religious iconography/talk but appropriate for the era, some body horror, death, main character is raised from the
2/5: CW’s: violence, a lot of religious iconography/talk but appropriate for the era, some body horror, death, main character is raised from
CW’s: violence, a lot of religious iconography/talk but appropriate for the era, some body horror, death, main character is raised from the dead.
My Rating: 2.25 stars
Let me start by saying I usually LOVE Orbit’s titles.
This was a huge disappointment, because I LOVE Orbit.
Honestly. I just don’t think this book was my cup of tea. I mean, it scratched a bit of an itch in that it hit similar to a history book, or a Primary source like some kind of journal. But it just didn’t evoke a lot of anything in me initially. It took a bit to get into the book and to focus on it because it had that undercurrent of a historic novel. And it is Historic Fantasy, so that makes sense.
I think the narrator really did this book a service in that he was engaging. The chapters being shorter and titled helped too.
This is definitely a book that leans into the “historical” part of “historical fantasy” and is also character driven, rather than plot driven or driven by the magic. I would definitely say it’s also relatively low-fantasy, so there’s not a lot of world building to speak of. Which really does shift the focus of this book and the kind of audience who would like it.
This book crawls at a snail’s pace, if you’re used to reading historical/non fiction books, it’s really not that slow nor does it feel out of place. The book reads similar to an autobiography, and it essentially is an ficitonal/fantastical autobiography.
There is a pretty heavy religious component, it’s time appropriate, so it isn’t out of nowhere, but there are a lot of mentions of someone’s “Spirit” as well as “God” and “Children of Adam and Eve” throughout the novel. It honestly, for me, does detract from the novel. But this is more of a personal preference than something I think is outright badly done per se. It does pull the rating down a bit, for me, but I don’t think the religious component outwardly problematic in itself. Maybe if I were more cynical or critical, I might wonder if this era was chosen on purpose to make the religious component make sense. But I don’t know.
Anna was an okay character, she wasn’t the most dynamic FMC I’ve read, and it definitely seems she’s written as a love interest rather than another character. But I think it’s hard to find really well written, fleshed out, dynamic women/girl characters written by men. It’s just the state of writing.
The writing is very stylistic, it’s this weird religious-fantasy kind of vibe to it, it feels very much like a parable mixed with historical narrative or an old fashioned fable, but again, like mentioned prior, there’s this historical edge that almost feels too boring. The pace is pretty slow going, it moves at a snail’s pace.
I also would’ve liked to see more of Bethali’s story. It would’ve been a really good opportunity for a female-rage plotline. There could have been this element of an angry woman seeking revenge on a man (Cain Caradoc) who is a genuinely awful and selfish person. And worse, the book focuses more on this man than it does on the women who deserve attention more. It kind of seems like I was supposed to like him? I couldn’t tell. I genuinely couldn’t tell if I was supposed to like the women or not, or dislike them, or find them too angry? Because I felt none of those things but they didn’t feel like they got the attention and focus and care they deserved and all of that energy and writing was poured into Willem and Cain Caradoc, who, respectively, were boring and awful. I think it’s possible to make a villainous character/anti-hero charismatic, iconic, and funny. Some examples, Rumplestiltskin and Regina from Once Upon a Time, or the MMC from The Familiar by Leigh Bardugo, which is also a good example of a FMC. More are Solomir from the For the Wolf sequel, For the Throne, all the MMC’s from The Enchanted Isles, even Sylvester from Harvest of Hearts I totally love the evil little wretch when they’re well done, this just wasn’t.
I think this book also just suffered from too many characters that are just this one-and-done kind of thing. They last a few chapters at most (many of these characters who are treated as disposable are women) and have little in the means of character arcs.
And honestly? The more I read of this book the more the writing seemed like it was trying too hard. I don’t think calling it purple prose even covers it. It just felt like the author wanted to write a novel that would become a classic or win an award. I don’t know, it just felt like this writing wasn’t organic.
