hann_cant_read's reviews
468 reviews

Maybe it's the current political climate, but this just didn't hit the way I was expecting it to. The banter was fun, the characters were cute, it was really the setting that just kept taking me out of the story. 

The British Royal family couldn't seem more American than if they were set in America. I was already rolling my eyes with every interaction they had with each other and with Alex, but when Henry's mom told the Queen to "Shut up, mom" I almost dnf'd. And then with her threatening to take the crown from her? I understand this is an AU, but come on. At least create a fake country or something if you're going to make the dynamics so completely off the wall like that. 

Also Henry is not like other royals, he thinks imperialism is bad... okay? Again, maybe just make him from a fake country so it wouldn't be so hard to suspend disbelief. 

Something about Alex being mixed race also felt very weird and his random phrases in Spanish very google translatey, just not quite as natural as it would be for someone who was actually bilingual. I don't totally understand why this choice was made, other than to highlight the Queen being racist I guess? But like, yeah. It was fine. 

I am an Emily Henry stan. She is one of my very few auto-buy authors. ...this one disappointed me. Hear me out though, I have my reasons.

One of my favorite things about Emily Henry books is that, while they're romances at heart, there is so much life in them outside of just the core relationship. There are always complicated family dynamics intersecting with career dynamics, and stakes that feel real and lifelike. There's always a moment before the book ends where the thought is "wait, is this actually going to be a happily ever after?" And then she brings it home.

This book, for the most part was no exception. I genuinely loved the mystery aspect, the dynamics between Margaret, her secrets, the island, etc. The romance felt a little more secondary than it usually does -it had less banter and, while it wasn't insta-love, the growth didn't feel as natural as in some of her other books, but it wasn't unnatural.

Where this book went from riding the middle of my EH rankings to the bottom was the ending.

miscommunication trope Emily? Are you kidding me?

We were in our sweet spot of, man this is tough how is this going to get resolved in a way that is both realistic and satisfying? Turns out, neither.

when I say miscommunication, I do NOT mean the NDA. I mean the part where she's upset and he's asking why and she refuses to tell him that she can't tell him because of the NDA. Girl. This boy is thinking he fucked up and Alice is just letting him. That's such a bitch move.

While I really loved the resolution with Alice and her mom, I think the ending between Hayden and Alice felt rushed and just suddenly was resolved with little to no effort.

How did a letter suddenly make Margaret change her mind about the NDA?

It felt so random and like...okay I guess that works.

That being said, my least favorite Emily Henry book still beats out my most favorite other romance book and always will. I'm gonna go re-read Book Lovers.

I had a lot of fun with this one, but I would say it fell a little bit short of my expectations as the 2nd book in a duology.

And honestly, that's my biggest gripe. It feels less like a duology and more like two standalones set in the same universe. 
Almost everything that happened in this book was set up in this book. I can only think of one minor foreshadowing attempt, but there were no plot point call backs. When that one point did come up again it was treated as brand new information. If someone completely skipped the first book and just read this one they wouldn't miss anything.

I also think that lent itself to being much more predictable than it otherwise would have. If we could have spaced out information a little bit more throughout the two books I think the twists would have been much more impactful. However, I'm still one to say I would much rather a book have predictable twists than twists that make zero sense just for shock value. And just because it was predictable didn't make it not a fun time.

Now for the positives!

This is one of the very few instances that I don't hate the miscommunication trope. It actually makes sense in the context of who these characters are and what they stand for.

I also have a very thin threshold for cringey banter, and this book did not trigger my fight or flight. Sometimes I rolled my eyes a little at their timing of their confessions, but it's a romantasy. These characters were able to talk about so much more than just their lust for one another and build an actually believable foundation for their relationship.

Despite my critiques I really do think this was a fun story, with very few loose ends left untied. I'm excited to see what else Kristen Ciccarelli has in store.

I have so many mixed feelings about this one.

To start, I like it so much better than House of Sky and Breath, but that isn't saying much to be fair. 

I feel like it started strong - I didn't even mind the rapid POV switching. I actually felt like it kept the pace moving more steadily than if we had been stuck with just one person, because in true SJM fashion it took forever for anything to really start happening. It also helped break up a lot of the info dumping that took place.

That being said - the crossover was ...fine. I wasn't a huge fan of ACOSF to begin with. (Don't come for me, I love a good tragic backstory and character arc, the whole thing just read like fanfiction) But it started to make a lot more sense if you think of it less as an ACOTAR book and more as a setup for HoFS.

I want to love Bryce, I really do. But she's just so so dumb, and it's infuriating that everyone around her is convinced she's so strategic and smart. A huge complaint I had from HoSB was that all of the action happens off page, we just learn about all the things Bryce did to save the day behind the scenes  while we were stuck following around some other jabroni. 
HoFS is better. SJM takes a more TOG approach in that we see seemingly inconsequential actions being taken, we just don't know the thought process behind those actions until the reveal down the road. That being said, I know I echo a lot of people when I say this.. Bryce is no Aelin. Maybe it's because people call Aelin out on her shit while everyone just fawns over Bryce (unless they're the bad guy) but almost all the "big moves" she made just feel superficial despite us being told we should be super impressed by it. Everyone acts like she's grown so much, but I don't think she's grown at all since the first book.

Bryce's and Hunt's dynamic was odd this book. It really felt like a case of me being told "trust me they're in love" rather than any actual chemistry. Bryce's complete dismissal of his hesitations was wild, and I don't even like Hunt all that much. 

Lydia carried the book and has never done anything wrong in her life ever.

The Autumn King arc just felt anti-climactic. We get flashes of possible emotions here and there but ultimately it amounted to nothing. 

