I was told this was like a fusion of Hunger Games, Bachelorette, and ACOTAR, and you know what? That’s exactly what it is. I had a fun time reading it!

There was some faint criticism on class and privileges afforded to the wealthy, but none of it came through too strongly. Lor was a fun character to follow through the Trials and she’s easy to root for. It’s funny because she’d constantly think “I’m gonna kill her!” and then pages later she’s risking her life to save other contestants lol.

Gender essentialism seems to be a language romantasy just cannot remove from its writing, so that was annoying. But I did like that our main characters are explicitly described as brown and not some vague, racially-ambiguous skin tone. There’s no mistaking they are POC. There were a couple of queer characters as well, and I’m desperate to find out what happens to Mariceli and Halo! 

Overall, a light romantasy read that’s captured my interest. Curious to see how book 2 goes!