I will have a very long review incoming but in the case of tl;dr, this book is bad and I implore you to not support it or read it.

The Pawn and the Puppet is a dark forbidden romance coming from a prominent BookToker that gained enough traction to, according to the author's Instagram, hit #4 on Barnes and Noble’s Top 100 Bestsellers List in all categories and #1 in Fantasy & Science Fiction when it went up for preorder nine weeks ago. It was a B&N Bestseller upon release and supposedly hit the Amazon bestseller list. (To be taken with a grain of salt, I suppose, since it was published on April 1st. Lord, how I wish this was a joke.)

So when I heard it was terrible and problematic AND discovered it was on Kindle Unlimited, I couldn't not pick it up. My friends are of the opinion that I will read anything, and I am nothing if not predictable.

I'll start with the trigger warnings. I expect dark romances to come with a lot of trigger warnings. They're dark, after all. But the list provided by the author is nowhere near sufficient. In fact, based on surrounding controversy, I've been led to believe that this has been done on purpose. Based on how much of the book is built on shock value and disgust, I'm unsurprised. Transphobia and incest are two huge trigger warnings that are left out, and I was horrified to learn that the transphobia included was INTENTIONAL, but I'll circle back on this later. If you're going to include a list of trigger warnings for your book, you cannot let it be incomplete to shock and potentially trigger your readers. They aren't even rare trigger warnings. I also believe that rape and sexual assault should be labeled differently, and also believe that child rape/sexual assault should be its own category, but even if you disagree with me on that, transphobia and incest having the place they do in this book means you cannot just 'forget' them.

But, on to the actual book. This romance follows Skylenna (I know), a 19-year-old girl reeling from the recent death of her sister who decides to fulfill her last wish and change the way patients are treated at Emerald Lake Asylum. After 80 pages of fucking around and terribly fulfilled exposition we finally meet her love interest: Patient 13, or 'Dessin,' who is supposedly the most dangerous and feared patient in the entire asylum. Dessin has DID (Disassociative Identity Disorder, called split personality disorder in the book) and checked himself in four years ago. He has been unresponsive to the torturous treatments but after he tries to break out, Skylenna is given 90 days with her kinder method to find the name of the host and give him control back. Her failure means his execution, and the growing attraction between them just raises the stakes higher.

Intriguing plot, right? Sure. I'll come right out and say I never thought a patient-caretaker asylum romance could end well, and I'm both horrified and delighted to see I've been proven wrong. This book starts off with an Author's Note about how the portrayal of DID is purposefully given to a dark, murderous character who is treated badly to reflect our society. I doubt Brandi herself has any experience with DID or the written portrayal would not be as heinously despicable as it is, but who knows. I personally don't think anyone without DID has any business writing about DID, especially if this is what they're going to do with it. Brandi is nowhere near skilled or nuance enough and instead added another entry to a long list of horrible, malicious DID representation in media.

While we're on the heavy hitters, I might as well go and discuss the transphobia. I am a trans reader, and because I suffer from a chronic case of hating myself I decided to read the book myself and see exactly how bad it was. You'd never guess, but it was to my joy (sarcasm) even worse than I feared! I'll set the stage for you so you yourself don't have to read it. Warnings for transphobia and incest.

In order to get to Patient 13, Skylenna is tasked with the other patients in the asylum to work her way to his room. One of these is Niles, a man who believes himself to be Cupid, and was arrested for kidnapping men and women and locking them in basements until they starved. Skylenna speaks with him until he finally admits the source of his belief. As a child, Niles was trafficked as a child sex worker in order to feed his family after his father abandoned them. One of his customers was Charlotte, a trans woman. She is described as strange and odd with heavy make-up and later referred to as "a woman with male parts." This child predator is revealed, as a shocking twist, to be Niles' transitioned father. Disgusted by the treatment, he decided he couldn't handle a world where that was the only love he knew and decided to become Cupid.

