this was such a middle of the road river book for me. I didn’t dislike anything, i just also didn’t overly love anything, either. i always had a good this was such a middle of the road river book for me. I didn’t dislike anything, i just also didn’t overly love anything, either. i always had a good time reading it, but i never truly had the urge to pick it back up. i will say that i read this while i was traveling in chicago, so maybe that was also a factor in my three star review! so please do not let me deter you from picking this one up! but also, let me tell you quickly about the basic premise.
☆ jack - bard, who crossed the river and left his community ten years ago.
☆ torin - captain of the guard
☆ sidra - his wife and the best healer the clan has
☆ adaira - an heiress, helping keep that east safe
and this book quickly starts, when jack is crossing the river back home east, where he left his family and three friends many years ago. and he even more quickly realizes that girls from their community have started going missing, and the east only has the west (and their very bloody past) to blame. but maybe his harp and voice, alongside these other three people, can come together and get some answers from the spirits to help solve and rescue the missing girls before it is too late.
rebecca ross has such beautiful writing, and her imagery is always amazing in every single story i read from her. again, i still really recommend this and i am happy that i read it. But we will see if i end up picking up book two and finishing this duology or not. (if you all can promise me more sidra, i might be tempted. Oh, my heart, i love her so much.)
trigger + content warnings: talk of death, violence, blood, gore, talk of war, drowning, missing girls / kidnapping, a lot of talk of loss of loved ones, talk of loss of a mother during childbirth, talk of loss of parents, sick parent, talk of self harm for magic, raids on villages, fire
this is my favorite read by this author yet! I truly had a really good time with this. the basic premise (depicted with this 11/10 book cover) is thatthis is my favorite read by this author yet! I truly had a really good time with this. the basic premise (depicted with this 11/10 book cover) is that our mc is fleeing from domestic abuse, and makes a deal with a demon for seven years of consensual service, in a different realm, where she will be auctioned off to a partner who is looking for a human partner. and she is quickly secured by a dragon lord who is in need of a human life to make his land, maybe on the brink of war, more secure. and i highkey loved the setting of our love interest’s land/kingdom? like, give me a full story set here, i am begging! but what i also really loved about this was just the themes of reclaiming all the things - sex, boundaries, trust, your safety, your pleasure, and yourself in general. it was really beautiful, and i promise this is the highest of three stars, and i really recommend!
content warnings from the author (may have spoilers for your reading experience, so please use caution/only read if you need tw/cws): domestic abuse (historical, off-page, but the heroine is dealing with the aftermath of getting out of that relationship), murder (off-page), human/non-human sex, size difference, explicit sex, breeding, pregnancy (epilogue)
additional trigger + content warnings i found while reading: anxiety, panic attack symptoms, mention of blood, mention of loss of parents in past, talk/fear or war, nightmares, self harm to get blood for a spell
oh friends, i’m so sorry! I truly did want to love this so badly. and the reason i picked this story up was because so many friends on goodreads have oh friends, i’m so sorry! I truly did want to love this so badly. and the reason i picked this story up was because so many friends on goodreads have given this five stars and put it on their best books of 2024 list (with many having it be their #1 fave of the year)! so if you’re interested in this book, please still pick it up, because i am for sure in the minority with my feelings on this!
saeris lives in a world where water is the most precious resource and is being rationed to only 6oz a day by a seemingly immortal evil queen. she is also trying to give her brother a better life, by secretly being a blacksmith who forges weapons, and by doing anything else she can in secret, too. but at the start of this book, she has an altercation with a guard, and quickly realizes that she is able to manipulate a special blade. and i probably shouldn’t say too much more than that, but she is teleported to a new world with the fae she only knew about from storybooks.
listen, i love anything with a forge and blacksmithing, and you add alchemy to that and being able to transmute some metals? oh, i’m living for it actually. you all also know that i love anything fae! I also have a very big soft spot for magical foxes! and fae gods and their backstories! and the mc’s friend, carrion, was absolutely amazing. but those are truly the only things i really loved about this. like, i feel like so many good and solid building blocks are here, but it just kept getting worse and worse as i would read on.