Overall, I just kept hitting this problem of feeling like I could care a bit, like it a bit, and then I’d go right back to being bored of the characters, the plot, and the writing.
Honestly? I didn’t even care about the climax, about Cain Caradoc’s Cosham rising up, or his defeat. I just couldn’t bring myself to root for anyone. Even the women in the book fell flat for me. Willem felt too much like a passive observer and I was never on the edge of my seat or gripping my Kindle in anticipation. I didn’t eat this book up.
Demond Bound and Hell Sent by Nina K Westra Review
3/5: CW’s: sex, sexual assault within the first chapter, blood, gore, threat of SA, marital/domestic violence, emotional abuse, sexual abuse
CW’s: sex, sexual assault within the first chapter, blood, gore, threat of SA, marital/domestic violence, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, bod
CW’s: sex, sexual assault within the first chapter, blood, gore, threat of SA, marital/domestic violence, emotional abuse, sexual abuse, body horror, cursing.
My rating for both: 3 stars
Okay. Jesus. Within the first chapter I was already getting the ick. i couldn’t tell what the setting was and this guy, this husband, is awful. Like the way he talks to her? And how he basically tells her the demon will violently rip her apart and SA her? Not off to a good start at all. Like I get it, dark fantasy romance, whatever. But I think there’s a way to do that without threatening SA by a demon and implying SA by her husband.
The author did a good job of making me hate Nirlan with a passion. But again, I think it’s possible to hate a male character wiithout SA coming into the picture. And we can portray a relationship that doesn’t work and has no love in it without the women suffering in that way. Women can suffer emotionally knowing they’re in a loveless marriage, there can be infidelity. I just don’t think Raiya had to be put through that, I don’t think the reader has to be put through that.
I will say, as I read further, seeing people who bound the demon get killed by said demon is total karmic justice. I would’ve liked to see Nirlan killed then too, though I suppose there needs to be a long-lasting villain.
Is it kind of interesting that the demon Azereth-or-whatever can feed off her pleasure? And that she makes a pact with him that requires consent? Yes. Is it still trash? Yes. Do I like this brand of trash like I like watching YouTube clips of Love Island?
Also yes.
The sex scenes were okay, I guess. Pretty bleh and cliched, not special but not overtly bad either.
I didn’t feel like the side characters really stood out either. They weren’t bad. A lot of this book is just an absence of either good or bad.
When Azereth and Raiya fought, I just didn’t feel a lot. I didn’t connect to the emotionality in the plot. And it’s not that I think there was none-I just didn’t connect to what was there. I wanted to, I really did. But I couldn’t manage it. I honestly wanted to just get it over with to move on to other books i had waiting on me to read.
The world building wasn’t the worst I’ve seen, but it just felt inorganic and like I was just being told about the different groups and kingdoms, nothing felt smooth or woven well into the story. I think worldbuilding shouldn’t feel so obvious, I don’t know.
I do think the author did some good things with some of the world, especially the magic system. And i think she did a good job, additionally, on developing Raiya’s abilities and the pace at which she did that. There are some really interesting threads here.
I do think there’s some shakiness in how she portrays the nomads here, who travel with a caravan. It feels a little like a parallel to the Romani people and it feels just a bit flat. I don’t know, I’m not qualified to touch on that.
The qualifiers and verbs in the dialogue were a bit flat too. The dialogue was shaky. But honestly, I’ve read much worse and it communicated parts of the story and did its job. And when the characters had good chemistry, the dialogue was actually pretty funny.
As the book developed, the world building did too, and once I was 62% of the way in, and the author had a more firm ground for her world, her characters, and the different groups (especially the “cults”) . It all worked really well for her. It gave some PrPrincess Bride type vibes in terms of the type of fantasy.
I do think it’s a little weird that the author chose to make demons born adults, which put Azereth as kind of ten years old?!? That was a little weird to me.
Overall. the plot of the book progressed pretty well, I liked the found family aspect a lot w/ Madira and Jai, and I liked the ending. The progression of their relationship was really sweet.