I was horrified enough by this and genuinely had my entire day ruined thereafter. Trans women and trans femmes already have such limited rep, and when they do, it's often horrible things like this. I was further disgusted to learn that the author said in an Instagram post that this choice was INTENTIONAL and done despite the author knowing it was wrong. She made the character purposefully ignorant on transwomen with the intention for Skylenna to "challenge" these views and grow in the future. But when your only trans representation is a predator, something dangerous, disgusting, and humane, you are not setting up any of this to be accomplished. I don't believe a cis writer has any fucking business writing an evil, monstrous trans woman, and there was absolutely no reason for this rep. Skylenna does not grow or change in her views on trans women because there are no other trans women in the book besides Charlotte to give her the opportunity for it. Charlotte's inclusion is purely for shock and disgust, clear by every single bit of writing framing the scene. 

This is the only prominent bit of LGBTQ+ rep in the book, but there is a throwaway paragraph about Skylenna's sister Scarlett that describes her choosing to "mate with the same sex" because men only care about women spreading their legs. If Charlotte's depiction wasn't already giving me radfem/TERF vibes, this would have sealed the deal. I'm not accusing anyone of anything, but I'm just saying. I have a special poison in my heart for the idea that women “choose” to be with other women to escape men, mostly because it still centers that attraction around men (even if it’s a rejection of them), and to top it all off after Scarlett goes off and sleeps with other women she comes home and scrubs herself raw. It might be her history of sexual abuse, or it could be homophobia, and Brandi's shitty writing means I have no idea which it is. This is yet another case of shitty rep remaining unbalanced by positive rep in the book. Maybe just don't have it at all. You in fact do not have to force yourself to grapple with the idea that trans women and sapphic women exist if all you're going to do is portray them through a lens of disgust and horror. 

At least now I get to talk about the fun stuff because even beyond the problematic aspects of the book, it's just god-awful. First of all, can we PLEASE talk about the names. Skylenna? Dessin? DeiSzek? Suseas? And those are just CHARACTER names. The fact that her dark dystopia asylum story is set in a country named DEMENTIA had me rolling with laughter. The 'Survivah' faction of bureaucrats was also a Choice. I get I'm supposed to feel bad for no one but Dessin getting Skylenna's name right, but honestly, Sky or Skye would have been much better than what we ended up with. I unfortunately cannot feel any sort of heat for a man named after the French word for drawing. 

The world-building and plot both fall apart under the barest hint of pressure. The plot jumps around at random and I have no idea how Dessin keeps escaping despite being the scariest patient. How he doesn't have 24/7 surveillance, especially after his escape attempt and ultimatum set forth, is beyond me. And to that point, he's not even scary! There is no sense of darkness or 'mind games' promised in the blurb. He's just evasive and annoying. The character art is beyond laughable-- how a man confined for 4 years and regularly tortured manages to have rippling pectorals and biceps for days, not to mention a wonderful tan, is again beyond me. The tone and pacing of this book are never consistent and lead to an all-around poor reading experience. How we go from an 80-page build-up to her wanting to drop her panties immediately... is, for a third time, absolutely beyond me. 

The world-building itself is also just... bad. Women are held to impossible ideals in Dementia and are subjected to basically government-mandated anorexia, leaving them weak and feeble to the point where city streets have fainting couches on corners. I ignored the ridiculousness of this for my own sanity, but Brandi seems to add this dystopia element for the sole purpose of Skylenna being oppressed for having boobs, an ass, and "golden skin" (whatever that means). Her being stick thin and still having double Ds, according to the character art, was certainly a choice and just proves to me that Skylenna and Dessin are copy-pasted romance ideals set against a shocking, gory background like that's supposed to make them shine any differently from any other romance book I've ever read. 

Listen. It's clear the book does not pride itself on accuracy, well-conducted research or a thought-out world, so let's hold off on that and judge it for what we are apparently all here for: a sexy, dark, forbidden romance. I saw this was promoted by the author using the forced proximity trope but she could have just dropped proximity from that entirely. This romance was drier than a desert in August. I felt no build-up, probably because there wasn't any, and I put myself through 351 pages of drivel for not a single spicy scene, which at this point is another problematic aspect that targeted me personally. Dessin is little more than a bottom of the barrel, bargain bin Rhysand and taking one look at Brandi's Instagram and Tiktok is enough to prove the connection. We even get the added bonus of his tragic backstory revolving around atrocities committed against his mother and his sibling, like that's what we really needed in 2022. 