saeris was a little insufferable to read from. and i do enjoy a “unlikeable” character, especially one willing to do anything for her family in a fae realm, but she was just so annoying and her banter with everyone made me cringe constantly. and kingfisher was just someone i never wanted to root for until the very end when we were getting 500 reveals of the villains just saying their evils deeds. it was instalove trying to not be instalove, under a wild power dynamic because saeris was forced to stay in the fae realm, with dirty talk that made me want to jump out a window. in my opinion, the plot just kept getting more away from the original cool concept and just pieces of all these really popular romantasy plots. and then the ending…
this next paragraph is going to include a spoiler for the ending of this book, that also discusses a type of trauma related to sa that is implied - please use caution while reading: i am always going to be here for authors writing queer characters, villains for sure included in that, but implying that the villain of this first book is queer, and was sexual assaulting someone over decades in the past as part of a "plot twist", is just something that is always going to make me very uncomfortable to read. i feel like this is a very harmful message that our very real world is constantly trying to criminalize queer people with. also, upon finishing, even though carrion was my favorite character, he is still portrayed as a pan or bi character who wants to have sex with anyone and everyone. and i never want to shame that, especially as a pan person, but it also contributes to a negative real world stereotype! and i normally would look past carrion, because that experience can be a real and valid experience too, but after how malcom’s “my love” and “playground” and many more implications made me feel…., it just feels extremely bad to me. but i also recognize that maybe i am being too sensitive about it, because i haven’t seen anyone else say this in any review, so maybe my reading comprehension just imagined those missing 47 years of abuse being insinuated for the entire ending? but it was loudly giving outlander (in 2025 !!) to me.
yeah, i think that’s all i want to say. I am sorry if this is your favorite book, it just didn’t work for me the way that i wish it did. and please don’t let this review make you completely not read this, because i really am the outlier with these feelings (at the time of writing this, i don’t have a single moot who has given this under three stars)! and if you do pick it up, i just hope you have happier reading than i did, friends!
trigger + content warnings: exploiting resources, extreme dehydration, torture, unwanted touching, talk of sickness, loss of mother in past, loss of children, murder, violence, gore, vomit, blood, self harm to get blood, magical compulsion, anxiety, drinking, assault, kidnapping, threat of sa, talk of rape in past, insinuation of sa in past, genocide, war, slavery, spider-like creature, imbalance of power dynamics
“I always have to choose, and I never get to choose you. I’m so tired of not getting to choose you.”
apparently i wanted to start 2025 off in the m
“I always have to choose, and I never get to choose you. I’m so tired of not getting to choose you.”
apparently i wanted to start 2025 off in the most unhinged way possible (going back to my earliest internet roots reading hp fanfic). but i was very influenced from booktok telling me i had until dec 31th, 2024 to download this (which also made me extra curious to read before this gets reworked and traditionally published).
i do not think i am going to rate fanfiction on here, but this is one of the best i've ever read, truly. senlinyu is a really good writer, and story teller, and i was inhaling this every night unable to stop until way past midnight for the first five nights of the new year. with equal time spent kicking my feet, screaming, and rolling around my bed like a maniac.
i can't wait to read whatever senlinyu does with this story without the cursed nostalgia ip that truly started enemies to lovers for me.
a party, a poem, and one really heartfelt dedication to dandelions later…
i finally am reading this very beloved series, and i am so very excited, buta party, a poem, and one really heartfelt dedication to dandelions later…
i finally am reading this very beloved series, and i am so very excited, but i will admit that i was unexpectedly surprised by this first book. a lot of friends have told me to think of this first book as a prequel, that really sets the tone for the story to actually come! so i was expecting that a little bit, but i was not expecting this to read so much like a historical and so not like an sff story. yet, i think there are few authors are talented as ken liu, and his storycrafting and telling are truly god tier. and even though my reading experience was not what i was expecting, i still had a really good time with this one. and also, i just deeply respect what this book is.
this is essentially a reimagining of the fall of the qin dynasty and the rise of the han dynasty. and it reads very much like many different stories, from a few different povs, from all over the land during this time, that all come together and weaves one big story! i truly don’t want to say much more than that, but the major theme that i ultimately took from this first installment is how heavy the price of power always was, always is, and always will be. and how it changes you, shapes you and your life, even if you never asked for that power in the first place.
friends’ reviews that i love a lot: mogsy, petrik, ts
trigger + content warnings: war, battle, violence, gore, blood, death, torture, mention of cannibalism, a lot of suicide mentions, slavery, human trafficking, loss of a child, torture of a child, loss of loved ones, abuse, assault, sa, conscription, killing animals for food, animal abuse (horse), captivity, prison, occupation, colorism, starvation, infidelity
“I have hungered for you in ways you cannot comprehend. I've craved you. More than my sin. You haunt me.”