I will say, Hell Sent is really just a few chapters of new information/background, then a different POV of the events of the book (Azereth rather than Raiya). But I do think it added to the first book.
4/5: CW’s: blood, gore, violence, mentions of abuse and parental emotional abuse . My Rating: 3.5 I received a free e-galley in exchang
CW’s: blood, gore, violence, mentions of abuse and parental emotional abuse
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My Rating: 3.5
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review
So I actually really liked the beginning of this book. Was it a book with stellar writing, plot and characters? No. Will it win awards? Probably not. But it hit that itch in my brain for paranormal romances, urban fantasy, and 2010s YA-aesthetic nostalgia that I have been trying so hard to recapture. I also loved that it captured those feelings while not being about 17 year-olds; Late college aged and older is far easier for me to connect with/relate to than the teenagers that populate a lot of fantasy and romantasy. I want an addictive book that’s like a drug to my brain, or junk food, without feeling so disconnected all the time.
I think there’s an interesting comparison to Twilight here, and other paranormal stories. There isn’t this element of “I’m attracted to this evil creature” but a more realistic “this thing I saw killed my friend, I am now going to obsess to an unhealthy degree over it, fixate on it, and be unable to stop thinking about”. Juliette has PTSD, she feels phantom pains where her wounds were, she feels brutal survivor’s guilt and can’t stop going through the “what-if’s” over her friend’s murder. When other people move on, she feels angry and defensive of her friend’s memory. Juliette’s pain feels realized and like it should, she’s terrified and vulnerable and trying to make sense of the change in her world view. Yes she has a crazy research board in her closet, yes I think she’s earned that right considering her friend died and she almost did too.
Also Alex’s card being “Vampiric Investigations” absolutely sent me into orbit, that was so funny. I don’t know if it was intentionally funny, but it was. And Juliette actually does the reasonable thing in first off, being incredibly hesitant to trust some random guy, secondly suspicious of his motivations, and third: running multiple searches to figure out who he is.
The book is definitely corny, a little clunky in the writing, but I don’t think it’s necessarily more clunky than other books in the genre. I liked that Alex was actually 24. The lack of a huge age gap was a really nice change up from the usual in the genre, and it didn’t feel too much like the relationship was at all toxic.
Alex’s world had laws that stayed consistent, with a governing system that had consequences for infractions/breaking of the laws it created. And the way both Alex and Juliette interacted with all of that felt realistic and like it made sense. Alex’s character aligns with eventually saying “screw it” to the laws he was worried about, and Juliette’s character was consistently stubborn all the way through.
Plot progressed pretty normally for this genre, again, it was a bit cheesy, but I don’t really expect it not to me when I picked up a book with this premise.
I think the progression of the mystery was okay. I do think it could’ve been paced out a little better, and I will say I didn’t really see the actual killer (or “the Knife Man” which is a bit cheesy in itself) coming. But I didn’t feel especially surprised or have an emotional reaction either. I didn’t quite feel that shock. So I do think there could’ve been improvement for more. But I do think the author did a good job at the end of setting up a mystery for the next book.
There is definitely some to be desired with the Alex/Juliette romance. But I will say that since this is not a standalone, I think that definitely isn’t so bad. Because there are other books to develop that as well. I think the author wrote this book with sequels in mind and she did a really good job of that. And I was really looking forward to their first kiss, and I liked how it was done. It felt organic and cute and sweet for my fanfic-loving-heart.
5/5: I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review CW’s: Violence, death, some body horror, violence against children, chil
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest reviewCW’s: Violence, death, some body horror, violence against children, children are
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review
CW’s: Violence, death, some body horror, violence against children, children are involved in the body horror, lots of discussion around looks, talks of class/classicism, violence is based on socioeconomic status, abusive and manipulative family dynamics, one closed-door sex scene.
Contains spoilers
My Rating: 4.75
Right off the bat I liked the writing style. I felt like Eames did a really good job with the flow of the story. Nothing felt stilted or too juvenile. The book didn’t feel robotic or like there was too much exposition. There wasn’t this telling-not-showing element to it. But the language felt so effortlessly beautiful as I read it.