In conclusion, The Pawn and the Puppet reads like a Wattpad draft that I cannot believe was published in this day and age. I'm unsurprised to learn that Brandi ignored beta readers with relevant degrees in the elements she chose to portray in her work in favor of the ones who were patting her on the back, which I can understand. It can be a little tough to hear that your self-insert OC x Rhysand fanfiction isn't quite up to par, but it's the truth. Even beyond the mind-bogglingly problematic aspects and the "dark" elements that have completely crossed the line in this book, there is none of the dark allure that will keep a reader wanting to turn the page. In the end, I wanted to commit myself for the emotional spiral this book send me on. 

I'd recommend you don't pick up or promote this book for your trans friends, but if you don't have any, do it for yourself. Your sanity is worth more than this. 

The world will be so much brighter once this author figures out that e does not actually write rom coms. 

arc provided by the publisher via netgalley in exchange for an honest review 

I think when it comes down to it, writing novellas and short stories that are compelling in a condensed amount of time is a really difficult skill to acquire and polish. I try to be nice to novellas that miss the mark because I understand how hard it can be, but there's only so much leeway I can give before a book turns out to be not worth the time. (At least novellas aren't much time to begin with!) 

Nothing But Blackened Teeth is a book about messy people making stupid decisions and reaping the consequences. Nadia has always dreamed of getting married in a haunted house, so when she and Faiz decide to tie the knot, golden boy Phillip rents a Heian-era mansion with a blood-soaked history of girls being buried alive for their venue. Cat, our main character and narrator, and Lin are invited along as well, but the night turns sour when the bride buried beneath the mansion's walls awakens and begins to stalk the thrill-seekers. 

I think when it comes down to it, this is yet another novella that suffered from a lack of development due to page constraints. The characters were one-dimensional and fueled by their messy choices, and sometimes as if we couldn't remember their one (1) personality trait, Cat saw the need to beat these traits over our heads in flowery language. If I can't pick up that Phillip is a ditzy rich white boy at 80%, that's a problem with the writing. In a novella, every word is crucial since you don't have as much room to work with, and I felt a lot of space that could have been used to craft a more spooky atmosphere was wasted on telling instead of showing character traits. 

Regarding the writing, I think this book would have benefitted from a consistent writing style and tone. Again, due to the condensed nature of a novella, switching from haunting, poetic descriptions to basically the complete opposite was a constant stream of whiplash. Cat is fresh from a suicide attempt and in-patient hospital stay, so as a dramatic depressed person I gave her a pass, but at some point, you go from Sylvia Plath to a middle grader's notebook when it comes to the level and quality of the prose. I value books where each sentence seems intentional and not a word is wasted, but here I was frequently taken out of scenes by Cat waxing poetic about Phillip's wonderbread behavior. In a horror story, tone and immersion are everything, and I did not end this book properly spooked, which was a disappointment! 

If you are a fan of prose that edges towards purple and can overlook character development and quality to appreciate a very spooky setting and plot, you may enjoy this much more than I did! Fans of Japanese folklore will at least get a bit of a kick out of this. 

arc provided by the publisher via netgalley in exchange for an honest review 

I have to say, I do love opening a book, getting really into it, and then checking the author to see it's someone I've read before! I requested Island in a Puddle without realizing it'd been created by Kei Sanbe, the brain behind Erased, which is one of my favorite series. Island in a Puddle follows a young boy named Minato who cares for his younger sister Nagisa in the face of their neglectful mother. Often leaving for weeks before sweeping back in with cash and food and leaving again, Minato tries his best to keep Nagisa in high spirits and keep her fed. But when lightning strikes at an amusement park, he finds his entire world turned upside down. 

I enjoyed this first volume and really wanted more by the end! I liked the ruthlessness of Kuromatsu's character as well as the pacing and setting, and I'm really looking forward to seeing more. The cliffhanger made my heart jump, and I'm really interested to see what kind of character Minato will become under huge pressure! I think this will be great for fans of Erased, since it has similar elements (a boy protecting his family, supernatural-fueled mystery, misunderstandings and struggle) while standing on its own as something new. 

arc provided by the publisher via netgalley in exchange for an honest review 

Tomorrow, Make Me Yours follows Yuki, a shy, average boy who changes class and falls completely for Hayato, the cool, confident kid who notices him right away and seems to want to be friends. When Yuki hears a girl in their class like Hayato, he realizes his own feelings and steps back, but is brought back in when Hayato returns his confession. 

