cunningempress's Reviews (526)

This was fun and lighthearted even though it was a bit cringy and syrupy at times.

It's a pretty book but I just got bored. Not in the mood. Listened the audiobook to 46% then DNF'd.

Thank you Netgalley and Victory Editing for providing me with an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

I DNF'd this at 70%.

For the first half I was entertained. I liked the idea and the premise. But this book felt like it should have ended after the half way point. I have no interest to keep reading, I'm mostly just frowning at the book at this point.

Spoiler

The world building is lacking a bit. I don't understand, is the coven really strict or not? Do they have freedom or are they forced to work with the coven? So, Elle wants to find her sister but to do that she needs to become a keeper in her coven. Why? Because keepers job includes travel and that way she can travel to the country she was born in and where her sister lives. So she can't leave the coven? Yet, one of the other keepers says he does it for the money? So he chooses to be there? So Elle could just take off and go find her sister? Why doesn't she do that then? Is this situation like becoming a flight attendant so you can travel and see the world??? I've got no fucking clue. Elle should've just left, forget the coven.
OR if these witches and their covens are so nice then why wouldn't they take in both sisters? The non-witch sister could still have helped around and they wouldn't have been separated.

Also, these gods. They don't seem like they're ancient. They seem like petty teenagers. And of course the MC has to fall in love with one of them. Yet another book to the add to the list of ships with hundreds of years of age difference. Also, Victor is so annoying when he comes in to the picture. To the reader is so stupidly clear that he's not trustworthy and he's lying about something. But nooo, everyone just loves him because he's pretty and really good at magic. Like stupid good.

And then of course the love interest turns into a brooding mess and the MC wants to help him. I think ancient gods can help themselves. At this point in the book I was ready to push him off a cliff. I couldn't care less about this piece-of-shit god that only stirs trouble. All the gods should be pushed off a cliff so everyone else could just live their lives.

In the middle of the book there's build up to a scene that makes you think it's probably the end of the book. But it's not. And I don't really know where the book is suppose to go from there. Maybe I'd know if I'd kept reading but I honestly can't care less about these characters.

Something about this book feels really rushed. There's not much character development. I also get weirded out when high fantasy books have modern tech like phones or cars. Or really, just electricity. The description for this book sounds way more interesting than what this really is.

So yeah, I'm giving it two stars and I won't be coming back for a sequel.

I remember back in 2010's this was one of those books that was all over Goodreads. And 14-year-old me would have loved this. Unfortunately I'm now 22-years-old and I have read so many YA dystopian books that this is a struggle to read. So I DNF'd at about 30% through.

The characters are 13-15-year-olds and sometimes I feel like they're not acting their age and I probably should never again read a book about teenagers.

this is way too bad to read even as a joke. dnf at 62%.

This is a very standard YA fantasy and it doesn't really have any outstanding features. I have read the same thing so many times that I couldn't finish this despite having only 40 pages left.
I tried to finish this just to finish a book and this isn't really THAT bad (just very similar to a ton of other books) and I have been having a lot of DNF's lately and I wanted to break the pattern. But alas, I got too frustrated by the ending.

If you're 13 and/or new to fantasy and/or like YA fantasy specifically then this might be for you.

DNF.

I didn't feel like finishing this. The characters are either quirky in the most annoying way or then they're just plain and boring. I read ~40% of this and I can tell this is one of those books where you have no business making predictions about the endgame because it's going to be something so crazy there was no way of knowing and all the characters have some secrets that makes them all seem questionable but probably half of them are just hiding something that doesn't even relate to the mystery. This book felt like a huge waste of time and seeing that there are two more books in this series doesn't help. So I'm just gonna give up now because I already know I'm never gonna read the sequels.

I did not finish this book.

I first started reading it as a ebook and got through most of it, couldn't be bothered to finish it and then got an audiobook but realised there's two hours of this mess left and gave up after reading the Wikipedia page to find out how it ends.

I was so excited about this book because I'm a big fan of politics and the whole idea of Hunger Games as an institution is very interesting. But this book is so damn boring I couldn't bring myself to finish it. Snow isn't very interesting main character and after what I've read I don't think he's very interesting villain either. He's just a bad person and there's not that much to it.

If there was something good about this I've already forgotten and mostly I will forever remember that this book is not worth my time ever again and I would rather watch a two-hour movie than read so many useless pages.

DNF 68% through.

I feel like the plot goes SO slowly and I don't even care for the characters. They just seems so black and white.
The premise of the book is great, there could possibly be great bits at the end and the sequels could be great but I just really don't feel like trying to force myself through this just to MAYBE get a good ending and sequels.

DNF @ 38% because I couldn't care less

I'm sorry but this book sounds like I would've liked it when I was 12. It's been 10 years and it's way too cringy. I tried but there are better books I could be reading.