ONCE UPON A BROKEN HEART by Stephanie Garber
First, I need to say THANK YOU to @goodreadsgraceandalice for writing the world’s best review of this book. I dropped everything I was doing once I read Grace’s thoughts and AS USUAL she introduced me to a new favorite.
EVERYTHING about Once Upon a Broken Heart is whimsical and evocative and something I viscerally want more of - the writing, the worldbuilding, the characters. The book itself is delicately hopeful at times and seductively dark at others. It finds its footing in the magic of fairytales and brims with all the best elements of romance: Character A’s gaze snaps to Character B’s, words with hard edges are belied by a crack in a facial facade, feigned indifference is betrayed by a touch that ignites where it should quell.
Evangeline knows she’s likely making a big mistake, but, driven by the consuming force of her heartbreak upon discovering the boy she loves is engaged to her literal stepsister, she prays to the Fated Prince of Hearts in a desperate attempt to stop the wedding.
Jacks, the Fated Prince of Hearts himself, represents unrequited love; the stories say only his one true love can make his heart beat again, and his kisses, which are allegedly worth dying for, are fatal to all but her. He’s got that It™️ factor that I love in fictional men, which the highest compliment I can bestow on anyone ever and I shall leave it at that.
And so Evangeline strikes an ill-fated bargain with Jacks: she has to kiss three people of his choosing, at times and places also of his choosing, in exchange for his stopping the wedding. Evangeline soon realizes she may have stepped into something much bigger than her broken heart, and the games begin.
Jacks is my new morally grey fictional king. The descriptiveness with which Stephanie Garber writes about his character is legitimately fictional ASMR. But what I really loved was that plot does not rely on the allure of Jacks (or any one character) to hold itself up; it’s cohesive and magical and compelling, and left me NEEDING more.
Have you read this (or Caraval) yet? Who’s your most recent fictional crush? ⬇️
