I am so glad I read "My Plain Jane" before I read "My Lady Jane", because MPJ is delightful, while MLJ is redundant and boring! Read this series. Follow these authors. They have wonderful wit. This first book does /not/; it is very much a first draft.

* Typos throughout. Who edited this book?
* The same "jokes" retold over and over. They weren't funny the first time, why should they be funny the hundredth time?
- A long list of synonyms is not a joke.
- Frequently reminded us that a person has a large nose is not a joke.
- Presenting a world where shapeshifters exist, and then expecting us to find a horse funny is not a joke. It's the world. Being a wizard in Harry Potter isn't a punchline.
- Sudden nudity, molestation, or unwanted oggling isn't a joke.
* In the final chapters the authors undo their own dramatic tension with frequent asides in parentheses explaining to the reader how they don't /actually/ need to worry about a character's safety, and they will be guaranteed a happy ending.
* Every single character is petulant and constantly bickering. The rampant jealousy in this book makes every arc insufferable. Why should a girl be jealous of a boy's /pet dog's/ affections?!
* Jane is the title character, but she is the least effective. Half the book is devoted to Edward's story. The half which follows Jane is largely about what guilt or drama her horse husband is going through. About halfway through the book, SPOILER Jane turns into a ferret, and needs to be carried around or rescued for another hundred pages. She becomes a /literal/ prop in her own book! Worst main character ever.

Indulgent in descriptions of nature and travel is about the only negative of this series. It's human, it's magical, it's timeless.

This book was an amazing, fresh perspective on the universe of Red Rising. Literally, since it shifts perspectives between 4 different narrators. It was exciting and invigorating to tell the tale from all the different echelons.

Sadly, 3/4 narrators were unlikable in the end, and Darrow is (rightfully) the villain of his own tale, at this point. It was a depressing turn of events from the previous trilogy's triumphant conclusion :(.

My opinion of this book might be clouded, since I was a huge fan of the TV adaptation. But I think Sookie is a fun, feisty, insightful narrator, and the idea of mainstreaming supernaturals is a juicy jumping off point for a series.

I have to say, though, that the TV show did more with the lense of Racism. I think there is a lot of meaty story to be had about The Other, and what monsters humans can be to each other, which wasn't played up as much in the book. I was sorry to lose that facet, because it makes the story much richer.

And lastly, don't let my high rating fool you, this book IS problematic! The main characters who are men are disgusting! Every single one of them doesn't understand the meaning of "consent". Sexual dominance and violence are glorified as "tamable", and a woman offering sex to get out of the threat of violence is framed as her being a soothing influence. This book is not woke. It's a fun, scary fantasy. But it is not woke.

This book is a gem! The world-building is so thoughtful and fun, I loved all the little, fresh details which went into this book:
- Lava globes for lighting caves.
- Currensea being the punny name for money.
- Bioluminescent mermaids, and merpeople with crustacean bodies, camouflaged mermaids, freshwater mermaids dappled like river bottoms...
Don't want to spoil it all, there is plenty more to discover in reading it. But it's a real world, it's a world with customs, religions, multiple languages... It's full of depth, no pun intended XD.

I am not surprised that this was published by Disney, because it gives off those Magical Princess vibes, in the best way possible. It's a story about girl power and friendship, believing in yourself and encouraging others, all wrapped up in a magical system which relies on singing! I can't believe this series isn't a TV Series yet; I would absolutely watch an underwater fantasy opera.

Short Version: You know that meme, "Rocks fall, everybody dies"?... Yeah...

Long Version: Minor spoiler alert.
I utterly regret reading this book, it has put me off anything else by Stephen King for life. I am admitting this as a HUGE fan of The Dark Tower series and The Eyes of The Dragon, who couldn't wait to revisit Randall Flagg. But The Stand fails in many basic aspects of storytelling: The protagonists' actions don't resolve the central conflict; characters are informed by prophetic dreams as to what they should do next, even when it's at odds with their personal motivations, common sense, or physical abilities; POV characters are annihilated and replaced with personality-void background characters, not with any sense of karmic justice or literary motif, but simply because... that's life, that's humanity, it's constant random horrors and sometimes people you care about meet quick, pointless deaths...
But backtracking a bit, I'm not just being a nitpicky literary critic. I'm also alarmed by the amount of bigotry in this book. Flavorful dialogue to highlight a character's personality, I could understand. But the prose, the writing /itself/ is littered with hateful slurs: The N word, Red China, Red Indians, the C word, retard, bitch, on and on... The cherry on top for me of hateful imagery was calling the atomic bomb: The Hand of God. In short, the message of this book /seems/ to be: The White Supremacists inherit The Earth. I am scared and embarrassed to have told people I was reading this book. I now feel like if someone says, "The Stand is in my Top 5!" it is code word for "White Power!"
I might have written off the vulgarity of The Apocalypse as simply Stephen King trying to highlight the worst of humanity, and how the best would later overcome and persevere... Except that many of the same scenes, speech, and themes will later resurface in The Dark Tower series. /Now/ I'm concerned that Stephen King has something deep and personal that he's been trying to work through, psychologically, with his writing all these years. I am more afraid of the author than I am the horror story on the page.
I suppose the question at the end of it all is... Who is this book /for/?
If it's a horror story alone, just meant to scare the audience, then it excels in its horror passages. But they are each disjointed, and ultimately a little pointless. They are like short stories submitted to a magazine which was then amalgamated into an anthology: Great in bits, /terrible/ as a whole.
If it's meant to be more of a Great American Tale about how humanity triumphs in the face of Evil, then why do the protagonists' actions not contribute to that triumph? Why are they, instead, sacrificed or saved by The Hand of God?
If it's a modern Biblical-proportions tale, which is meant to meander, meant to show great and terrible acts of man and nature, meant as a cautionary tale to the audience...then wouldn't the intended audience be Christian, or thereabouts? A demographic who would most likely be offended by vulgarity? Why couch an odyssey in a horror story?
If it's for Stephen King to work out some things about sexism, racism, ableism, queer idetity, other religions, and any other demographic you can think of, because every single one of them outside of White Christian Male was insulted in this book, then whyyyy is it not in a long-ago-burned-up-journal that Stephen King kept to himself?
In summary, I suggest that one only read this book if you're teaching a class on how /not/ to write a book.