The magic system and plot were so unique. I loved the idea of hearts having to be used to make magic. I also loved the element of the Magic House as an extension of Sylvester. The magic felt like it had stakes, like it had sacrifice. Like something had to be given up in order ot have the magic. I felt like there was some real weight to the decisions made and that the conflict in the book, that drove the plot, felt real and well paced out. I felt Foss’ fear and dread, I felt her panic and her worry. I felt her father’s worry and the worry of the people around her. This felt like a real consequence of magic and it felt like something more realistic. That the poorer people on the outskirts of the kingdom were sacrificed for the prosperity of the elite closer to the center. It felt like it was an allegory for something real and it felt well thought out.
I also like the way Foss was portrayed, she was scared and confused but determined. She wasn’t dong what she was doing just for other people. She didn’t have to be this selfless person driven by just altruism. She’s allowed to do something that protects herself, she’s allowed to be scared for her own well being and she’s allowed to do things to save herself. Not only does she not need someone to save her, and she’s taking action to do it on her own, but she doesn’t need someone to save. Sure, she’s seeking out this problem that’s plagued her town for a long time, but she’s driven by her own feelings, her own peril.
And the way other people react to this, how other people think of this thing that’s happening, it feels…evocative. There is something in the complicity of the inner villages to this awful thing happening to the outer vilages that makes it worse. And it builds a male lead that isn’t a killer but takes parts of a person that are vital to someone feeling whole. The magic system works because it isn’t a source of all knowing power. Even with the magicks there’s no ultimate power. There’s an uncertainness to it that is just right. It’s not so uncertain that the magic system is unexplained, but it has a realistic sense of being hard to explain and there almost a physics element to it that I thought was really unique.
Also an animal companion? Amazing. I loved him.
I loved the way the victims’ are portrayed. They’re not helpless or hapless. They’re angry and sad and hurting and they’re allowed to me. They have stories of being victimized and being unable to stop it and they’re allowed to have different emotions. Different people have different amounts of their hearts taken, and there is this general attitude of the narrative that they’re all victims. I thought the way the other victims interacted with each other was very realistic. Some believed no matter how affected, everyone was valid, some who had their whole hearts taken dismissed Foss’ pain. And the narrative interrogates that.
I think there’s also an interesting element here of how ensorcellment impacts both sides, and the wildness of magic where Sylvester, the MMC, can’t control a lot of it. He doesn’t want to be what he is. But him being the only boy puts him in a position where he feels obligated. He doesn’t have humanity in the same way Foss does, and I think that was nicely done too. I think Foss’ struggles with what she feels for him, and her active attempts to figure out what is real and what is because of the spell she’s under was a really unique flip to it. The author acknowledges that part of it, and acknowledges that Foss’ predicament is in a gray area. She isn’t sure what is and isn’t real.
While you really see more development of the villains after the 45% mark, I think it was done really well. They felt like real motivations. They were taught that it was either their survival and the kingdom’s survival, or the hearts of a few. They were taught to sacrifice the few for the good of the many. That’s what makes a good villain, in my mind, that they have motivations thatm ake sense and that are almost understandable. Like I can see how the villains Darius, Clarissa, the other sisters, are convinced of their integrity and that what they’re doing is right. Sylvester has conflict that makes him an effective morally gray character. He loves his family who does wrong, but he desperately tries not to do the wrong they do. They’re convinced they’re in the right, that they’re superior and what they do is something that should earn them gratitude. It makes them more frightening.
I can’t say enough how much I love that Foss is so flawed. She’s angry and resentful. She’s described as “ugly” and that’s not something that has to be fixed. She’s mad that she’s ugly, yes, but she’s more so mad at the way the world treats her because of that. And her development because of that adds to her characterization in a few ways but without she still stands on her own. And when Foss is driven to kill, it impacts her, she experiences revulsion at it and her trauma feels real and grounded. She doesn’t have to be this beautiful bad ass.
