3.5 ⭐️ rounded up

This is a story about a vampire named Anna. It mainly follows her in 1984 as the owner of a preschool in America and it flashes back to moments in her past. She becomes a vampire in the early 1800s as a child and takes on lots of different names and personalities on her way to the modern age. At one point she just starts murdering Nazi’s and butchering them to protect a little French village which is sick. The flashbacks all tie in nicely with the main plot going on in 1984 and you slowly learn more about why Anna, or “Collette” as she goes by later on, is the way that she is.

I really enjoyed it. It is probably closest in genre to literary fiction but has some really good mystery elements to it that I liked and made the plot more interesting. It focuses on the horrors of living forever and experiencing the cycle of loss for a lot longer than mortals ever have to.

I liked the mystery side to the story but unfortunately the threads don’t get tied up in the end which left me feeling a little unsatisfied. There are a lot of questions that don’t get answered. The ending has elements that are open to interpretation which I usually enjoy, but I didn’t work as well with this story.

This was a fun romantasy break from my usual reading. Nothing absolutely special about it but it had a good message about positive sexuality which was nice. A lot of these romantasy novels struggle with making the romance reciprocal and consensual so I appreciated that!

I think most of the ACOTAR and Fourth Wing girlies will also love this! A good mix of soft world-building and romance.

1.5 ⭐️

I don’t think there’s a more boring romance book on the planet. The main characters had no chemistry. The dialogue was all like “there was a spark and i know you felt it too” and I was so confused because these characters could be siblings with the amount of bickering they do. There was no spark.

The flashback was interesting but it was one chapter 80% of the way into the book. If this wasn’t an ARC I probably would’ve DNFd it. Although People We Meet on Vacation isn’t my favorite book, I think if this book was structured more like that it could’ve been better. Break the flashbacks up and spread them throughout the book. Also the reveal for the “awful thing Jack did” needs to be sooner. By the point it’s revealed I don’t even care anymore and I found Andie just super annoying and whiny.

The characters are boring, the subplot is unbelievably boring, and the romance has no spark. Definitely skip this book IMO.

2 ⭐️

Uh yeah so this was technically a romance novel. As my brother would say, this is one of the romance novels of all time. I don’t know how all the chemistry between these two characters evaporated but it did. The first half was really boring and nothing really happened. Finally, around halfway through stuff started to pick up.

Wes struggles with the loss of his father which hit me harder than I expected. Similar to how Liz’s relationship with her step-mother made me emotional in the first book (but the first book did it better for sure).

The chemistry is non-existent and I wasn’t even really rooting for the couple to get together by the end. They don’t seem to know each other anymore and only seem to want to get together because it is easy and what is expected of them.

The cute rom-com references were a lot farther and further between in this book which is what made the first one unique. A lot of the charm of that book is missing. It also feels weirder to make the book SOO PG when the characters are in their early 20s rather than late teens.

I do like both the MMC and FMC, but I think they’ve grown apart and need to go their separate ways now. Part of being a good author is understanding that well-written characters will make decisions for themselves and shoe-horning in what you want them to do makes it feel unnatural and off-putting. While I don’t think Wes and Liz are anything special character-wise, they have enough backstory and history that I think I know what decisions they’d make if there wasn’t an omniscient author trying to cram their story into a YA romance novel.

Not a good read. Relies on a miscommunication and white lie. Ruins a lot of the good banter and chemistry Wes and Liz had in the first book. I used to think that it’s impossible to write a bad romance novel because the formula is so tried and true. But these authors keep trying to prove me wrong.

4 ⭐️

I enjoyed this much much more than the first book in the series! West is a lot more endearing and Skylar as interesting as Rosalie. The banter isn’t the highlight of this book as much as the emotional connection is.

I really loved the kids in this book. I wasn’t expecting to but they really stole my heart. They even made me emotional at one point. They, like Cora in the first book, are the best part of it.

Skylar’s story requires a little suspension of disbelief with her level of fame and notoriety but after you get past that her story is really captivating.

I didn’t care for the teasers for the next book in the series (AKA giving Rhys and Tammy some extra screen time). But I also didn’t care for West in the last books teasers either.

Super cute family dynamics and another good exploration of how child stars are treated (even if it’s fictional)

3.5⭐️

It’s funny how Ali Hazelwood has written the same romance book like a dozen times and I eat it up every time. Big, tall, strong, refrigerator man secretly pines after the small, tiny, FMC. He is reserved and not sure how to express his feelings for her. She believes he hates her. He is overly cautious about making her uncomfortable. Eventually they smash and then fight about a stupid thing and then fall in love. (yes I know her newer books have broken the formula but still)

This is exactly that book. But instead of physicists or chess players or biochemists our main characters are video game developers.