This book was very okay. The art style, relationship, dynamics, story, main characters, side characters, setting, and I could really keep going on were nothing special. This didn't hit like other amazing TokyoPop titles I've read and I think it boils down to the fact that everything happens very quickly. There's not much room to breathe and feel the emotional weight of the events in the book, which leaves for a flat reading experience. 

If you're a fan of fumbling high school romances with the shy x confident pairing, you may enjoy this title more than I did! 

arc provided by the publisher via netgalley in exchange for an honest review 

First of all, I apologize deeply to this title, but it did not catch me in a benevolent reviewing mood. Mame Coordinate is a cute, lighthearted story about an unusual model named Mame. Having no fashion sense or confidence, she's finally foisted on a rookie manager for her last chance at being a model. This manga has a sweet, slightly childish art style to match its sweet, childish main character, which I think is the beginning and end of my praise available for this book. 

The bottom line is, I finally started watching ANTM before I read this, and I think if I hadn't this book may have gotten 2-3 stars. Instead, I'm a little flabbergasted how Mame made it as far as she did in the modeling world, and I think this story has already fallen very flat with regards to how to make readers root for an underdog. If she'd made it past auditions, Tyra would have sent her packing in the first week. Mame is cute, and that is about it. She is somehow a perfect model, accidentally taking great care of her skin and looking stylish no matter what she puts on, but beyond that she doesn't have much of a personality beyond being singularly motivated by karaage (honestly, same, that was the most believable part of this book) and dressing like a five-year-old. 

The rookie manager's entire family falls over themselves to help her become a top model, but it's because they want to, not even because her next audition will be her last if she doesn't succeed. There's not much about her that draws me as a reader to support her, so I'm curious why so many people she comes across seem to. I think I'd care much more if it was a confidence issue, but we soon see that she doesn't even know how to walk properly or take proper portfolio pictures of herself. Maybe there's just a huge gap between my understanding of how Japanese models are recruited and treated, but even beyond that, the characterization doesn't give me anything to go off of and Mame's current status as a sweet but clueless character doesn't give me any hope for her to handle a world as cutthroat as top modeling. At this point if she unseats Noel in the next audition I'll be disappointed. 

I will not be continuing with this series, but thank you to TokyoPop for the opportunity! 

arc provided by the publisher via netgalley in exchange for an honest review 

After muscle-obsessed Kaho Hibi gets noticed and recruited by the basketball team's star to whip the team into shape, she thinks her dreams of being surrounded by muscles have come true— until said star takes an interest in making her see beyond his pecs and biceps. If you were a fan of Gou and Seijuro in Free! you're going to eat this up. 

This shoujo had a very funny, lighthearted premise, which I enjoyed but ultimately fell flat under the pacing. This book starts off strong with chapter 1, which is fine, but the face paced-ness of their relationship doesn't seem to match how Kaho herself actually feels. It's very one-sided towards Natsume, and I didn't feel a strong drive to root for their relationship. It felt both like a lot and nothing at all was happening, which was a little impressive. In the end it wasn't the type of shoujo I really enjoy. 

I don't think I'll be continuing, but as stated above, if you enjoyed Gou and Seijuro's relationship in Free!, you may enjoy this a lot more than I did! 

arc provided by the publisher via netgalley in exchange for an honest review 

Nighttime for Just Us Two is a hilarious shoujo following a girl who no one can remember the name of. Her classmates call her everything under the sun but her name, but everything changes when the most popular boy in school Koga remembers her name! ... Well, and also when he reveals he's actually an alien borrowing Koga's body and wants her to be his first friend. 

I absolutely adored this manga. The art style is a bit simpler than what I'm normally drawn to, but I loved the way the mangaka used facial expressions and pacing to convey the humor. I definitely had to cover my mouth a few times so I wasn't so loud. Koga's actual personality flip flops in an endearing way, and you can really feel his emotions underneath them. It's very silly and I definitely see this series becoming a comfort read since I'm definitely continuing with it. 

arc provided by the publisher via netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

 Far too much going on and not quite what it was marketed as. Did not enjoy.