I'm SCREAMINGGGG at how cute the romance in this book is. It's a good 'ol will-they-won't-they slow burn, and I am HERE for it. I haven't been this in love with a fictional man since George Freaking Cooper (Song of the Lioness Series). In other words, it's been a LONG time. Kellyn is a sweet, compassionate mercenary and we love to see it.

The next best thing is my girl Ziva, the tall smithy that can whisper magic into her creations. She's better with metal than she is people, and I can certainly relate. The author's depiction of her social anxiety was so spot-on for me. I think that's why this book totally works in first person: we get a front-row seat to the spiraling thoughts that come with anxiety. YET, I didn't ever feel like it was heavy-handed. Does it mean sometimes Ziva says or does the wrong thing? Yeah. But if you struggle with anxiety, you know that sh!t happens sometimes, and your brain does its damndest to convince you that the world is against you. YES, even when all signs point to something being GOOD, that doubt remains. For me, that was relatable as hell.

Despite Ziva's battle with her anxiety, she grows as a character and learns how to push her boundaries in a way that is healthy. She isn't perfect, but she tries. And I love that for her. It's amazing to have a character who has such a whirlwind internal struggle and still has the strength to face it down. That's yet another thing I admire. I've see some criticism that internally she struggles yet externally she's more or less fine, and that it somehow makes the representation bad. But I have extreme social anxiety and I'm forced to face it all the time! I probably (hopefully) seem fine on the outside all the time. So personally, it really worked for me.

The other two characters in our band of misfits are also wonderfully fleshed out, and I love the distinct feeling each person has. Not to mention, the banter between our four heroes is top-notch. I genuinely enjoyed the dialogue and how the characters interact with each other.

Readers, take note that on occasion, the conflict can have to do with miscommunication. I'm tired of the miscommunication trope as much as the next person, yet in this case, I feel like it's done with a careful hand. Levenseller chooses only the things that make sense. Without spoiling anything, the characters are still learning to trust each other. And, in some cases, social anxiety facilitates miscommunication. This is done VERY lightly, and in my opinion, just enough to be believable without being frustrating. However, I hope the sequel continues to be this light-handed.

The story itself was entertaining, if not open-ended. Because the general plot was just "hide from enemies," this left a lot of room for surprises in the flow of the story. This unpredictability made for a good time, and even better character interaction/development. While it wasn't revolutionary for a fantasy plot, I did find it refreshing. Ziva and her friends are not your typical heroes, and they're not out there fighting evil and trying to save the day. That was plenty to keep me hooked.

And then, of course, there's the romance. There's no spice in this book, which is YA, and there doesn't need to be. What we get is so perfect and sweet: Levenseller really knows how to build the tension and longing. Give me more anticipation! It makes the payoff sooooo much better.

The only thing I think would improve the book is more detailed world building. I have no problem believing that this is a medieval-ish fantasy. However, every once in a while, Levenseller employs a term or concept that doesn't seem to fit. Granted, this isn't OUR world, so it doesn't have to play by our world's rules. There are plenty of modern-ish, medieval-ish fantasies that work. (The ones that come to mind are Galavant and the Ella Enchanted movie.) But I think that could be better established in the book. Instead, I'm left to wonder if those are simply mistakes or misunderstandings. For example, in the first few chapters, the characters go to a "restaurant" and order off menus from a waitress. It was jarring, since most fantasies tend to have taverns and barkeeps...and I'm pretty sure menus are fairly modern.

The kingdom also had some surprising geographical elements. Like apparently they've got every type of biome right next to each other on one map, though this is never explained well. At one point they go somewhere in the middle of the map and suddenly refer to it as the tropics, but also there are penguins? These things don't ruin the story for me, but they did give me pause.

Ultimately though, this promises to be a phenomenal duology, and I can't wait for book 2! Thankfully, I won't have to wait too long. If you're a fan of Tamora Pierce, I think you'll enjoy this.

This is worth a read for the art alone (if you like beautiful and gruesome), but the story is also so fascinating. I can really feel what Lou was going for, as mentioned in the author’s note. And the cliffhanger was nuts.

The only downside was that so much was going on that the story could be a bit hard to follow, but the cat scholar interludes definitely helped with the world-building. By the end of the volume I felt like I had a decent grasp on things, though I still have a lot of questions.

Beneath the Starlit Sea has a lot of promise as a story. The premise is really interesting, and think that it could be incredible with a little work. The story follows a witch and a doctor who are tasked to discover what’s been killing men at night. The threat is potentially magical, but it’s been hard to find any discerning evidence.

That being said, this reads almost like a draft zero to me. Sure, there’s been line editing, but I think there’s a ways to go with developmental edits.

