I'm usually not a huge fan of the friends to lovers trope, but this was done reasonably well. The main characters are likeable and have friends and family relationships as well as flaws that helped them have an identity outside of their friendship/romantic relationship. They each also had their separate careers that were demanding and had to manage their relationship while balancing out their career plans for the future. We got to know the characters really well despite the fast pace of the book because of these details and it made for a better love story. Easy to read through and makes you look forward to other books focusing on the side characters.

Akane and Ranma have definitely develope feelings for each other but are nowhere near admitting as much. Nabiki is as obsessed with money as ever and it made for a few great laughs. She did manage to set Akane and Ranma up on a date, though, so that's something.

This was a very fun volume. We don't get a lot of information on the Eye of the Midnight Sun, but they seem to be after Astra's grimoire. Thankfully reinforcements showed up to help Gauche and Asta. We got a lot of funny moments that led to a few discoveries. Noelle has a crush on Asta, but apparently so does Rebecca Scarlet. Worst of all, they think Asta likes the other person. This is turning into a hilarious love polygon. To top it all off, someone had a crush on Yami and I would have never guessed who. I'm looking forward to the next volume as it seems Asta's importance continues to grow in the plot as a whole. 

I have to give props to the world building in this book. There are elements of the world that aren't revealed until later, but it's different and not very predictable. It was really nice to have those elements introduced with new lore and history attached .  There is a class akin to a clergy in this world and they are highly unlikeable, which is usually what I expect. The romance was quite fast paced and started off as physical attraction that then evolved into more. We get to know Poppy and Hawke better as the story progresses and Poppy has a tremendous amount of character growth. Hawke plays a large role in helping her begin to question her motivations and why she is taking steps to become an Ascended. The side characters, such as Viktor and Tawny are also fleshed out well and let us get to know Poppy better through her relationships with them. Despite having the burden of being a Maiden and other responsibilities, she has a friend and a father figure that feel as important in the story as the romance. The story changes tone by the second half, but it's a great twist and by the end I was craving more. There is a cliffhanger, so I would have the sequel nearby. I can't say much more without spoiling, but if you like fast paced romances with a mysterious plot with a twist and fantasy lore presented in a unique way, this is for you. Please note the trigger warnings as there are moderate descriptions of those triggers in the book. 

I won this book a while ago in a giveaway and I'm glad I was finally able to finally finish it. The book addresses various aspects of how being white in America garners more opportunities and spares white people from a lot of the hardships that come with being black. The author speaks directly to the reader and the writing style can make the message seem preachy, but you have to keep in mind that the book was intentionally written in the style of a sermon. I know some people might not be fans of that, but it does get the message across. The book balances out the use of personal anecdotes, historical events and court cases to use as arguments for how some white people often do not fully understand the events that have led to black communities as a whole to be disenfranchised and disadvantaged in many ways. The author provides an empathetic view of why crime and incarceration rates tend to be higher in these communities and how white people continue to play an active role in maintaining this as the status quo, even if unintentionally. 

There are certain portions of the book that I do not necessarily agree with and I will explain them because I think they are extremely relevant and important when speaking about race as a social construct. At some point the author differentiates between black Americans and black immigrants in America. The argument he makes is that black immigrants have, and I quote: "arrived from societies where they enjoyed equality without regard to color. Thus they arrive with great assets, skills , and experiences, allowing them to compete in the American marketplace." My father and his entire side of the family is black Cuban and I am also black and a first generation American in the United States. My paternal great grandmother was a white Spanish woman who married a black man and went on to have children with him. When breastfeeding her black child she would often get racist comments such as "why are you breastfeeding your servant's child".  My mother is from Honduras and there is also racial prejudice present in Central America. Interracial couplings with a darker skinned partners are often looked down upon in Latin American countries because there is a lot of colorism. As a results, if your skin is lighter there are more opportunities granted to you in society because you are perceived as "whiter".  This is a concept the author even makes reference to much earlier in the text in fact.  Racial prejudice exists in other parts of the world besides the U.S. and I am not sure why the author would phrase the text in a way that suggests that he believes otherwise. It is possible that he was solely referring to immigrants from countries with a largely black populace. However, if that was the case it was not clear at all from the text and I think that was a huge oversight by the editing team and the author. Even if that were the case, there are multiple examples of racial prejudice affecting the quality of life and opportunities offered to black people in those countries. One of the more popularly known cases is apartheid in South Africa. While on this topic the author also suggests that foreign black people are more well tolerated by white people than black Americans. I can't vouch for the accuracy of that statement considering the number of cases of racism that there are against non-English speaking immigrants in the U.S. (largely in the Latinx community). I can't imagine that being black makes situations like that any better, but I can only speak from my perspective. I wish the author had expanded more on that so I could better understand what they were referring to or even used more specific examples. As a reader I can only opine that it was unclear to me and I think that it lacked the topic lacked the depth it needed to be clear to the audience.

Overall, I think the book offers some much needed perspective on race. I would think that the audience picking up this book already has as interest in learning about how race affects black Americans and how white people play a role in that. This book definitely addresses that appropriately and there is something to be learned by reading this. I would take my critique above into consideration when reading though because I do believe there is more space to explore what it means to be black in America outside of the black American perspective.