![]() In no particular order, here are my top ten reads of the 50 full-length books that I read this year! The Love Hypothesis One of TikTok’s most buzzed about rom-coms of the year, The Love Hypothesis exceeded any and all expectations. I don’t know about the whole Reylo fanfiction thing, but Ali Hazelwood simply wrote a really good book y’all. I love the romance genre and this book not only had a fantastic heroine and an interesting, fully developed love interest, but it also takes part in an important conversation about women in STEM. Beloved I was actually assigned this for my English class about transnational literatures, and I’m very happy that I read this for the first time in that setting. It’s definitely a difficult book content and format wise, but I think everybody should read this AT LEAST once. Rhapsodic This was probably my favourite fantasy read of the year. I partook in a lot more NA books in 2021 and I really love the NA fantasy-romance genre. I’d say this was more of an enemies to lovers slow burn, which is pretty much my bread and butter. Des is everything you could want in a leading man and Callie is a multi-faceted character with all the vulnerability and badassery you could want in an MC. I plan on reading the rest of the series early in the New Year. If We Were Villains Dark Academia is not only a wonderful aesthetic, it’s a great genre too (is it a genre or just a vibe? idk). As someone who considers themselves a somewhat pretentious bitch, the Shakespearean troupe and theatre college setting of If We Were Villains held a lot of appeal to me. I laughed, I cried, I learned how to obnoxiously integrate Shakespeare quotes into everyday conversation - what more could you want? The Idea of You I did not expect to love this book as much as I did. I picked this up after my mom sent me a Vogue article that said it was inspired by Harry Styles and had top tier smut (she’s not a regular mom, she’s a cool mom). Not going to lie, Hayes and his band are so close to Harry Styles and One Direction that this is basically fanfiction. But like, really good fanfiction. I personally don’t read fanfiction and never really have, apart from a couple Dramione fics because everyone needs that in their lives, and I’ll admit that fanfiction about real people sometimes gives me the ick. Occasionally the blatant similarities pulled me out of the story but overall this book was so well written and the main characters were such interesting people that the connections to a certain favourite singer of mine didn’t bother me. If you’re looking for an easy breezy romance this definitely isn’t it, but if you like your romances to suckerpunch you in the heart then pick this up now. The Ex Hex I read The Ex Hex in November and holy mother of god it’s so good. I mentioned in my review that it had similar vibes to the Practical Magic movie and I think that’s a big part of why I liked it so much. Rhys and Vivi were just fun and likable characters that you couldn’t help but root for even in the midst of their dumbassery. Chasing Serenity I re-read about 5 Kristen Ashley books at least once a year, and her 2021 release Chasing Serenity landed itself a spot on that list. There’s just something really comforting and charming about her writing, even though most of her books have literal serial killers and mobsters. Chasing Serenity felt like classic KA, and I don’t think I’ve ever related to one of her heroines like I did to Chloe. So if there are any Judge’s out there, please send me your resume. Crescent City I read two Sarah J Maas books this year, and Crescent City beat out A Court of Silver Flames for a spot on my list. While I had some issues with ACOSF (Nesta and Cassian are interesting as individuals but they have no pizzazz as a couple, fight me), Crescent City blew me away. I think that putting her faeries in a modern setting allowed Maas to differentiate this series from ACOTAR and TOG. The first 100-150 pages were a bit of a whirlwind of worldbuilding, but once you understand the world’s hierarchy everything starts to flow. I read this pretty close to ACOSF which was very romance heavy, and I liked that this had more going for it plot-wise. I also found myself much more invested in the Bryce/Hunt romance than Nessian, sorry bout it. If Hunt gets Tamlin’d, I’ll sue. Any Way the Wind Blows I simply had to include this because it was the final book in one of my favourite trilogies. Simon and Baz have a very special place in my heart, and I think that this was a great send off. Wayward Son was good but not great, and I think that Any Way The Wind Blows wrapped up a lot of those loose ends and gave us more character growth and closure on these fantastic characters. Kingdom of the Cursed What a truly fabulous sequel. Making this book more R-rated then its PG-13 predecessor was a very good decision for the series because how can you have your love interest be a literal embodiment of one of the Seven Deadly Sins and not have some smut? Admittedly, not much actually happened in this book but the focus was on character and romance development for Wrath and Emilia, which was both very well done and will be necessary for the next installment. This is just a really freaking great time for anyone who loves fantasy and enemies to lovers.
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![]() “It’s the arrogance of men, to think so little of women. And it’ll be their downfall too.” Gild is the first book in the Plated Prisoner series by Raven Kennedy, a NA fantasy-romance series that gets A LOT of buzz on bookstagram and booktok. Disclaimer: Gild has exactly zero romance, so reader beware that you’ll have to make it to book two for that. It probably took me over a month to actually get this friggin’ thing read due to a combination of real-life obligations and the fact that I just did not enjoy the first half of this novel. I think this is one of those books where it’s definitely better to know what to expect going into it, because it’s pretty intense. I absolutely felt like I knew what I was getting myself into; I knew that there were themes of grooming and sexual abuse, and I knew that it was told from the point of view of someone who essentially has Stolkholm Syndrome (I’m hesitant to use a real clinical term, but I think we can all agree that that seems to be what’s going on here, right?). However, the first part of the book was just so over the top sexually violent and degrading that I just couldn’t get into the story. It all felt very unnecessary and like it was just thrown in for shock value. I also didn’t connect much to Auren, it felt like I was reading from the perspective of an impartial observer when she is most certainly not that. The first time I read “saddle” I had a bit of a chuckle because despite the intended misogyny it is a kind of funny bit of wordplay. But when it proceeded to show up in every other sentence I quickly grew tired of it and wanted to gut punch everyone who said it, not for the obvious insult but because they couldn’t come up with another freaking noun. I also felt like Midas was a terrible villain. Obviously what he’s done to Auren is reprehensible and horrifying, but I think his ass could very easily be kicked. Literally the only thing this man cares about is screwing around with his concubines. I just didn’t find him all that intimidating as a larger threat in terms of the developing storyline. He’s an immediate threat to Auren but I don’t find him strong enough or scary enough to make for a lasting villain in the series. Luckily, the second half of the book picked up immensely when Midas got tf out. Things were actually happening in the second half of the book and I felt like Auren became a more interesting character. Seeing more of the kingdom and some of the outside terrors was a really great set up for book two and made for some actual pay off in Gild. It was gratifying to see Auren start to take charge of her surroundings and to simply have a setting that wasn’t a caricature of a Game of Thrones brothel. I’m not in any rush but I definitely think I’ll read the rest of the series because I have a lot of predictions (Rip and Ravinger are definitely the same person, you can’t change my mind). |
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