While this wasn't terrible, once again another 'it blew up on socials so everyone tells you to read it' was not actually that great. Maybe Ive read enough monster romance that this was not shocking to me in the slightest but the way i saw some people going on about this in videos online was just outright silly. Its really not that deep.

So our FMC Temperance aka Tem lives in a place where basilisks are the enemy and some kind of truce has been put together so that the snakes - i wont be typing basilisk anymore - train the would be brides of the crown prince in sexual exploits so that he can better choose a wife. How whether or not she knows how to suck dick is a trait worthy of marriage remains to be seen but whatever, we go with it. Tem meets Caspen, her snake who turns out to be a snake prince - of course - and she - of course - ends up falling for him. She does however also fall for the prince. While there is actually not issue with her loving two men, this is actually what pissed me off the most about this. She spends so much time talking about her unbreakable bond with one guy to only go and bang the other, makes no real sense. If the bond with one hadnt been made to be such a big deal, i doubt i would have cared. The fact such a huge point is made of what this connection means, why would you then go and fuck someone else!?

Moving on from that then, Tem herself is confusing. She starts out being a bit of a loser because one other village girl is mean to her but then as we go along, every moment where Tem would, you think have some kind of endearing vulnerability, she actually becomes a bit of a bitch. She's demanding, she's rude, she's always asking questions at inappropriate times and putting herself in danger just because she thinks she's cool now. Because you take dick now? So. So does everyone else. Endlessly. You're not special.

The writing in this was really good and there was a decent enough plot but it just felt put together too weakly. Reasons were just made up to make Tem have sex and she was just way too willing to do so considering how new she was to love making in the first place. I believe the author tried to make this plausible with a plot point about Tem but i just didnt think that was strong enough. At one point after a fairly traumatic sexual experience, she just wants to jump back on the horse so to speak and it just didnt ring true for me.

The end isnt really a cliffhanger, just open ended which is fine. She leaves room for more story should you wish to continue but I dont wish. I enjoyed it for what it was but it got too repetitive and too unrealistic for me to really care.