I LOVED her relationship with her dad. It was adorable. He loved her so much and she loved him. He did what he could for her but stepped back when she needed him to. It meant a lot to see such a nice and loving dad in a fantasy book. I loved it.
Also, the slow burn?!? Sylvester and Foss? When he sees the foss flower and she calls it beautiful and he says that it fits her well?!? Like, way to make me kick my feet and sob at the same time. Oh my god. I love that stuff. I Eat. It. Up.
And the themes of how government/governing bodies control what their people know, understand, and how they view the world? And how easy it is to lie and change the narrative by limiting outside information? So well done.
And I don’t usually like sex scenes/love scenes in book. It just feels awkward and weird for me personally. But this one I loved and was written really well. It felt like the pay off was not only well built up to, but well suited to the characters and the story. And I couldn’t stop the whole, giggling, blushing, looking away, covering my mouth thing. I so rarely get that in books.
I was GRIPPED for the ending. And I loved it so much. I loved it.
I was given a free e-galley by the author in exchange for an honest review
CW’s: some violence, some language, pretty tame.
My Rating: 4.25/5 Stars
The concept right off the bad, was amazing. And for me, it kicked off right away. Jackson didn’t waste time in the book with exposition, she multi-tasked by providing both at the same time. She built the world and began building out the characters as she established what the story would be.
On that note, from the beginning the writing was so beautiful and lyrical. I adored how she wrote. The writing reads as effortlessly beautiful and readable at the same time. It didn’t feel like Jackson was trying too hard and it didn’t feel like she was implementing purple prose. Her writing style made the exposition seem natural, like she was telling a true fable and was building the world out for the fable to begin.
The world itself was a good mix of urban fantasy and high fantasy. I think most YA books are good entry points for high-fantasy, but this one especially is one of the ones that maintains quality of the book while being digesteable enough for someone new to the genre. I don’t know what it is about Fantasy worlds with plays on divinity, heavens/hells, etc. But I love them so much. I was obsessed with angel books as a teen (Hush, Hush, Fallen, Immortal City, etc) and this feels like it scratches that itch for me while having this even-better quality of escapism.
But at the same time, it maintains this aspect to it that interrogates oppressive systems that are in part, perpetuated by people around the oppressed. And it’s what they’re taught to do, yes, but it demonstrates how propaganda can influence people into participating in oppressive systems out of fear.
Meiling and Suraya are both enjoyable characters. I in particular really liked Suraya, as this overachiever who desperately wants to believe she deserves what hse has. She wants to earn her place. At the same time, in contrast, Meiling has the opposite problem. She deserves to be treated the same, to gain access to education, but because she’s not Gifted she doesn’t get it. So it offers up a really interesting contrast between the two of them.
This book does require a bit of suspension of disbelief and just acceptance of the world you’re placed in. Which i think is fine when it’s well done and well executed. And I think that Jackson did a pretty good job. She sprinkles in confirmation that this world is a lot like ours (mentions medications, doctor’s visits, lap tops, news, articles, etc). And the author explains, in pieces, about the religion and center source of powers. I think if you’re someone who needs a lot of establishing for the world, then it might be a bit confusing, but I think if you’re willing to go into it without having to know absolutely everything, it makes sense.
Also, special shout out to not having a long directory. For me, personally, I didn’t really feel like I needed it that much, which is a credit to the author.
I also like morally gray FMC’s, like Suraya. I’m so used to these teenage FMC’s that have to be perfect, or have to be this very specific type of morally gray. I like when girls are allowed to break the mould a bit and still be flawed and angry and ambitious.
There are a good number of POVs, and some show up more than others. I think if you’re someone who has a hard time keeping track of multiple POV’s, or wants them to be distinct, the book might be a bit disappointing. But I think with the third person point of view the book is written in, and the way it’s written, distinction doesn’t super make sense. The characters feel distinct, I don’t really think the narrative need to be separate. I think their motivations, their backgrounds, and their abilities distinguish them enough (I adored Evie by the way, though she’s introduced around the 30% mark, she’s adorable).
