erm.

now, listen. no one could be more excited than me for LESBIANS. VAMPIRES. BOARDING SCHOOLS. MYSTERIES. no one. maybe i just expected too much.

EKHEM! let's start.
1) the white cishet superwoke saviour thing kat had going on rubbed me off in all the wrong ways. it just felt like poc and queer people were being used in this book just for diversity points, like the author had a list of things to include and just ticked everything off without giving anything any depth. like, the author could have just added poc characters to the damned book!! in this review, the person says, "when you’re a society full of immortal beings you could at least transcend sexism, racism and homophobia. why would such things as sexual and gender identity or skin colour even matter to vampires? a lot of the bigoted ideas in society have their roots in religion, and i honestly don't think many vampires will care about god after being turned. they're literally immortal already—heaven and hell are not really something they have to worry about," and these are my exact thoughts on the matter.

not to mention the downplaying of colonization through galen. it was completely unnecessary--as were all the other racist and queerphobic takes--but,,, yikes. you could take these problems all out and it would change nothing except make the book a tiny bit less uncomfortable to read.

another thing: kat saying "i CAN'T be queer" when both her friends at home are queer and her ex best friend slash current roommate slash the girl she kissed is also queer, when she's clearly from a very, very accepting community (she makes it very clear by bringing it up ten million times),,, UHHHHH . and, okay, internalized homophobia is a very hard thing to go through but when it comes to her, it's literally never addressed in the book. she's like "i can't be queer!!" in one second and then she's in love with taylor in the next. not to mention that she calls evangeline for using 'lesbian' as an insult and then keeps sucking up to her and wanting to be her friend.

i also have an issue with her queer friend saying, “see? straight people always assume it's something you have to discover, but i was born this way.” like--silence. i would even take this if a cishet said this, because they just don't understand. but so many queer people i know--myself included--have struggled and are still struggling with coming to terms with who they are, so the "you just know" message was super weird to read about, especially if it was a person who's questioning their entire identity who read this.

[dj khaled voice] ANOTHER ONE! this was marketed as romance so, you know, i expected romantic tension. whatever was going on between kat and taylor definitely wasn't that. there was no character or relationship development. NONE. they're just fighting, watching twilight, fighting some more, had 10 misunderstandings, and then professed their love to each other because they have ALWAAAAYYSSSS loved each other. they can't live without each other. you're getting expelled?? I'M GOING WITH YOU EVEN THOUGH I LITERALLY COULDN'T EVEN FANTHOM THE THOUGHT OF LOSING MY MENTORSHIP AND SCOLARSHIP!!!!! i'm gonna be honest. for 80% of the book i really thought they weren't even gonna get together in the end.

the writing didn't bother me at first but then it just kept getting worse, especially the descriptions. the unnecessary metaphors just sounded weird as hell. a failed attempt at being poetic.

the only interesting part to me was the virus/cure mystery, but it was done poorly and basically hidden under all the nonsensical high school drama with characters who make the same mistakes over and over and learn nothing from them and have absolutely zero development. it was irrelevant for the majority of the book. even the mystery of kat's fangmaker and benefactor was clear since the beginning i couldn't believe she didn't find out. or that her mother didn't tell her the truth right then--like, she had to know. so, there's basically no plot.

i also can't understand kat's weird need to be accepted by castel. the way she can't fanthom that he could be the bad person just because she depends on him financially and he's "nice" to her??? GIRL??? get help.
i have all sorts of issues with that character, and another one is the way she's playing with galen's feelings when even at the beginning she KNOWS she doesn't like him, the way she cheats on him by kissing taylor, and then later on can't even support him as a FRIEND, and dismissing him when he opens up to her when she's the one who prompted him to think of his behavior and that he should change,,, DUH.

Spoiler

it was also ridiculous when the headmaster wanted to kill kat & taylor

and instead of idk. running away. fighting. grabbing him. kicking him. doing SOMETHING!!!!! they just hugged and were ready to die? just like that?? i'm sorry i had to laugh.

anyway, i'm just very happy i can finally put it down and forget about it.