This book is AMAZING. Sci-Fi can get a bad rep for being stilted, too dense, or too "masculine". This book is delightfully refreshing for the genre! It's smart world-building, diversely cast, quick-witted, action packed... There is a lot to love, but I think my favorite thing about it is it's actually three stories braided into one: a detective mystery, a space-cowboy drama, and a contagion outbreak story. And twining said braid is the quintessential question for humanity: what are we, inherently, and what are we meant to become... *Mwah!* Just delicious writing <3.

Trigger Warning:
This book was a dumpster fire. I say this as someone who enjoyed the first book and the TV adaptation, problematic as some parts were. But /this/ book felt like the first was meant to be a stand-alone success, but it gained popularity, the publisher demanded more, and Charlaine Harris was left scrambling to develop a coherent plot in time.
- There are two plots, one in Dallas and one in Bon Temps, and they do not overlap in any way. These conflicts should have been two different books.
- There seems to be a /very/ flimsy theme about how we all have our natures and our cravings, and we can vilify an action or an addiction but not a /whole/ person, so long as that person feels remorse and strives for moderation. But the people who are lumped together as dangerous are: murderers, pedophiles, rapists, religious zealots, and queer folk... Being LGBTQ is not synonymous with being a threat to others, and it is precisely this fundamental failing of representation or understanding which leads to hate crimes and corrupt legal misrepresentation in reality.
- A new adversary, The Fellowship of the Sun, is introduced, and /would have been/ a welcome addition to the series. A religious order which feels that vampires are a threat to humanity, and sets their sites on converting vampires from their natures to being more human, or else offers vampires a chance to repent before "meeting God" in the holy death of facing the sun, would have been a /great/ vehicle for exploring the persecution and misunderstanding of LGBTQ. And Sookie, who is both a God-loving Christian, and a Bill-loving vampire defender, would have been the greatest narrator for wading through the hate inherent in the debate, and finding what positives could bridge both sides... /Instead/, within a few pages of introducing The Fellowship, they are reduced to cartoonish mafia villains who have access to an entire underground bunker full of weapons, and a proclivity for rape and murder... Which Bill responds to with rape and murder... So much for either side.
- The misrepresentation of relationships continues to be problematic. I had my reservations about the first book, but Sookie was a delightful, insightful, strong narrator, so her missteps in her first-ever sexual relationship seemed like a learning curve we were /supposed/ to doubt, and /supposed/ to wish better for her... But this book makes it clear that Charlaine Harris is just another vampire-romance author who doesn't understand kinks, consent, and basic relationship guidelines. A person who has been assaulted and battered twice in this book, should expect sympathy and medical attention, but instead receives ogling stares at her bruised breasts. A person who enjoys rough, spontaneous sex can have a conversation with their partner and - if both parties feel comfortable - make that a part of their routine; but a home invader who uses their superior strength to demand sex from a person is /rape/. A person who compliments their partner's appearance or wardrobe, and buys them apparel to compliment their body, is attentive and trying to speak a love language. A person who criticizes their partner's appearance or wardrobe, rips through their partner's clothing and then buys replacements as an excuse for their violence, and solicits sex even when their partner is injured/asleep/feeling-generally-gross-from-being-both-injured-and-unbathed/says "No!", is abuse/rape. A person who enjoys group, sexual meet-ups between consenting partners is valid, and nobody's business but the partners involved. An orgy without consent or safe words is gang rape. A couple who enjoys BDSM, specifically dominant-sub relationships or blood-letting is someone's kink somewhere, and nobody's business but the partners, but firm consent and safe words are definitely necessary prerequisites. A person whose kink is BDSM who attacks non-consenting strangers is an assailant, possibly a psycho; the fictional misrepresentation ought to have been punished, and the majority of BDSM enthusiasts in reality would /not/ be turned on by harming someone who was not equally enthusiastic about the situation.
In summary, this book fails its plot, its themes, its characters, and its basic premise as a kinky romance novel. Dumpster. Fire.

This book was a vapid disappointment :(. Spoilers ahead:
The first book built a rich, intriguing world, and worked to quickly assemble a stellar team of heroines... And then this book scattered the team, returned the protagonist to her decimated hometown (which she knew was a lost cause, but felt a desire to confirm with her own eyes), and saw the secondary protagonist locked in her room for 60% of the book. What "twists" there were in the plot, were easily predicted from book one by anyone who has ever read a fantasy book. And considering this book series was a contemporary of The Avengers and Harry Potter, the central conflict of "We need to find the Mcguffin before The Bad Guy does" isn't even original. Lastly, I know I'm not the target audience for this book, but there was a lot of Telling instead of Showing. Something would be easily inferred by context clues or body language, and then immediately repeated in expository dialogue, sometimes in actual mind-reading. No matter the age demographic, it upsets me when a book dumbs itself down for its audience; an author should always trust their reader.