After getting hit by a car and discovering the body of Ashley James, Georgia Avis still owes her brother $4,000. In order to repay him, she gets a job at Aspera, a lodge/lounge/club/resort for the elite. As Georgia's fascination with the Hayeses, the couple who run Aspera, increases, so does her entanglement with the victim's older sister, Nora. However, balancing Aspera and her investigation becomes more and more difficult until there's enough pressure to potentially break a girl.

The main issue that this book struggled with is pacing -- it ebbs and flows. The first few pages are jam packed with action and then the next 30% has very little plot developments and only after the 50% mark does the book recover a consistent and attention keeping pace.

The writing portrays a world that is enticing and horrifying in turns. The plot is intriguing, a story that you cannot look away from. The slow discovery of how, exactly, everything happens was fascinating. The characters were all intricately developed, the well-fashioned pins holding up the story. Sexual violence is an integral theme to the story, which makes the book difficult to read at times.

Overall, a book that will require a reread in order to fully see the way in which everything unfold, that will leave you with questions to ponder after it's done. 

"A girl enters a reality dating competition to get revenge on her cheating, royal-adjacent ex-boyfriend, and ends up falling for another girl on the show—in fact, the girl he cheated on her with." Let me tell you, this book most definitely lives up to its premise!

I absolutely adored the reality show setting -- this is only the second book I've read that utilizes it this well. Incredibly well written -- I loved the subtle comedy of it all and the incredibly relatable portrayal of the girls. It is quite clear that a lot of thought had gone into the creation of Chalonne, including the development of a language for it. The characters were brilliantly written -- Skye and Maya both distinct and likeable and the villain villainous in such an underhanded manner that you almost don't notice it. Maya and Skye as a couple simply have my whole heart. This book also has a few themes, most of them well fleshed out but kept to a subliminal level. One theme in particular felt like it had been left untied up at the end, but that is a very miniscule drawback. The ending surprised me for a bit but makes sense entirely within the context of the story.

Overall, a wonderful sapphic romance! Would most definitely recommend. 

[I received an arc in exchange for my honest review. Thank you to NetGalley for the copy!]

 Do you love bad romance movies but think that they’re just too short? Would you like the disaster to last 5 hours instead of 1 and a half? Then, boy, do I have a book for you.

There are two things that were fine about this book: the message that you are Indian no matter whether you choose to participate in traditions or not and the dressing room scenario (only as a concept for a scene and not the actual scene due to issue number 1 below).

There are many things I didn’t like about this book.

First of all, let’s start with some of the lesser evils of this book.

It’s just not well written. It reads like it has never seen an editor and that doesn’t make for a great experience.

Manny, as a main character, is rather inconsistent and, due to her wealth, pretty far removed from the average, non-rich reader. She seems completely blind to how Adam is very much a bad person despite it being emphasized how she’s a strong and empowered woman, over and over and over again. Manny even refuses to believe Sammy when he tells her about how traditional his family is.

Second of all, the romance between Sammy and Manny just doesn’t have any chemistry. It borders on insta-love and the ending does not make sense. Sammy reads like a Hallmark love interest getting the business woman to rediscover life outside business, which is essentially what he is. He’s pretty much just Manny’s guide to Indian culture until he suddenly isn’t.

Now, onto the middle ground evil which is: Manny’s company as a concept. It’s a company that enables you to break up with your partner through email, which a) is honestly callous and a rather cruel way to break up with someone and b) means that she’s made a business of profiting off of people’s vulnerability. And it’s never genuinely challenged. It could have made for an interesting character trait in another book.

There are somethings about this book that are even more uncomfortable and, frankly, sickening.

At every turn in the story, Manny makes a point of emphasizing how different and odd and alien Indian culture is to her. The book leans into stereotypes. White characters make rather insensitive jokes and are let off the hook for it. Adam who behaves despicably, ends up being let off the hook without a confrontation. It is not my place to talk about this, so please read Aashna’s review to fully understand.

The LGBTQ representation in this book is borderline offensive. There are multiple gay men in this story and every single one of them is written the exact same way and relegated to the exact same role: the Hypersexual Gay Best Friend. There is no depth to any them. Every other line they say is either something about how gay they are or something sexual. It was honestly pretty sickening to read. Representation has gotten much better in the last decade and this reads as an outdated and horrible stereotype.

Next, the only non-skinny character in this book is written to be comedic relief in the same way early 2000s TV wrote non-skinny characters as comedic relief. Characters are just allowed to make remarks about her body weight and, while the main character worries about her carb intake (perpetrating diet culture) the non-skinny girl is showing eating lots of bread and butter. Again, upsetting and I thought we, collectively, were better than this by now.