The book was well paced in my opinion, this is subjective, naturally. It’s a lot happening all at once and the book doesn’t always give time to breathe. But to me, that’s what makes it so readable. The characters have multiple plots going on but to me it doesn’t feel frivolous or inane to have so many. They feel like threads that matter. The way this is plotted, and the world building, feel like they were actually kept track of; things stayed consistent.
I will say the dialogue ia bit clunky, but dialogue is difficult to write, and it’s not so clunky that it takes you out of the book and honestly, real life people talk in clunky ways.
Also special shout out for the diversity in names AND the well written fight scenes.
Once the half-way mark passed, it picked up even faster. And it felt like one revelation after the other was happening but it didn’t feel overwhelming to me. Not really. The emotions felt complex and dynamic that the characters felt and I think the characters all got their fair shot at development and growth. I do feel like Suraya almost had reverse-growth, but i think it was well done and realistic. If that revelation happened to you, and you found out something about your best friend that was connected in such a negative way to your family, you’d react in a bad way too.
Overall, great book! I loved the two of them and their dynamic.
3/5: *I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review* My Rating. 2.5 Stars CW’s: not many, mentions of family death. So the
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review
My Rating. 2.5 Stars
CW’s: not many, mentions of family death.
So the book is cute to start for sure. It doesn’t really pull me in right away. It’s not super boring but it isn’t really engaging either. It definitely picked up a bit. The pacing was just more slow and leisurely. It wasn’t really trying to be too fast paced. By 15% it did start to pick up and the plot got going a bit more.
I love Victorian settings, I think they’re romantic. And I think Fisher does a good job of embodying the aesthetic of that era. I will say, if you don’t like Jane Austen or Emily Bronte or Charlotte Bronte novels, then this book might not be for you. It is very reminiscent of those types of novels, and it very much feels like one of them. I think it’s important to note that this book is really heavy on a very classic-esque feel, it reads as a soft fantasy classic would read. I like that, but it’s clearly not something everyone likes.
The romance was cute, for sure, it felt nice. But that’s all it was…cute. It really wasn’t anything super special and it didn’t stand out. I’m a romantic at heart, and I like swooning romances, especially in a book set in the Victorian era, I feel like the romance should’ve been far more, well, romantic. It just didn’t feel quite rounded enough for my taste. And maybe there’s something to be said about subtlety in the development of the relationship, maybe some people would like that. But honestly? I didn’t. I didn’t really care enough. I wasn’t rooting for them especially hard. At least not from the get-go.
I want to care about the characters and care about their relationships. I want to have to tell myself “it’s just a book, they’re not real, you don’t have to feel so sad for them” and I want to feel the angst when it’s done in a good and healthy way. But there just didn’t seem to be much adversity standing in their way or for them to work together to be against. Yes, they had a shared vested interested in the curiosities shop and Lizzie’s father’s legacy living on. And they shared a love for those books. But I just didn’t feel their predicament. They had people close to them who were sick with a mysterious and terrifying illness. The way the illness is described should bring more terror, I should feel that viscerally…and I just didn’t.
I was also pretty unsure of the magic system. Like…what was it? Was it just ghosts? The world felt underdeveloped and a bit too cliché. It just didn’t feel like the book was super in depth or super developed, a lot of it felt just so hard to be passionate about.
The plot seemed to mostly resolve by the halfway mark. And yeah, there was more, but I feel like the big one sentence summary was completely done by that point.
You know what this book felt like? It felt like if my depression was a book. Like, I’m not sad all the time, and I don’t want to end it all, but I also just live in a world that’s pretty flat emotionally. Like I don’t feel a lot without my sunlamp and medication. Unfortunately for this book, there’s no anti-depressant/SSRI to make things better. Like nothing is BAD or SAD but nothing is good or happy either.
