wardenred's reviews
836 reviews

So, I really, really loved Casey McQuiston’s RWRB and One Last Stop. Absolutely loved them. A big fan. And then I expected something just as good from I Kissed Shara Wheeler, but it turned out to be profoundly meh for me. I hoped it was just a hiccup. Surely McQuiston’s next book will stun me again with the perfect vibes, and all will get better.

*dramatic sigh* Reader, it got worse.

Honestly, it’s so hard for me to dial down the snark when I even think about this book. Normally, I really try to be objective in my reviews and to remember that anyone’s one-star disappointment can be someone else’s five-star favorite (or vise versa). But this one is just so acutely baffling!

First of all, I feel like this is a second chance romance done wrong. I love this trope. I love second chance romances that remember to show me what it was like between the leads the first time around, and why it didn’t work, and what has changed to make it possible now. Here, though, I have so little idea of Theo and Kit’s past relationship, beyond “they were friends, then they hooked up, then they had lots and lots of great sex, and then they had a big dramatic misunderstanding that could have been solved by healthy communication.“ And then in the present, they continue to avoid actual communication like a plague, and if it kind of happens by accident, they immediately take 10 steps back to create another misunderstanding as if it’s been their goal all along??? So what’s changed, what am I rooting for here?

Next, I love dual POVs in romance. It’s always fun to see each romantic lead through the other’s eyes, to figure out where and why they misread each other, what it takes for them to open up/empathize without prejudice. Here, though, it’s so odd. There are no alternating chapters, just a switch from Theo to Kit smack in the middle of the book. And like, the first half was all about Theo, Theo, Theo. They kind of idealized Kit, but also kind of didn’t treat him as anything other than accessory to their own life and heartbreak. For the most part, their observations and recollections revolved around two things:

1) when they used to be together, Kit made their life easier; and 2) sex with Kit is great. They were actually pissed whenever Kit seemed happy, and whenever they heard/thought of Kit’s accomplishments, they seemed to feel like it was a competition and Kit took something from them by doing well.

That… doesn’t sound super romantic to me, tbh, but whatever. So when the narrator changed, I thought, great, maybe now I’ll get to know Kit better + learn more of his perspective. But it was still

all about Theo, now in absurdly purple prose, because there wasn’t a single thought in Kit’s head that wasn’t all about obsessing about Theo. Altogether, it painted a picture of a selfish, pretentious person who just wants the other to make their life more pleasurable, and a dramatic, pretentious person who wants nothing more but to obsess unhealthily.

Reeeeeeally not my drug of choice. The book kept telling me these two people were good for each other, but it showed me the complete opposite.

And I suppose I should have known I would’ve have some issue with a book whose premise is literally, “Two bi exes on a tour through Europe challenge each other to a ‘who can hook up with more people’ competition.“ To ace for that shit and all that. But honestly, I can imagine at least five ways to execute this premise that would be super interesting and perhaps non-straightforwardly relatable for me. What I got, thought, just… I don’t want to say it was bad, because these things are subjective and yadda yadda yadda, but I definitely feel it was bad. The characters just created miscommunications on top of miscommunications. They weren’t being fair to their partners in these flings. And the partners in question may as well have been made of cardboard. They didn’t feel like their own characters, they were just there to be conveniently charmed by the MCs.

Which brings me to another point: one of the things I’ve always enjoyed about Casey McQuiston’s books are the fun, varied casts. Even the Shara Wheeler one that was mostly a disappointment still had a bunch of great side characters. This one, though? A Theo and Kit show through and through. I finished the book like an hour ago and I already have trouble recalling specific characters. Nobody was memorable. Nobody made me care. And then there’s the setting, too—just one the most vapid, surface-level, stereotypical depictions of Europe through an American tourist’s eye that I’ve ever seen. 

Also, can I just say, Theo’s whole

nepo baby angst was so frustrating. Maybe instead of playacting at being poor or something just take the resources available to you and use them to help actual poor people instead of angsting around?

In an effort to be objective, I will affirm the book does have a few worthwhile moments scattered around. I really liked the nonbinary rep. The coming out scene was super touching. There were some fun, vibrant food descriptions and some cool moments of banter when the author didn’t seem to try too hard. But overall, damn. This was one of the 2024 releases I was looking forward to the most, and it turned out to be my biggest bookish disappointment of the year :(

The book definitely delivers on all the most interesting elements of the blurb that spiked my interest in the first place. Heavy metal horror! The mythology behind a specific (made-up) niche metal album turning out to be true! An older protagonist confronting the past! All of this are very much present and reasonably well-done, and I definitely recommend this to anyone who likes horror and has ever been, to any extent, a metalhead.

