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eggcatsreads 's review for:
The Dead Romantics
by Ashley Poston
This book isn’t bad. I finished it in one day with a cat on my lap. It’s fun and easy to read. A normal 2-3 star read. It’s sweet and cute and doesn’t take long to read or too much effort. Very beach-read esque, and since that’s what I read it for it accomplished it perfectly.
But.
It’s cringe as all hell, and not even in a good way.
Half the plot feels like a romantic spin on Colleen Hoover’s Verity and since that book was mid at best, not the best start. The love interest is literally only described as “big” or “large” like, that’s it. What else is there? Idk other than “conventionally attractive man who is so big next to the small dainty woman” and I’m bored. Give me something to latch onto. Literally all we get about how attractive he is is how large his chest is or how ripped his abs are. Boring. I'm bored. Where are the flaws? The thing making him human and not some perfect caricature of a man.
Plus this book is amazingly slow and half the plot isn’t even relevant to the blurb on this book, the literal reason I read it. The fact that she can see and talk to ghosts, or that her family owns a funeral home is barely relevant to her own internal monologue about how hard her life is or their own family drama. It gets old fast.
Plus, the plot.
You want me to believe that she has been trying and FAILING to write this book for a year, and meeting with her editor literally ONLY the day before the manuscript is due. And to combat her literal less-than-24-hour deadline, she not only goes out to buy books BUT SHE GOES OUT DRINKING???? HELLOO??? IS SHE NOT EVEN TRYING??? Literally, a deadline of a month would have made more sense than literally the next day. That was so stupid it took me out of the novel entirely.
And I get it. She’s been betrayed and doesn’t “believe in love anymore”. I don’t care. Finish the fucking book you had an entire year and you just fucked off the whole time. Where is the forgivable action here, she did this to her own goddamn self.
And the fact that she’s only written one (ONE) book that just so happens the love interest has read and liked, and while it wasn’t that good some rando famous author took her on to ghostwrite for her? NOT TO MENTION IT WASN'T EVEN THE BOOK THAT DID IT - IT WAS SOME RANDO FANFIC SHE WAS WRITING AND THE ONLY REASON SHE WAS CHOSEN WAS BC SHE CAN SEE GHOSTS. THAT'S IT. It’s literally Verity without the rest of the cringe of Verity and yet, the book is still a slog half the time.
This book literally uses the word “unalive”. Am I on TikTok what the fuck is this.
“It’s not me being stuck unalive, it’s you.” What the fuck. It feels so off, it literally would have flowed better to fucking say the word dead.
Plus, not to even mention the unnecessary and yet fucking constant name-dropping of better or well-known books in this to, idk, make the protagonist seem more relatable? Quirky? For buying Howl’s Moving Castle or seeing Red, White, and Royal Blue in a bookstore? What is this. I can’t tell if it’s the world’s lamest ad, or if the author wrote too much fanfic and never got out of the habit.
Not to mention how fucking fanfic-y it reads. And not in the good way because I fucking love some fanfiction. But in a cringe “is this scene over yet???” kind of way. -
This book was sweet and cute and an easy read. But IMHO, The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy was better.
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Also there was a scene when the brother just randomly goes that kissing his boyfriend “tastes like a Taylor Swift song” and then just starts fucking singing one and namedrops it. I literally have her racist ass blocked on every social media platform and I can't even escape her in a book. Bad.
But.
It’s cringe as all hell, and not even in a good way.
Half the plot feels like a romantic spin on Colleen Hoover’s Verity and since that book was mid at best, not the best start. The love interest is literally only described as “big” or “large” like, that’s it. What else is there? Idk other than “conventionally attractive man who is so big next to the small dainty woman” and I’m bored. Give me something to latch onto. Literally all we get about how attractive he is is how large his chest is or how ripped his abs are. Boring. I'm bored. Where are the flaws? The thing making him human and not some perfect caricature of a man.
Plus this book is amazingly slow and half the plot isn’t even relevant to the blurb on this book, the literal reason I read it. The fact that she can see and talk to ghosts, or that her family owns a funeral home is barely relevant to her own internal monologue about how hard her life is or their own family drama. It gets old fast.
Plus, the plot.
You want me to believe that she has been trying and FAILING to write this book for a year, and meeting with her editor literally ONLY the day before the manuscript is due. And to combat her literal less-than-24-hour deadline, she not only goes out to buy books BUT SHE GOES OUT DRINKING???? HELLOO??? IS SHE NOT EVEN TRYING??? Literally, a deadline of a month would have made more sense than literally the next day. That was so stupid it took me out of the novel entirely.
And I get it. She’s been betrayed and doesn’t “believe in love anymore”. I don’t care. Finish the fucking book you had an entire year and you just fucked off the whole time. Where is the forgivable action here, she did this to her own goddamn self.
Spoiler
Plus, what. Making out with him behind a bar suddenly? Cringe. Making it that he TOTALLY noticed her before her shitty ex got her, but "aw beans, I had someone. Darn monogamy." Cringe. We didn't need that. They literally didn't need to meet before or anything - he should have only known her from her one book she did write.And the fact that she’s only written one (ONE) book that just so happens the love interest has read and liked, and while it wasn’t that good some rando famous author took her on to ghostwrite for her? NOT TO MENTION IT WASN'T EVEN THE BOOK THAT DID IT - IT WAS SOME RANDO FANFIC SHE WAS WRITING AND THE ONLY REASON SHE WAS CHOSEN WAS BC SHE CAN SEE GHOSTS. THAT'S IT. It’s literally Verity without the rest of the cringe of Verity and yet, the book is still a slog half the time.
This book literally uses the word “unalive”. Am I on TikTok what the fuck is this.
“It’s not me being stuck unalive, it’s you.” What the fuck. It feels so off, it literally would have flowed better to fucking say the word dead.
Plus, not to even mention the unnecessary and yet fucking constant name-dropping of better or well-known books in this to, idk, make the protagonist seem more relatable? Quirky? For buying Howl’s Moving Castle or seeing Red, White, and Royal Blue in a bookstore? What is this. I can’t tell if it’s the world’s lamest ad, or if the author wrote too much fanfic and never got out of the habit.
Not to mention how fucking fanfic-y it reads. And not in the good way because I fucking love some fanfiction. But in a cringe “is this scene over yet???” kind of way. -
Spoiler
THERE’S LITERALLY A SCENE WHERE SHE CONFRONTS A FORMER BULLY AND HAS THIS WHOLE CRINGY SPEECH AND IT WAS VERY "AND THEN EVERYONE CLAPPED" LIKE ARE YOU SERIOUS.This book was sweet and cute and an easy read. But IMHO, The Undertaking of Hart and Mercy was better.
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