At some point I did ship the main couple, but I just felt like I should have shipped them from the start. I felt like the romantic tension wasn’t there throughout the whole book and I just found myself feeling really bored the whole time. I don’t know, I just wanted to feel more and to giggle more and to kick my feet more. I just didn’t get any of that and I’m kind of disappointed because I felt that way for Olivia Atwater’s Regency Faerie Tales books. I felt like the author could’ve put a bit more emotion into this book, and made it not feel so hollow.
The ending also just felt anticlimactic too. Overall, it was just a “meh” kind of book and didn’t really inspire anything. I think the author could have done better.
5/5: I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review CW’s: blood, violence, gore, body horror, death, depictions of mental illn
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest reviewCW’s: blood, violence, gore, body horror, death, depictions of mental illness and
I received a free e-galley in exchange for an honest review
CW’s: blood, violence, gore, body horror, death, depictions of mental illness and health issues resulting in long-term care, sex (the most SAPPHIC kind), various types of abuse, various types of emotional manipulation, cults and MLMs, historic setting comes with queerphobia.
My Rating: 5 stars
I loved this book from the jump. I mean, Sapphic vampires? Win is a win. Both Iris and Lucy felt like real people right off of the bat. They were already dynamic from the jump and it felt like they were already people, Kiersten White didn’t have to do all this work to set them up, she managed to do so within 10% of the book.
Also, gay pining? Absolutely a win. Their meet cute? Adorable and swash buckling at the same time. The classic “stop-you-from-getting-hit-by-a-car” trope done with two women is so much nicer than when it’s done by a woman and a man.
The way the story was fleshed out and the world was built was really natural and organic. It wasn’t info-dumpy, it wasn’t flat, it wasn’t boring, and it wasn’t confusing. I liked the take on vampires, and the inclusion of Dracula and Mina, and villains that felt realistic. The villains felt true to not only the time periods they were from, and the ones they lived in, but their circumstances. The men didn’t feel cartoonishly evil, they felt like real men that women worry about being alone in a room with.
I loved the parallel timelines too, especially with the parallel love stories between Mina and Lucy then Elle and Iris. I loved the representation of queerness/sapphicness in this era. The depiction of marriage as a political match was well done, better done than A Rose By Any Other Name. The way that a woman’s place, and how she gains power, in the 19th century was done really well. Lucy was used by her mother but she knew how to use that to her advantage still.
I was also invested in the plot enough to make guesses about the connections between the timelines/points of view. I wanted to guess who was related to who, who Iris’ mother was, and who Lucy became when she’s meeting with the therapist. Is the girl she references either Elle or Iris?
I’m so invested.
It just kept getting better and better. I loved Elle and Iris developing relationship. I loved the way Iris’ story was told as it intertwined with Lucy’s, and how the romance developed.
I also loved the portrayal of flawed queer characters, it allowed them to be human and realistic but didn’t demonize them or force them into tropes that were harmful stereotypes. They were allowed to love and feel attraction and lust and it wasn’t treated as bad or brave. It was just…there. It was normalized and the narrative didn’t focus on queer phobia but rather love triangles and the danger that men posed to women throughout different time periods. Iris’ journey in terms of romantic relationships wasn’t focused on her queerness, the roadblocks were related to her MLM mother and the cult-like environment she grew up in. It was about her going back into that world and not being involved with outsiders rather than her being queer. Which I thought was a really refreshing spin.
Kiersten White also writes really well, not just beautiful writing, but writing that is compulsively readable. Her chapter lengths also do a lot for the pacing of the book. It didn’t feel like it lagged at any parts and it was character driven without losing in the plot.
I was absolute addicted to the book, the plot was fast paced and the individual timelines were interwoven really well together and done in a way that paces out reveals and world building really well. I think the way they cut the chapters did a service to its pacing,
I do feel like this was kind of two books in one. But it wasn’t disjointed or anything, I just felt like this, for another author, could’ve been one long book and another novella or drawn out novel. But Kiersten White kept it all in one book, which I liked. Dracula’s chapters were really cool too, Kiersten White does a good job with horror/villains and makes them really terrifying. But once the Lucy/Elle and Iris relationship got to a developed stage, it was interesting seeing it along with the plot line of Iris’ mother’s cult/MLM and Dracula and this “we have our own issues to deal with but we’re still together” plotline.