I loved how a bunch of popular conspiracy theories from the 90s were casually woven into the plot and the worldbuilding, and I enjoyed the structure of this novel, with all the flashbacks and radio transcripts thrown in. On the macro level, it’s really well-crafted, with the tension points spread wonderfully over the entire thing. Although on the scene level, I felt it meandered at times, with the narrative getting bogged down in the details and asides. Never to the point that it would frustrate me out of wanting to know what’s next, though.

I was kind of surprised that I found the MC’s younger self from the flashbacks a lot more interesting to follow than the main timeline Kris. Normally, I really like reading about older characters and I’m of a mind that people—real and fictional alike—generally become more complex and exciting as they age. Then again, character work definitely isn’t this book’s strongest point. I wouldn’t call the characters flat precisely, but most cast members embody specific archetypes with a heavy metal bend, and all in all, the focus is very much on the plot. 

I feel like I’ve made a mistake in picking this up as an audiobook. The writing style is the kind I can better perceive, perhaps even enjoy, when I see the words in front of me on the page. In  this format, though, it ended up being kind of distracting and almost dense, which likely colored my perception of the story to some extent.

As for the story itself… Well, plenty of people have recced it to me with a comment that this first book is deliberately crafted to match the Hunger Games-style tropes popular at the time, but grows into something more unique and expansive in the latter books. That sounded super interesting in theory, but now I’m not so sure if I want to continue to those latter books, tbh. Maybe I’d rather re-read Hunger Games.

I wouldn’t call the book bad, and I’m actually really impressed by the worldbuilding. A lot of it is really intricate and thought-provoking. I also generally like plots focused on going undercover to stay among the enemies, and this one has its awesome moments. But in general, there were just too many aspects here that aren’t to my taste. For example, I’m definitely a character-first reader, and here all the characters just so obviously exist as vehicle for the plot and the themes. This was hard for me to vibe with.

I also found the way all the brutal violence is handled here off-putting. Not just the quantities of it, but like, the way it was spoken about? Maybe it’s at least partially on the narrator, but I felt like it was constantly crossing into torture porn territory. Finally, the pacing was just too rocky, with a loooong expositin that had me wondering if the inciting incident would ever occur, then big sections moving at breakneck speed around the middle/in the second half of the story, making an already dense story with lots of characters harder too follow. 

All in all, lots of cool ideas here (and really great worldbuilding!), but I’m not sure the author is for me.

Back when I read the first book of this trilogy, my irritation at the MC knew no bounds (I always believe there’s a special place in hell for those oppressed who willingly and consciously side with the oppressor). But she’s demonstrated passable growth by the end of the story, and the combination of the worldbuilding and the overall plot hooked me enough to get the next book, so here I am, finally fitting it into my reading plans. 

Sophie is indeed a lot more pleasant as a protagonist this time around. I still found myself disagreeing or occasionally getting annoyed by some of her decisions, but she’s definitely more proactive, more conscious of the problems within the country, and more empathetic. So all the annoying parts are more like flaws that make her more “alive“ and realistic rather than reasons to want to yell at her for 24 hours straight, lol. I also liked her plotline with figuring out her magic a lot—the arts and crafts based magic system here is really super interesting. And I also quite enjoyed how her romance with Theodor transitioned from the “will they even try?“ phase into “so how are they making this work?“

Speaking of Theodor, it’s him who was my main source of frustration this time—just because of how stupidly idealistic he is. He wants to do the right thing, but he keeps wanting to do it in a specific manner that is right and righteous and simply won’t work. And like, it makes sense with his upbringing! But also, past a certain point this approach just dragged (though it was all the more satisfying when he changed his mind later).

Plot-wise, it’s very much the middle book of a trilogy. A big part of the events feel like they’re there to bridge the gap between the first book and the planned big conclusion. The worldbuilding gets expanded by a whole lot, but the most exciting elements do little but exist very, very pointedly. I expect them to pay off big time in the final book, though, and I’m even constructing theories that I’ll be glad to see either confirmed or debunked.

Oh, and the sapphic subplot grew more prominent and pointed here. I love the sapphic subplot.

