The holiday season is now in full swing! By now trees and lights have been decorated and strung. Now is the time I expect my precious reading time to get stolen by hectic holiday preparations.
Bad Romeo By: Leisa Rayven
Trash TV in the form of a book.
Cassie, typical girl blinded by love and convinced she can ‘fix’ a guy.
Ethan had been hurt in the past. Nothing unique and nothing to warrant the severity of his behavior. The intensity of which he has a vendetta against the entire world is over dramatic and filled with bitterness.
Saying Ethan is a colossal a-hole is an understatement. Because he is hot and causes Cassie’s body to do things, she doesn’t want to let him go because that’s love, right?
The story is told in alternating timelines. Some chapters are told in the present while others are tell the story of the two meeting and their time in college.
The present depicts a complete role reversal.
The past is all about Cassie being swept off her feet, convinced her love and their passion can heal Ethan. All the while Ethan, though just as bewitched by Cassie, warns her to stay away knowing how toxic he is. Neither of them to listen to the warnings of course.
The present portrays Cassie as jaded and broken while Ethan tries to convince her he’s a changed man. Frustration all around.
I believe the intent was to end this on a cliffhanger. But it just kind of stopped.
This one was hard to rate. The writing isn’t bad at all. Considering the author had to discover over a hundred ways to convey the same feelings in the same situations, and she did. A great feat considering this was a very circular book, a repeating cycle of skepticism, optimism, soul crushing pain turned to rage. Lather. Rinse. Repeat.
This reads exactly as you expect it to.
Broken Juliet By: Leisa Rayven
I borrowed the first from the library because I found this one in a library book sale. I found it in the YA section. This is NOT a YA series by any stretch.
Could this series have been condensed into one book? Why yes, it absolutely could. Was it ridiculously drawn out? This gave award-winning taffy pullers cringe. Now the most important question: Did I love this? Not even a little.
In this, the roles are reversed. Where we started to see this in the first book, we are hit with it fully in the face.
Ethan has seen the light and has become a changed man. He knows exactly what he wants and is mentally and emotionally in a place to pursue it. Good for him!
Cassie, on the other hand, understandably, is still jaded, broken, and bitter. It’s a complete broken-record story.
There are, of course, more flashbacks. In all honesty, I appreciated that story better than the one that takes place in present time.
In Bad Romeo, Ethan continually said the same things and acting in a way to solidify his words.
Now Cassie is worried that she is going to get burned again. Like I said, understandable.
In most predictable books, I don’t mind the predictability. The journey is often times worth it. This journey annoyed me. I mean how many times do you have to get hit in the head by a coconut until you move out from under the coconut tree?!
If I had been one of Cassie’s friends I would have deemed her too hard-headed and toxic to be around. Even her friends admonished her when it came to anything relating to Ethan. I’m just glad this is over.
Burn With Me By: Lucy Smoke
Isaac is the son of a high-powered man, Damon, tied with to mafia. His father just married a woman that is bringing her 18 year-old daughter, Rory, with her to live with them. Neither Rory or her mother know the true nature of Damon’s business dealings.
To save them from being dragged into this life, Isaac is determined to get rid of the new stepmom and stepsister. Breaking Rory is more difficult than he anticipated. Rory isn’t the spoiled brat he thought she would be. Besides, she has her own plan to get her mother away from yet another damaging marriage. Although, none could be more toxic than her last.
What neither Rory or Isaac planned on was whatever burns between them.
My biggest criticism of this book: Rory is 18, Issac is not much older. That’s fine. But when you have an 18 year old stating, multiple times, how she hasn’t had great sex in a long time, it’s a bit weird.
Rory is only months away from starting her college journey. Did she really need to be in that stage of life for this story to work? Nope. Both her and Isaac could have been mid-twenties. Their age threw me. They both talked as if they had combated the trials of life for decades when in reality, they are both incredibly young.
Sure, some experiences cause you to age quicker. None of that justified how aged these two sounded. Still, I really wanna know what happens in the next book.
The Deck of Omens By: Christine Lynn Herman
Another I enjoyed the sequel more than the original.