I thought the pacing and excitement was kept up throughout the novel. I didn’t ever feel like it lagged or slowed down too much.
And oh myyyy goooodddd the gay pining. The amount of moments where Wait for Me from Hadestown could’ve been used were numerous. In that lovely, lovely way. I adored this book so much for Lucy and Iris’ relationship. The “touch-her-and-you’ll-die” trope is so intense here too for both Lucy and Iris.
The ending was my favorite by far. Oh. My. God. The last bit was a combination of stomach dropping and heart pounding and soul souring. The unapologetic queerness of this book was something that made me feel something so beautiful. I loved it so much.
Review of The Sisters Who Were Promised by Kayla Cosentino
2/5: CW’s: violence, death,, some language. My Rating: 2.25 stars I received a free e-galley from the author and the Nerd Fam in excha
CW’s: violence, death,, some language.My Rating: 2.25 starsI received a free e-galley from the author and the Nerd Fam in exchange for an ho
CW’s: violence, death,, some language.
My Rating: 2.25
I received a free e-galley from the author and the Nerd Fam in exchange for an honest review
So, I want to start with how much I liked the premise, and I felt like the book kicked off the premise immediately. I do feel like some of the writing right off the bad left something to be desired, it felt a bit like it was trying too hard to be beautiful. It reminded me a little bit of fan-fiction, but I don’t think that has to be a a bad thing.
My main issue with this book was that it just felt clunky, the prose was clunky and so was the prose. There was definite potential, but I just didn’t feel like it flowed very well. The dialogue felt like the author couldn’t decide between more modern language and language more befitting of a fantastical setting. It was unclear was exactly the setting entailed. Was it based in history? Was it a world all its own? Was it supposed to feel more modern?
All of that was just really unclear. This book’s premise was a really interesting one, and I think that the author tried to make the princesses distinct. But they just initially felt really flat right off the bat. They didn’t come alive immediately, it didn’t feel like they were real characters and I didn’t feel immersed. To be quite honest, some of it felt like AI writing. The emotion just wasn’t completely there and when it was, it felt very classically fanfic-y. And not good fanfiction either. I just don’t know how else to describe the first third of this book.
The plot just…again, I didn’t feel it. I didn’t care enough about the characters or the people in this book to feel like the stakes were high. I really have to care about the characters for the plot to matter to me, and I felt really disconnected from the plot and I didn’t feel that spark of connection to each of the characters. I feel like this had a lot of potential to be like the Princess Bride or similar fantasy books that evokes nostalgic YA vibes, but it hadn’t delivered that by the 33% mark. I feel like books, good books, should be able to deliver right away.
The writing still feels so juvenile and I just can’t get into it. I think the writing is certainly readable and I did fly through the chapters but I just felt so indifferent. I can’t put it into words, why the writing was so off but it was.
I really would have liked to see more development and fleshing out of the magic system. Where do powers originate? What rules does the magic have?
I feel the same way about the religion. Are there multiple Gods and Goddesses? Or just the one? How do people worship?
I think this book suffered from a lack of development that could have been fixed with developmental editors. It had a lot of potential to be good. Even the prose could have worked better if the author allowed a more natural writing style rather than something so forced. I think a focus on making sentences flow should have been a priority over purple prose.
I will say, I did like the casual queer representation and the queer joy. The author didn’t make a big deal out of it and I loved that. I liked the Aella and Natalie plot line a lot. At least up until the "end twist" which just didn't pay off and ruined it.
I liked the sisterly bonds too. They’re complicated and they fight each other and protect each other. They’re complicated have complex feelings about each other and their parents. I think it’s one of the places that the author showed real potential. If that had just been applied elsewhere this book would be so much better.
But overall, I just felt like there was a lot of exposition, a lot of telling and no showing. I just didn’t feel much when I was supposed to feel grief, I just didn’t.
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