cursed_sapphire's reviews
163 reviews

If you like a book with pretty prose, good message, but no plot this is for you. 

This is a story of a young girl growing up going through a cycle of abuse through a fantasy-like lens that seems more like a delusional hellscape. It's basically the same event happening over and over as the girl slowly begins to realize that the relationship she has with her best friend is toxic. Also there's a groom looking for answers in the present day.

  The ending was predictable, and this read more like a contemporary novel than a fantasy.

This is a book for readers of contemporary explorations of mental health, female relationships, and growing up who love pretty prose and strong vibes. I would not recommend this to fantasy readers, despite the fact it was marketed as a fantasy. 

This was a very easy, fast read. I promise I mean this as a compliment, but it read like au fanfiction-it never lingered anywhere too long, had simple but engaging prose, and it was very satisfying. The author clearly knew her audience and what they wanted, and made sure to give them what they came for.

However, I will say this fanfiction-like quality did leave some things lacking. For example, outside of our heroine, I felt that the other characters weren't well defined. In fanfiction, you already know the characters, and authors often rely on that, meaning they don't spend much time showing you who the characters are or establishing their dynamics. This felt very similar-the characters felt like they just fell into dynamics with each other without any build-up, and the heroine would often have intense feelings of love or hatred towards someone when the book hadn’t really earned it. The characters in the book are pretty easy to understand, so it wasn't distracting, but it did feel somewhat underwhelming. I especially found this true of the male lead and the villainess- both characters clearly had depth and intrigue but the setup was lacking.

Finally, I will give my compliments to the world-building. It wasn’t anything too crazy or different, but the world felt thought-through amd grounded. The author was also very good at integrating details into the story without long exposition dumps. It was very natural and, by the end, left me with a good understanding of the politics and magic system.

This book was marketed as a slow-burn romance, but for my taste, it's not that slow.

The two protagonists are firmly in love by the end of the book, just not together because of the male lead's curse. If he wasn't cursed, they would have already be together and likely would have already slept together.

If you, like me, like romances that build very slowly, possibly even over several books, this might be a bit disappointing. I know their bond will deepen in the rest of the series, but to me the characters seemed too attached too quickly, especially since the protagonist had issues with trust.

This was a solid book that I was able to read very quickly. If you like romantic fanfiction I can 100% recommend this, and even for a fantady-lover who wants a quick, easy read with a stress on romance, this is a good time. If you're looking for quick spice, this isn't it. And if you're looking for characters slowly developing feelings of trust and companionship before finally realizing they also have romantic feelings, this isn't it. It's a book where characters het over distrust perhaps a bit too quickly and, if there weren't firm obstacles in the way, would have gotten together. It just so happened that said obstacles are fantastical.

The world and concepts are fascinating. If you can look past some of the dated ideas, you'll see a surprising amount of our world here. Huxley predicted some parts of our society too well. 

The characters are interesting but not likeable, I recommend knowing that going in. This book is an exploration of a potential future built on consumption, sameness, and constant pleasure. The characters are meant to embody different parts of humanity/society. Bernard is only content if he's more special than everyone else, Lenina wants more monogomy than is normal but otherwise accepts everything, Helmholtz is just kinda bored and wants to be a tortured poet, etc. John is supposed to be the last real person, representing a true believer in religion and art which cannot survive in this society. Mind you, John is a very 1930's Christian ideal of a true, good person. And while his obsession with suffering for his sins serves as a counter to the painless society of the book, it came across a bit overzealous for me. It felt like Huxley was trying to make John suffer all the pain everyone else never had to, but that made him feel a little too obsessed with pain instead of the virtues he claims to care about. The same could also be said about his obsession with chastity. 

This is a book more focused on ideas than on characters. The plot is a bit sparse, but that leads to a slice-of-life feeling, where the day-to-day life is the focus. There's a certain horror in the mundaneness that the characters experience, and that brings out the themes in a different, but still very effective way. 

Overall I recommend this for anyone who likes the philosophical side of sci-fi/dystopia, as long as they are able to handle the old-fashioned lense.

Overall this was a fun read with some great characters and a tense plot. I have a few complaints, but I had a really good time reading this.

Our main cast of characters were entertaining and fun, and I really found myself rooting for them even as they did some deplorable things. This should be a case study for how to write likeable villain protagonists. The world was also well fleshed out and the lore made sense. I liked the very simple and limited power sets most characters had, as it made everything feel more like a tense struggle. The writing and tone were also consistently great.

However, my main problem was with the villain. While Eli and Victor's relationship was well defined in the flashbacks, they barely interacted in the present. Perhaps they'll get more time in the sequel, but as it is, this was not the "Superman and Lex Luthor" or "Professor X and Magneto" style rivalry promised. While Victor constantly thought about Eli and craved vengeance, Eli did not have the same level of hatred for Victor. I even felt like Victor's reason to want revenge in the first place was a little anti-climactic.

He was so ready to kill his friend for calling the police even though he had just killed their mutual friend/Eli's girlfriend. Also, I would have appreciated seeing more of Eli's religious zeal back in the collage days. It seemed like he prayed twice and the rest was just Victor saying "he believed in God" like twenty times.

Overall this didn't affect my enjoyment as much as it could have, but did keep this book from a 5 star rating. 

I actually thought the secondary antagonist, Serena, was more interesting than Eli. Her struggle with her powers and her relationship with her sister were all extremely interesting and paid off in satisfying ways for the most part.

I almost wish she got what she wanted in the end, and that they found a way to disobey her, and that caused her death, but oh well. I still really liked her as an antagonist.

Also, as an Asexual myself, I appreciate that Victor is a canon biromantic asexual, and I just want to say how happy I was to realize that he was ace. Overall I personally approved of the representation.

I definitely recommend this for fans of darker superhero content, like Joker. While it falls a little short of its true potential, the story is still a satisfying ride with characters you hate to love.

A fun if not necessarily ground breaking suspense thriller with some interesting twists. This is not advertised as paranormal but is definitely paranormal. The characters do what they need to, although sometimes they act in ways that serve the plot without really adding to their characterization. The plot is all over the place, but not too hard to follow. Overall a decent YA horror read, althogh the scares were a bit lackluster, the suspence overall was good. 

I will say that I'm not nearly educated enough to evaluate the accuracy of the mental health issues discussed in this book, so just a warning that the main character struggles with mental health issues,

specifically dissociative disorder with hallucinations exacerbated by the haunting,

so if that's something you're sensitive to I reccomend either giving this a pass or finding a review from someone who knows more about the topic and whether it was handled well in this book. Also there's an openly gay main character who briefly discusses his homophobic parents, so you may also want to be aware of that.

One of the most creative stories I've ever read. Don't let the fact that the main character is a plush yellow dinosaur fool you- this is a tense mystery novel with a lot of suspense. I'd say it's a film noir in a Toontown-esque world, great for fans of Roger Rabbit.

The plot was very meandering and never really invested me. There were a lot of characters that were difficult to differentiate from one another. Overall I just felt confused and disinterested.