I have this really odd relationship with Alyssa Cole’s books. On one hand, the plots, themes, and character dynamics she works with are right up my alley. And I can never find any real fault with how the stories are told: the prose flows well, the plots are well-constructed, the arcs make sense. But there’s some kind of spark missing, and I just can never figure out what it is or why.

Anyway, this book isn’t an exception. I did enjoy the dynamic between cautious, prickly Mercy and confident, generous Andromeda. I tend to like these storylines where one character gets hurt and swears off so many good things, and then the other character swoops in to show them those things still exist, and then they realize that it’s not even about the other character bringing beauty back in their life, it’s about life itself. This type of arc really is executed so well here. I also enjoyed the depiction of the Post Revolution America and the Black community. And I felt like the story really fit the novella format: it’s rather short, but it’s absolutely complete, with no part feeling rushed or skipped over.

But still. The spark. For some incomprehensible reason, it’s just not there.

Wow. I can tell this story is going to haunt me for a very long time. Somehow, I didn’t expect to cry actual ugly tears over it, and yet here we are.

The first half of the story hooked me so easily. It had everything I wanted the book to be: the thick as hell dark academia vibes, the forming of a dysfunctional found family, the absolutely excellent magic system that might be my favorite ever, and all those hard, impossible choices no one should ever make. What do you do when you love something that wants to destroy your origins? How do you reconcile the good your getting out of your relationship with your colonizer with the rest of it all? Can you pay the cost of fighting against the oppression? Can you justify not joining the fight?

And then the second half came, and damn, it pulled no punches, turning the already painful story into something that made me want to throw my nook into the wall, but also made it impossible not to keep reading. Especially after that one death—damn, that character tricked me with his entire personality into believing he was invincible, and then this, and it somehow wasn’t even the most painful part of the story???

It is scary how viscerally and relatably the story paints the evil of empires. All those powerful men who make entire countries their playground, dehumanizing those countries’ people because it suits their designs; who would sacrifice everyone before they let go of their pride. All those big, insurmountable forces that won’t cave no matter how much weight you throw against them—but maybe it’s worth it to keep fighting just because someone needs to oppose it. Because if you’re not fighting it, that means you’re supporting it, whether you want to or not.

I’m a little frustrated with the openness of the ending; a part of me wants to know whether that one big thing worked. Whether it paid off. But I think it suits the story best not to know. The worth of the act, sometimes, isn’t determined by whether it rendered the desired results or not. Sometimes, it’s just about doing the right thing—and sometimes, doing the terrible thing means doing something terrible. The book does have some flaws, such as the occasional tangents the author seems to go on merely to show off more worldbuilding and research, but the ending isn’t one of them.

Anyway, I should go get another tissue.

Well, damn. I’ve seen quite a few positive reviews for this book, and it’s one of those times when I just feel I’ve read a different story? I would love to read the one all those reviewers got, it sounds rad. The one in front of me, though… not so much.

I really like the concept here, to be clear, but sadly not the execution. I guess I may retain a few fond memories about the first half, although it was unbearably slow and full of cardboard cutouts in place of characters. Seriously, most of the angels we meet seem to be there only for the author to go, “wink wink, nudge nudge, see that name? THIS HERE IS A FUTURE DEMON.“ And despite spending all those endless pages there, I’ve still got so many question about why Heaven here is the way it is, or how it functions exactly in many aspect. Also, all those big joyous worshiping scenes made me feel weirdly uneasy, almost on part with the gore and sexual assault from the second half. Still, there were also some nice turns of phrase here, some beats that evoked emotion in positive ways, and an overall feeling of “this set-up is sure lengthy, but whatever’s to come when it pays off looks promising from here.“

And then I reached the second half, and, eh. It got worse. On one hand, the pacing no longer was so abysmally slow, but on the other, it got incredibly patchy. The narrative jumped all over the place. There was a lot more focus on the characters’ reactions to pivotal events than the events themselves, so part of the time I genuinely found it hard to figure out what was going on, or how we transferred from one plot point to another. The sudden introduction of gratuitous headhopping didn’t help matters at all (seriously, *why*). 

My main takeaway from this book sadly is, “I just don’t get it.“ I don’t get why Lucifer’s fall from grace was driven so greatly by shame (I find it interesting, actually! But. The execution. I don’t get it). I don’t get a single thing about God, like what did he even want, what his motivations were, why. I have no idea what most of the characters’ agendas were, if they had any in the first place. I think I maybe see what the author was trying to do, and the ideas are interesting, but the shape they take is just confusing.