A new type of threat is threatening Four Paths. That isn’t the only change in the small town. After many truths emerged by the end of The Devouring Grey, the town and its people have changed a bit. And not just because their lives are more fragile than usual.
Bringing some outside help in the form of an estranged father and a brother, things get tense and awkward.
This time around, the real truth needs to be discovered, not just the ones that made the founding families out to be the heroes to all.
While this book was still laden with details and history, I did feel it was as heavy and slow as the first. Every turn
was filled with another piece of the puzzle whether it made sense or not.
The twist at the end? Yes, please. It was set up beautifully. I’m glad that this was only a duology. turned out to be the perfect length. It could have been dragged out, I’m sure. The ending tied up loose ends quite nicely and put a smile on my face.
Nightshade By: Andrea Cremer
I downloaded this during a Stuff Your Kindle day. I honestly don’t know how to feel about this.
In a world where werewolves are a species serving the Keepers out of honor and respect and not packs for themselves. It gave a different spin on the race.
As Calla gets ready to mate (marry) through an arrangement set by the Keepers. A chance meeting with a human is the catalyst to everything falling apart.
This story is a case study in how indoctrinated someone can be into a cult and the power of denial.
Cassie is strongly rooted into her role set by the Keepers. So everything that causes more questions that she has answers of course is met by her mind flashing ‘unable to compute’.
There is a love triangle – kind of. Cassie believes she has feelings for the man she is promised to as well as the human she ran into. Turns out he is no ordinary human. Personally, I think one side is led by lust and the other actual loving attraction. A bit forced on both ends though.
The best part is the unfolding of the truth and how easily betrayal flows around the werewolves/Guardians. While it ended on a cliffhanger and I would like to see the truth revealed, I don’t feel compelled to read the rest of the series. Admittedly, I did cheat and read the back copy of the remainder of the series and I get the gist of the entirety of the story. I’m satisfied.
Pleasure Unbound By: Larissa Ione
I had never heard of this series but found the first two at a library used book sale. Buffy the Vampire Slayer with a cult-ish feel.
Tayla is a demon slayer raised to believe everything is well, demonic and evil. It isn’t until she lands herself in an underworld hospital when the actual truth of the world begins to seep into her mind. As well as some of her own personal truths.
Eidolon runs the hospital as the head doctor and as such has a firm set of ethics he sticks to. He is on a ticking clock before undergoing a transformation that could take everything away from him.
Now a slayer has entangled her way into his life. On top of that, other worldly creatures are being attacked, part of them are being taken and sold on the black market.
The world building and introduction to it all was slow
enough to completely immerse the reader without smacking them in the face with information overload. It is face paced enough to keep the page turning. The characters diverse and well-rounded.
My only real criticism is Tayla and her physical relationship with Eidolon. The spice was good, not a problem there. It’s more on the ethical side. For someone ingrained to hate demons without bias, she didn’t seem to have much, if any, aversion to being intimate with a demon. Then again, he is hot. That seems to be all women’s kryptonite in romance novels though.
Thunderhead By: Neal Shusterman
If reading this book in 2024 right after a Presidential election wasn’t relevant, I don’t know what is… And that is as political as I will ever get on the internet.
As much as I liked Scythe, this one was better. It dove down deep, real deep, into so many aspects of humanity. But with the perspective of the Thundehead. Putting government, religion, and basic human behaviors under a microscope.
Citra, now Scythe Anastasia, is stirring the Scythedom pot. Gleaning in her own way while unintentionally making a statement.
Rowan is causing his own waves as he takes a different persona to help clean up the Scythedom.
An attempt has been made on Scythe Curie and Scythe Anastasia lives. It was only stopped because of one brave young man, Greyson Tolliver. A man that was basically raised by the Thunderhead. But who was the real target? Curie? Anastasia? Why?
Learning more about how the Thunderhead thinks and ‘feels’ was a great addition to the story. There are so many more deceptions, twists, and mysteries. Not to mention suspense ending in a cliffhanger.
After reading Scythe, I didn’t really care about Citra or Rowan as characters. They were merely the vessels that brought us into the scythe world. Now they are developing into their own and becoming a major part of the future.