I love Ali Hazelwood’s stupid cheesy writing style and this is a perfect example of that. I think because it is shorter it is both better and worse than a normal full length romance novel. It cuts the fat and the b-plot that can sometimes ruin an otherwise great romance (looking at you Love on The Brain) but it also lacks the side characters and character development that can turn a good trashy romance into a great book (Love, Theoretically).

This book is the ultimate sweet treat romance novel. There is no plot, no character development, no side characters with any personality. I love slow-burn romances so this was a little too rushed imo but still a lot of fun. Ultimate guilty pleasure.

Very funny reading this and Deep End at the same time. Deep End is so focused on kinks that this book seems ridiculously vanilla. Also having an hour of smut in your four hour audiobook must make the book qualify as erotica. A quarter of the time is spent on sex. It was well written as usual with Ali but was a little egregious considering the overall runtime.

5 ⭐️

This is an extremely well written memoir. I have always had an interest in the criminal justice system and this is an exceptional study of the cruel sides of it. Hearing how fucked up the system is from a defense attorney somehow makes it even sadder.

Obviously I was anti-death penalty before I read this book but I’m not sure how anyone can argue for capital punishment after reading this. Even an error rate of 1 is too much when you’re dealing with people’s lives. (Hint the death penalty has definitely killed more than 1 innocent person).

The death penalty is not about whether people deserve to die for the crimes they commit. The real question of capital punishment in this country is, Do we deserve to kill?

I spent a lot of my academic career studying racial injustice and imprisonment so a lot of this was things I’ve heard before. The brief sections about convict leasing, arrest rate differences, community policing, etc. was all stuff I researched for my capstone project. However, the personal stories, the individual cases, were all extremely fascinating. So many people’s lives have been completely ruined, or ended, because of a racist system that refuses to bend to people’s mistakes.

Each of us is more than the worst thing we’ve ever done.

Reading about the worst parts of our society always makes me pissed off and motivated. I think last time I almost applied to law school because I wanted to work for the Innocence Project lol. (this is still an option omg I’m appalled and pissed). How can I go back to reading my silly little fantasy and romance books after this?

Also: Audiobook read by the author ✅

3 ⭐️

This book is all over the place in terms of quality. The best parts are amazing. They are emotional and gave me chills. The weakest parts are dreadfully boring and dragged on.

I think this book would’ve benefitted from a little bit of a faster pace (especially towards the end). It got really slow and I felt like nothing was really happening for chapters at a time.

I think that Semiramis is a great main character for one of these mythological “feminist retellings”. I am obsessed with this genre and I will never get tired of them. This book tried to do something a little different in the genre and had multiple POVs. At first I thought it was working, but overall I think it hurt the story more than helped it. I feel it should’ve focused solely on Semiramis’ story. Often times (this story being no exception) the characters are all morally gray and I think leaving the butterfly effect caused by these horrendous decisions hidden from the reader helps with the story. It forces us to consider and imagine the worst instead of literally see the bad things happening. Our imaginations are usually worse than the reality.

I enjoyed the first half a lot. The last half was more a struggle but I thought the writing was consistently great throughout. Very poetic. Very quotable. Very good imagery.

I know that Casati is a very talented author and I am still eager to see what else she releases in the future.

Disclaimer: I got an eARC of the audiobook through netgalley. Thanks to NetGalley and RBMedia for the advanced copy!

I ABSOLUTELY LOVED THIS BOOK. Except there was one smut scene towards the end that was so foul and disturbing and flabbergasting and slightly triggering that it completely ruined the book for me. I’ve decided to pretend this scene doesn’t exist, and rate it off of that. It’s written so vaguely that it’s easy to miss what’s happening. I didn’t miss it Ali. I’m looking at you.

4.5⭐️

The characters

5 ⭐️

I loved this book. I wouldn’t change a single thing about it. It has all my favorite things and none of my least favorite things all tied up in a cute and unique package!

single parent ✅

forced proximity ✅

sloooooooow burn ✅ (like actually)

characters improving themself before they enter a relationship ✅

entertaining and fleshed out side characters ✅

no miscommunication trope ✅ (in fact there’s a scene that kind of makes fun of this)

what’s not to love?!

I loved the presentation. The radio show idea is sooo unique! I loved it. It was creative and led to some ideas i’ve never seen in a romance before. This book will live rent free in my head forever.

Every man that isn’t Aiden.