This book is a tricky one to review for me, because I just can’t shake the feeling I’ve read a messy first draft. I don’t mean it in the sense of prose being clunky or pacing being all over the place; the writing is actually fairly smooth and immersive, and the pacing is more or less fine, save for stuff like the reveal about the reasons for the initial animosity between the leads coming too late and kinda out of the blue. I’m more talking about the story itself.

See, it felt all the events and relationship developments simply piled up, with the author seemingly just jumping each time to whichever seemed like the coolest/funnest idea. Nothing wrong with that! But this led to a seriously inconsistent narrative that felt almost like it followed several different sets of characters with the same names. And some of those characters were perfectly compelling flawed fictional human beings with relatable problems, while others were just completely unhinged, and I never knew which option I was getting in the nearest chapter. The whole fake marriage plot just kept spiraling out of control, too—sometimes in ways that were at least entertaining, but ultimately the key points of it barely made sense. Or rather, each of them kind of made sense in isolation, but looking back at the book, I just fail to see a singular coherent narrative. 

The thing is, I can see the bones of a pretty strong romance underneath it all. But I just feel like there are some important transitions missing, and some creative choices could perhaps be tweaked or toned down to better match what came before and after. As it is, the book is kind of all over the place, though the combination of some of those more unhinged developments and the dynamic writing style made it a very entertaining experience regardless.

Such a fun read! I actually liked it more than the first book, perhaps because the main characters and the dynamics between them are more fun. Calladia has been my favorite from the very start, and I was so happy to get to know her as more than just the MC’s best friend. She turned out to be everything I’d expected and more. Astarot, on the other hand, completely surprised me. I expected him to have practically the opposite type of personality. And yet between the amnesia plot, the reveals about his backstory, and everything else, the character on the page makes complete sense and his arc feels like a pretty natural continuation of what we saw of him in book 1.

I went in kind of expecting to get more of Glimmer Falls—the magical quaint small town—but the story mainly takes place outside of its limits. Can’t really complain about that, because the road trip the MCs undertook was ridiculously fun and provided lots of engaging moments. All the locations were so charming, the recurring werewolf pack provided for some occasionally frustrating entertainment, and the way Calladia and Astarot’s relationship developed throughout it all was simply chef’s kiss. The banter! The bickering! The lifting each other up while bantering and bickering! And oh, the story gets smuttier than I expected in the second half, but like, in a way that continues *progressing* the character and relationship development, which is my favorite approach.

I also loved all the parts that deal with the demon realm and their politics (and I feel like that part of the setting got fleshed out nicely and now the aspects of it I had doubts about make more sense.) It was fun to meet so many demon characters, too. I’m a big fan of Lilith. And speaking of demons, I really, really liked Astarot and Oz reconnecting and hashing it out.

Still can’t fully stop shipping Mariel and Calladia over each of them with their respective demons, though.

I’ve heard a lot about Chuck Tingle, admittedly mostly *not* in the context of horror novels, but this is the first time I’ve picked up a book by him. I’m not sure what I expected. Probably something… idk, wilder? Out there? I guess I have trouble putting a finger on it. But anyway, what I got was a fairly good satirical queer horror book that kept me engrossed throughout. Or at least definitely from the moment the horror part came fully into view. Because a script writer getting haunted by his own creations? Yeah, I’m very much here for that.

I liked how the themes were handled here: the intersections of making art and complying to the rules of the corporate machines who are in charge of getting that art to the consumers; the questions of identity; how all of that can intersect. The nonlinear narrative lent itself really well to this story, I feel, especially the parts that delved into the parts of Misha’s childhood and adolescence that inspired the horrors that are after him. Honestly, the more I look back at the book, the more I like the structure and the more layers I find in the intersection of structure and theme. So that’s really cool.

At the same time, I feel like the book suffered when it came to characters. The protagonist is the only one who felt to me like a fully realized person with all the hopes, fears, conflicts, and complexities that come with it. Everybody else kind of felt like just, you know, functions in his story. I guess given the subject matter it could be interpreted as very meta and intentional, but I’m not convinced.

Also, not to give anything away, but the explanation for all those horror characters showing up in the real world? Very chilly, very interesting, and very in line with the modern fears that probably most creators world-wide have to grapple with.