Maybe 1.5 stars.

I had more fun talking shit about this book as I read it with friends than actually reading the book (which always made me feel dismal and frustrated). Even though people tried to keep me fairly spoiler free SpoilerI still saw the 'plot twist' at the end coming from a mile away, also the reason as to why Andras had to die -- sadly there is no other plot beyond those 2 points. It held no real surprises and I feel like I just read 400 pages where only 150 of them had any meaning.

I did not like Fayre much. I feel like the only thing I DID like about her is that she's stupid and stayed stupid throughout the whole book, so, consistency at least. Lucien is probably the most decent character of them all, but he should've just stayed mean - it would've been more fun.

I slept on this and after a night thinking about what parts of the book I DID like was more difficult than I had thought. I liked a simile. To paraphrase: 'I was like dandelion fluff and he the wind that stirred me about the world.' That was nice. Not nice enough to make up for everything else though.

I'll read book 2 since I'm told it's massively better than this one, so that I might give the series a pretty fair chance, but I'm going to need a detox after this.