Because the thorns in this book will get you angry.
Song Vibe Check:
"Leeches" By: Melanie Martinez
"Queen of Kings" By: Alessandra
"Game of Survival" By: Ruelle
Does it ever happen when you pick a book that gets a lot of buzz, that you start to read that pulls you in, sort of loses you, then gets you interested again and then just INFURIATES you until the end? That is what happened in this book.
And it was not the "I want to smack these people but really hope they live." It's the "I want to throw this book into a lake, find the author and THEN ask her why she made this and this character so infuriating for it all to get tied up like THAT in the end" type of infuriating.
But, before I elaborate more... here we go.
Short Summary: The resident seer tries to save the prince she saved seven years ago (again) from ending up dead by the end of the summer.
*cue wedding bells*
Long Summary: Violet Lune is a seer, but a lot of what she sees is not truly enough for an actual prediction. And if she wants her high tower and commodities, she has to remain on King Emilius' side. So she lies through her teeth until she becomes influential enough that people come knocking on her door desperate for others. While she pleases the world, there is one person who isn't pleased by her talent... or her.
And that is Prince Cyrus, the annoying oaf Violet saved seven years ago. The prince who only looks better as the years pass by. The prince who claims to hate her, but also can't help the fact that he's been in love with her for all of his life. The prince who doesn't trust her, but also can't stop leaning on for some support .
The prince that could be Violet's cause of death if she doesn't hurry up to get him married.
And as Cyrus resists the chance to fall in love with someone and to get married, a war between two kingdoms starts brewing and tensions of the prophecy being the end of the world. With beasts from an enchanted forest starting to kill more people, the time for a wedding is running out. And to top things off, there is an evil witch who plays with the arranged match of Cyrus as well as Violet's Sight that could threaten to destroy the kingdom she is trying to protect.
I really wanted to like this book. It had a strong start, with Violet as our resident cynic who doesn't believe in love, who "hates" Cyrus and has a decent relationship with Dante who was my favorite character (until the lazy reveal that he was a spy *GASP*) and with Camila, the resident casanova who sleeps with half of the bachlorettes in the land but as the story progressed, there were moments I'd put the book down because it would drag. I would pick it up and be drawn in again and then the irritation began.
Which spiraled into anger, into being infuriated by how the story could not decide whether we were going to retell Cinderella or if this was going to be a poisoning tale a la Sleeping Beauty or if we were going to head to a strange Beauty and the Beast retelling.
This should not be a point of confusion when you are 3/4 through the novel and yet, this is what the novel caused me. We have the climatic point where Violet who is portrayed as the villain at this point, stabs her love, saves him and he... forgives her? And then asks to marry her?
Did he lose his brain cells? He SPENT NEARLY THE ENTIRE BOOK TRYING TO KICK HER OUT AND THEN PULLING HER INTO SLEEPING WITH HIM!
That's if we avoid covering the ending. The storybook ending with the whole "and she said yes" as a way to "rewrite the narrative".
I was happy to slam the book shut after I finished but it turns out there's more and while I want Cyrus to end up buried in thorns and tree bark for the rest of his days, I don't want the author to further mess up Violet's character because I think enough damage was done to the seer. But there is a book 2 apparently in the works and while I am very dubious about reading it because I think I had enough of this book, it was not as great as I would hope it would be.
Overall: 3/5 stars
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