I think this book deviated a bit from what first interested me. 

A lot of my focus and interest was lost for maybe the 2nd and 3rd quarters of this book. It felt like too much of it focused on Halen and Kallum and left too much of the killings behind. I get that this series is supposed to be a dark romance first, and everything else comes second, but there was a huge chunk that was just sex scene after sex scene and I felt like I was drowning in it.

The end really followed through, though, and I feel like I got most of my questions answered, and it all wrapped up pretty well. 

I truly loved the psychological aspect of these books. The murders and the occult depictions throughout were so well done, and I was entirely captivated by all of it. 

For the most part, I thought Halen was a great character, even if she did annoy the shit out of me every now and then. Kallum was great, even if he did take obsession a little too far. I loved the fire between them, even if I did get tired of reading them banging, haha. 

I really wish I didn't see the plot twist coming. It seemed pretty obvious to me from boom one who the Overman was, so I wrote it off in the first book because I thought it was TOO obvious. It also seemed a bit too easy, to be quite honest.

I just want some freaking answers. This series just spins you around in circles nonstop until you don't know what's up or down. I feel like something has gone completely over my head, and I'm missing something completely, but at the same time, I also think that it's deliberate to create this Gothic and dark atmosphere. I'm glad Halen suddenly remembers everything at the end because I am more than ready to get some answers.

I don't think I enjoyed this book as much as the first. And I definitely raised my eyebrows and made a couple of faces while saying “riiiight” in this one. 

I could not put this down. 

I got through the entire book in one sitting and was obsessed. 

But the more I thought about it, the more muddled it all became, and the less I understood WHY I was obsessed. 

The ideas behind the killings was absolutely what caught my attention, but we really don't learn much about the killings in general.
This book is very centered around the psychological ideals behind the murders and got a little obscure at times, but it was also so interesting that I couldn't get enough. 

I think, at the end of the day though, that maybe this book was trying to do too much, and to connect too many dots because there were a few tikes that it got to be a little convoluted. 

I'm absolutely reading the next book, like right now. I need some answers after everything that was hinted at and implied at near the end.

This book is a collection of 3 short stories. 

Hooked - A retelling of Peter Pan ☆☆☆
Caged - A retelling of Rapunzel ☆☆☆☆☆
Seduced - A Hades and Persephone Story ☆☆☆

Hooked

While I liked the premise and the spin on the characters, the way this story was written just didn't work for me. I think the length of it had a lot to do with that. A good amount of time was spent focusing on Peter and Wendy's history, but I almost wish that we had Peter's pov as well as Wendy's. So much of the actual guts of this story was completely skipped over and just kind of mentioned in pieces, and I really wish that the readers could have been a part of it. If this was a full-length novel, and we actually followed Peter on his search for Dante and the Captain, I think this really could have been something. But too much of this story was left out, and it really left me feeling hollow and deflated. 

Caged 

I loved this. Tangled is my all-time favorite Disney movie, and so I went into this one with high expectations. MC Frank absolutely delivered. While I felt that Hooked was too short and should have been written as a full-length novel, I think this one was perfectly done. I obsessed over Valentine and Zella. The locked room romance was to die for and was wonderfully done. Zellas story was absolutely heartbreaking, and I was completely enamored with her character. Valentine was swoon worthy from start to finish and was impossible not to fall in love with. For a short story, this absolutely delivered with a bang. 

Seduced 

I loved this story from the start. I loved watching Poppy take control of herself after all of the abuse from her brother, and I genuinely like Hades as a character. But the longer the story went on, the less I liked it. It started to get very repetitive, and (maybe this is an asshole thing to say), but everyone whined and cried. A LOT. I know there was a lot of abuse in this book, with all the characters, but by the end of the third story, I was kind of tired of everyone crying about how awful their lives were constantly. This one was no different. After the entire story and Poppy learning how terrible her brother was, she still went back to him. And that was the moment that I was mentally absolutely done with this one. The banter between Poppy and Hades was wonderful when it was there. But there just wasn't enough of it for me. 