The first thing that struck me was the length of the sentences. Each sentence is a plodding run-on with little to no variation. I feel like breaking up the sentences would bring the book up to a three star book almost immediately. As it is currently, reading it feels like a slog. The sentence structure also, unfortunately, detracts from the really interesting descriptions because it’s all shoved into one line. This makes the pacing both incredibly fast, while feeling slow.

The story spends little to no time building emotional weight, and so scenes don’t stand out. Nor do the characters, unfortunately. And when the romance begins, I almost got whiplash. The love interest, Garit, seems like a stand-in for Geralt (The Witcher) for the first few chapters, until he’s suddenly waxing poetic about how his love is the kind that bards write about. It feels very out of character, and I have no other context clues to make sense of this shift in his nature. Similarly, Illyse, our main character, doesn’t seem to have more than an attraction to him at first. Then out of the blue she’s in love. We’re to believe these two have been working together for two months, and then this just occurs. Their relationship should have been more advanced than it was, in my opinion.

Ultimately, the reason I feel like this reads like a “draft zero” is because it reads as if the author is plotting out the story. I,e, “This happens, then this happens, then this happens.” While there are some good nuggets of prose, certain scenes definitely need to be expanded upon. I know people roll their eyes at the “show, don’t tell” advice, but this is a perfect instance of how a story could be improved upon by following it. We’re often told what is happening, but there’s no sense of what it looks, feels, smells, sounds, or tastes like.

Ultimately, I gave this two stars because I feel like it has so much potential to be something amazing. Howevre, it just didn’t hit the mark for me, personally. I genuinely don’t think it’s bad, just feel that it’s not for me and the style I’ve come to enjoy.

I’ve got to be honest, this book was not hitting for me for the first 25-50%. HOWEVER, because the second half of the book definitely made up for the first half I’m giving the book a generous 3.5 rounded up.

The reason the first half or so felt like a slog for me is because the real meat of the plot didn’t begin for quite some time. Setting aside the spice, the premise of the book is that the old Ares has died, and the new one must be determined through a contest of sorts. If you’re unfamiliar with the Dark Olympus series in general, it’s a modern reimagining where Olympus is ruled by the “Thirteen.” These are what we would call the pantheon, except in this world they’re not Gods (I think…the world-building is a bit fuzzy, and seems to get clearer with each book). In this world, the Thirteen are simply titles for the ruling entities. The Big Three—Zeus, Poseidon, and Hades—are legacy titles, passed down through bloodline. The rest of the titles have their own way of determining a successor.

ANYWAY, I love a good competition…when there’s actually a competition. And for a long while, I was doubting whether we’d actually see much of it at all. A good portion of the book’s first half was dedicated to setting up character dynamics.

Which leads me to the other thing that I was pretty skeptical about…the success of the throuple. For some reason, I had it in my head that the three characters would be supportive of each other from the start. I went into the book thinking that the three of them decided to compete together, so that one of them could be Ares, and they didn’t care who. I swear someone said that, and I thought that idea was super nice. But that was SO not what happened lmao.

Instead, it’s almost Helen vs. Achilles/Patroclus. Except they all secretly-not-secretly want to bone each other. And Achilles is a HUGE dick. Like I don’t read Bully romances, so I’m not sure if this qualifies as a bully romance, but he felt like a bully. I really disliked him and the way he treated Patroclus and Helen for a good portion of the book. Until I didn’t. I think that speaks a lot to Robert’s skill with character development that she managed to make an unlikeable character likable in a believable way. And once the characters addressed some of their issues, the throuple actually worked really nicely. They were a super functional unit, and as always I love the emphasis on consent in the books. Robert continues to prove that consent is sexy.

And seriously, once the book got really into things, it was hot. And because each character gets chapters from their perspective, the spicy scenes often spanned chapters. Of the three books so far, this one had the best spice.

The competition aspect also had its time to shine later in the book, which I was grateful for. Even with the good spice, this book wouldn’t have been as good without the plot (where as I feel like the first two books weren’t harmed by lack of plot). The plot was so necessary to the character growth in this book, and it managed to set up the rest of the series very well. It seems like moving forward, the books are going to get increasingly plot heavy, and I’m here for it. Robert has created an interesting world, and it deserves to be expanded upon.

My biggest complaint about the second half of the book is that we don’t get an Epilogue. Can a person hope for a novella…as a treat?

Side note: I now expect every book to start with a party that the heroine/MC doesn’t want to be at. Two was a coincidence (when I read Electric Idol, I thought I accidentally restarted Neon Gods), but three is a pattern. It better stick, or I won’t know what to do with myself lmao

Cursed ACNH content, this is so unhinged haha