I know this is a wild take, but I don't hate Ithan. I don't think he's great or reliable or anything, but I don't hate him. The Fendyr heir is who I think sucked. I was hoping for some sort of trauma arc for her to grow into anybody worth saving and instead she just made it a point to make everyone wish she was still trapped.

Tharion. I still think his decision to swear himself to the Viper Queen, on top of being an extremely dumb move for a supposed "head of intelligence" it also just made literally no sense. There were so many options and he picked and continued to pick the worst ones. He was supposed to be smart?


My last complaint (for now) is really just the ending. Not only did she just kind of spontaneously win against all the all powerful asteri, ("we're going to have a democracy!" - cool Bryce, where have you ever heard of a democracy before?) but I swear to god if one more character "dies" but then is brought back to life I might just be done reading SJM.
You can't crossover all your books and then reuse the same tired tropes between them. The emotional impact is just gone. People almost dying, or not dying at all but losing all their powers would be way more impactful than this same arc repeating over and over again. 

This book infuriated me.

For such an amazing concept I don't understand how it could be so boring.

Red is the most incurious person I've ever seen. You just found out your entire religion / life purpose is a total lie and you ask ZERO follow up questions?!? 

The pacing was rough. We spent the majority of the book just basically reliving the same problem over and over again. The tiny interludes into Neve's life outside the woods was the only part that actually drove the plot forward. Our main story line didn't progress until like 3/4 of the way through the book - we just kept re-learning the same information over and over again. Maybe if Red EVER asked a follow up question we could have gotten somewhere. She's so stubborn in the weirdest ways. I don't understand how "Why?" just never came up. She would insist on doing something, the wolf would say no, and then she would just sulk or storm off. 

I also couldn't actually feel the supposed chemistry between the two leads. The Wolf has had a number of second daughters come through as sacrifices but somehow Red is different and he's never felt this way about any of them even though they barely interact. It's supposed to be forced proximity but it's really just giving "there's no one else around so might as well"

I wanted desperately for Red and Neve's bond to be the redeeming relationship in this book. (I'm a total sucker for sibling bonds) but Red went from caring more about her sister than anyone or anything to the point that she went into the woods to certain death to protect her in the first place, to literally seeing

her sister with black veins and being like "huh. Weird. Anyways..."

The worst part, is that the ending was actually great and sets up an incredibly interesting premise for book 2. You just have to suffer for 3/4 of the book to finally get there. 

Two disaster bisexuals banging their way through Europe.

Okay so it's smutty and steamy, but also heartwarming and heartbreaking. The story is extremely character driven vs plot heavy, and about halfway through we switch POV's.

Normally I'm a big proponent of a plot driven > character driven story, but I do think it was balanced here really well with the setting. The forward momentum of the trip they were on was a really interesting and unique way to keep driving them forward as well.

I would have wished to see a little bit more personal growth from Theo. Kit seemed to take more accountability of his part in the break up, and while he was unhappy without Theo he was still making self improvements. Theo is still kind of just...floundering.

I think the nonbinary coming out was a big step, but they had already come out to people back home before the trip so it wasn't a lot of growth from our starting point with them.

Okay. So. I loved it, but I can definitely understand the criticism.

Is it historically accurate? no. Is it scientifically accurate? also no. Should it have been marketed as a comedy? Absolutely not. It has funny moments absolutely but the overarching theme of sexism and abuse are deeply embedded in very not-funny ways. 

I have it sorted as lit fic, but it's almost a little fantastical. Not actually fantasy, but the vibe feels very "Ella Enchanted" or "My Lady Jane" but without the magic. Personally, I love it but I can see why that's not everyone's cup of tea - especially coupled with such dark themes.

Luckily I don't have triggers, but the detailed rape scene pretty early on was still extremely jarring. (That's, again, more of a problem with the marketing than the actual book itself though)

For the things I did love:
Elizabeth was a flawed character. She was incredibly smart, but also sometimes a little dumb. Stubborn to her own detriment, but so funny. She didn't love often but when she did she loved so deeply.
I loved the character growth, specifically of her female friends and how those relationships really developed over time. 
Six-thirty. My absolute favorite character.

This is so boring. I would have dnf'd it if it wasn't our book club pick.

The two main characters have zero chemistry. Even their bickering feels forced.
His Scottish accent feels like it was written by someone who watched Brave one time, with just random words thrown in to remind you he's Scottish - but somehow understands her slang perfectly.
The whole premise felt flimsy, which I would have been able to excuse if the chemistry was there but I've never seen two more annoying people less attracted to each other.

The monster smut was fine

- although we never actually find out if he's able to partially transform during the deed anymore once the curse is broken. Feels like a waste if he can't tbh

The 3rd act break-up and the the "secret" that lachlan was keeping made literally no sense.

The poem/curse had a second verse that mentions "the end only comes with the daughter of mackay" and lachlan decides to keep that part from her. Why? Who fucking knows. He says it's because he doesn't know her/trust her yet but no one even knows what it means. He's pretending like it's any sort of information and when she finds out she's out of proportion mad, again, as if he actually kept anything vital from her.

Neither person makes any sense in this scenario.

The reasoning Duncan had for escaping to America with his daughter also made no sense. He said it was to protect his daughter, but protect her from what? Just because the poem says

the curse ends with her why does that mean she needs protecting? If anything you should be excited to have a daughter so she can end the curse your friend is under.

AND that's assuming he didn't read the full account from Sorscha

where she LITERALLY spells out that all it will take is a daughter of mackay to forgive them.  when we KNOW he did because it was his journal!

Also the grandmother sucked.