Also, there's a lot of God talk in this series… I just kinda skim over all that.

This book. 

The atmosphere alone is entirely worth the 5 stars. This overwhelming feeling of darkness just covers the entire plot of this story, and Starling House just pulled me in over and over again. 

We aren't just given one heartbreaking story, we're given a whole handful of them, all intertwined and spun together. 

The fact that we get to see this boom through both Opal and Arthur's povs was really great because they were so vastly different. They might be seeing and doing the same things, but they experience it in entirely different ways. I found myself entirely devoted to both of them.

I wasn't entirely sure the direction this book was taking, but it was so perfectly done, and I truly couldn't have asked for a more wonderful experience.

Overall, I enjoyed this book as the finale to this series. But while I liked the ending of the overall plot line that connected all of these books together, I didn't really connect with Carys or her story. To be quite honest, she really frustrated me and I didn't really like her at all. 

I wish that this book would have focused on Aneryn. She deserved her own story, and considering how much this book focused on her at the end, I really missed not getting more from her. 

Carys was headstrong and stubborn and unwilling to listen to people. Or to reason. And I'm pretty sure I was supposed to empathize with her when it came to Ersan, but in reality, I felt for him more than her. I spent most of this book wishing she'd get off her high horse and get over herself rather than feeling for her. 

I also think that the trials weren't really well done, or focused on enough. I kept waiting for the trials to get exciting but they really felt like an afterthought. 

If I don't focus on the main plot line in this book, and I focus on the overarching plot of the series, this book really did follow through. I loved how everything concluded and wrapped up, even if it all seemed to be a bit too easy and a bit too neat. 

Book 3 in this world didn't quite hit the same as the other two. It's really not even due to the change of main character. I really love Sorinda, and for the most part, I like Kearan. But I really didn't connect with the story. 

I liked diving into Sorindas life and learning what made her turn to the life she did. It was heartbreaking, and I felt for her so much. I love a badass fmc, and she was really all that and more (mostly). 

BUT. I really wasn't able to connect with Kearan in this one. I feel like in the other two books, he had so much personality and brought a lot of humor to the crew, and I didn't get that in this one at all. He was so serious and blah all the time that I found him to be quite boring. 

I also didn't love the plot, though it was well written. We kind of left the whole piracy storyline less than half way through the book, and it really took on this kind of magical plot line, which, I don't hate, but I also feel like it didn't fit in this series.

11/04/2021 ☆☆
06/29/2024 ★★★★

I'm not sure what is different with me this go around, but I enjoyed this book significantly more than the first time I read it. 

I already loved Alosa so much, and watching her grow into her strengths as a captain and finding herself as a siren was an absolute joy.

I love her crew and that we get these little snippets of all the different women throughout the book and create small bonds with so many of them. This book really went beyond Alosa and Riden more than I think the first book was able to. 

I also liked diving deeper into Ridens' past and getting to know him better. His relationship with Alosa is so cute and fun, I really love them together. 

11/03/2021 ☆☆☆☆☆
06/29/2024 ★★★★

I really don't want to drop this book a star, but hear me out. 

I love this book, it was great! Alosa is my favorite kind of fmc. She's strong, she's a badass, and she's not afraid to get her hands dirty. There's nothing better. 

We're surrounded by pirates this entire book, and again, there's nothing better. 

The slow growing feelings between her and Riden was really well written, and honestly, I don't think it was overdone. I didn't find it cheesy or ridiculous, and I loved their banter. 

My only real issue with this book is that for so much of it, nothing really happens. For a book that's about pirates, we spend a lot of time just standing around on a ship with Alosa sneaking around looking for a map. 

Everyone is so deceitful and it was fun to watch it all unravel at the end of the book, and because of that I ALMOST bumped it back up to 5 stars, but there was just a little missing for me that didn't kick it there all the way. 

This little Novella just hits you right in the heart. 

I couldn't get to The Amethyst Kingdom fast enough to see what happens to her. It hardly scratched the surface of the questions that I have, and I can't wait to dive in.