you all know i keep reading these books because they are truly so much fun, but they are just never perfect reads for me. and also let me remind you that i have praised each book in this world for the amazing twists and turns! so imagine my surprise when i thought this was going to be a five star, because i loved these characters and circle of hell so much, only to be delivered the most nonsensical twist ever. and maybe that’s my bad, for hyping and awaiting what i was really sure would be a mind blowing reveal… only for foolishness.
so in this new spinoff series, we follow a new prince and get to see his hell domain (my jjk biased fingers wanting to type expansion) - and this one follows gluttony, who i truly ended up falling in love with. this story is also a loose cinderella reimagining, where our other mc, adriana, is just trying to make life more bearable for her and her stepsister, while working as a journalist, reporting things that others might not want her reporting. you know, like how ice dragons are attacking and our prince is trying to keep it undercover while he figures out what is going on. So gluttony (aka: gabrielle), assigns adriana to report on his own fantasy love island competition to find a suitor to help him rule his circle of hell. yet, both of them can’t seem to exactly remember things that took place in the past, and you as the reader are trying to piece things together alongside them.
i adored both characters, and their banter was truly 11/10. i loved the setting, and i am always going to eat up a dating competition side story. i actually enjoyed the sex scenes in this, and for the most part didn’t find anything too cringe like i did with book two! and this even has a very adorable baby dragon! truly, the only other negative thing i can say, aside from the twist in this being outlandish, is that you can just tell that this author is a fan of bridgerton, and at times i felt like i was reading from a blue haired lady whistledown. but truly, i had a really good time with this and i am excited for what (and who) comes next!
trigger + content warnings: debt, talk of money problems, abusive home, loss of father in past, grief, battle, blood, drawing blood to do a blood oath, violence, unwanted sexual advances, drinking, magical memory violations
i feel like before i start this review about kerri maniscalco’s adult debut, i have to kind of talk about the original ya series that this is a spin oi feel like before i start this review about kerri maniscalco’s adult debut, i have to kind of talk about the original ya series that this is a spin off/continuation of. Ii know i gave that entire trilogy three stars, but they really were high threes and i think back on that series so fondly. the atmosphere, the main heroine, the yearning and angst - all five stars. and for three years, it was truly so much fun to buddy read these each halloween season.
so i went into this book expecting to enjoy those same aspects that i know this author is amazing at creating! i will say the atmosphere, and the setting of this alternative magical london, was amazing, we barely got to spend any time in it before we went right to heck (literally). and then, the yearning and angst was just replaced with really cringe and over the top sexual dialogue. and you all know that i love steam in books, but this felt like it was done just to “prove” it was an adult book, but it truly was so bad in my opinion. and finally, i just could not care about envy or camilla the way i did for emilia (and i guess wrath too, but emilia supremacy for sure).
but even with those negative aspects that i was really banking on being not negatives, i still had fun reading this book. the writing is so consumable, and the plot really always feels good and like it is at a good pace, which makes the reader never want to put the book down. i also really loved all the tie-ins with that first trilogy that i should probably go back and rate higher since i am writing this review and reminiscing about it so fondly.
lord, three paragraphs written and not a single sentence about what this book is about lol. okay, so basically this is a series about the demon princes of hell, each based on a different seven deadly sin, and what is going on with their specific courts, while also getting a romance. this specific story is about envy, and a very secret game that he is playing, where he is tasked to get a painting done by an artist in london, who is being blackmailed and also going through feeling a lot of grief because her father has passed and her mother has run away.
also, i just loved learning more about the princes of hell. and i also really, really, really loved seeing fae (and vampires and other paranormal creatures) truly enter this story as main players! And one thing that i truly will give kerri maniscalo, is that she can write good twists. I think she has bamboozled me in every story i’ve read by her, and i feel like that is a somewhat hard feat, especially in paranormal romance. and then this book? she was able to pull the rug from under my feet like three times. like, i will give credit where credit is due, and she really deserves credit for making a really fun reading experience for me because of her twists and turns.
but i have to say that i was screaming, going on goodreads and seeing book two is going to be gluttony’s book, because i truly was 110% expecting it to be pride’s with the work that was put in for him at the end of this book! But the tl;dr is that i will be reading it for this halloween season, and i hope it has more of the elements that i love and less of the ones that i do not love so much.
trigger + content warnings: debt, blackmail, loss of parents in past, talk of parent with illness, uncomfortable unwanted sexual advances, talk of infertility, abandonment, grief, abuse, blood, drinking, threat of sa, kidnapping, brief mention of self harm to get blood for a vampire, violence, gore, torture, battle, throwing up, and maybe a cannibalism mention
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