1.5

I think it's ironic that if felt like it took me 323 years to finish this book.
I understand repetition to make us feel the ennui of Addie's life, but the readers didn't make a deal with the devil so idk why we had to suffer with her too.
I also think that the repetition should have been tastefully done, once here, twice there and not every flashback being some other person she spent the night with who forgets her because it served no purpose to her arc. The only characters she meets in the flashback that was noteworthy was Remy; after him she began to learn languages and read.

I enjoyed Addie's character and her motives the most at the start of the story when she was most 'alive', as the years and chapters went on, that feeling withered away.
I do appreciate the story of her meeting Henry and how she makes a new deal to free him of his own curse, but instead of that being the climax of the story, I would have much preferred if that was at the 25% or 50% mark and we followed Addie trying to exploit that semantic in the new deal she made with Luc and gaining her freedom.
And in doing so maybe she could actually do the exploring she so desperately wanted to do at the time she made the deal, instead of the revisiting of her own misery and woes. And maybe in that time she could learn to care about others and the world more, could actually visit more than 4 countries, travel out of Europe without having to fear being thrown in prison so long as she exploits Luc. Actually learn that much like her life, the human race repeats its mistakes, cruelty and experiences. Could idk have something to say about the happenings of history like the slave trade, or idk the colonisation France was doing at the time she was admiring the new Eiffel Tower made with the steel of France's colonized countries.

Her obsession and love of art felt vapid, only because it could reflect her, and not because it can translate and express all the different experiences and happening of the world that didn't have to do with her.

I felt like there was something missing from both romances or affairs with Henry and Luc, one because it calls into question whether it wasn't just a romance out of convenience in both situations; only she and Henry were not affected by each others curses, and only she and Luc kept living whilst the rest of the world died. The second reason being that I felt like there was no one Addie loved more than herself and that's good for her, but it just felt like if Luc/Henry didn't bring her to dine or to meet Bea and Robbie, she didn't really ask or wasn't really curious about the other person if it didn't tie back to herself. She didn't ask about Henry's upbringing, his parents, his dreams, his goals. She didn't ask Luc where he came from, his past, why he did what he did, if it was a job etc. I think because there was no one the author loved more than Addie in this story and it showed.

Despite all this, the most fun parts of the book where the Addie and Luc interactions, they had the most chemistry, and whilst I don't think they could ever love the other until they were on equal footing, a toxic war of him trying to get her soul vs her trying to get her freedom and Luc's soul too, with a little interlude of the Henry arc, would have been much more fun and quick to read than what the story ended up being.

The writing was beautiful and sort of gave of the nostalgic lyrical writing you read in really good fanfics, but alas the story was not entirely my taste.