Idk why I thought I might like this. I’ve already established I hate YA fantasy.

TL;DR: Typical ya fantasy female mc, irritating love interest that has tension with her way too early, vague magic system

Violeta: She’s the exact same as so many other ya fantasy mcs I’ve read. Dumb (why was she convinced shadows that leave a physical mark on Arien’s skin were dreams? What??), rushing into trouble when she clearly knows less about what’s going on than the other characters, no personality other than ‘must protect brother’ and ‘I hate this mysterious scary evil man except I’m blushing at what he just said/did for some reason’. And why did she call her brother ‘my love’??? Ew

Lord Sylvanan/Rowan: Him being called ‘the monster’ over and over felt dumb to me. Like you’re trying to convince me he’s evil and scary and it’s not working. I just found him annoying. Also, I’m disfigured, and him being scarred felt like an attempt to make him seem ‘scarier/more evil’, which is an overdone, offensive and harmful trope. To be fair, I don’t remember the actual scar being described in a negative way, it’s more just the combination of ‘man whose supposedly done terrible things, is constantly referred to as ‘the monster’ and is generally just an asshole’ + the scarring, that feels questionable to me. Even if he’s redeemed or they explain why he’s scarred, that doesn’t justify it. 

Storytelling: Why didn’t anyone explain to Violeta what they needed Arien for? Was there any reason for keeping that from her? Or was it just so that there’d be some mystery for the reader? Because it felt like an excuse for Violeta to interfere and be stupid, which I’m not exactly sure why that need to happen anyway.

Magic: It was very vague and didn’t feel well thought out. Maybe if I’d read further it would’ve been more fleshed out, but it just felt flimsy. Especially in chapter six, I think if you’re gonna have a high stakes scene like that the reader should probably know what the hell is going on. It just doesn’t have the same impact if I’m stuck on trying to picture what’s even happening. (It also didn’t help that I didn’t care about any of the characters).

I’ll end this very negative review on a positive note with a quote that I liked:

“Most of the windows are closed, and a thick tangle of ivy winds between the wooden shutters. 

This book read like a 2012 self-insert watt pad fanfic, especially in the beginning. There’s a lot of build-up with no delivery and it seems like instead of letting the story speak for itself, the author instead just tells you how you should feel about the story. 

At the beginning, the main character refer to the (initial) antagonist as “the monster” constantly. After hearing a single rumor about him, being told that he’s called a monster and having like 2 interactions with him. It’s like it was just easier to have the main character keep calling him a monster instead of actually illustrating it and leading you to that conclusion yourself. The entire book just felt like it was trying to hard to be dark and scary, without actually delivering. 

My biggest complaint, though, is the descriptions throughout do not line up. When I read, I have a movie that plays in my head of what’s going on in the book. And the way actions were described, it completely took me out of the story almost constantly! For example, if it describes two characters in the same room, at first it will describe them as being on opposite side of the room, and then 2 seconds later it’ll be saying that character A grabbed Character B’s hand. When did they cross the room?? Did I miss something or do they just have super long arms?? 

My final note:

there’s supposed to be  a love triangle in this?? The third person in the supposed love triangle is only actually in a scene maybe 3 times. And the way it’s described it felt my creepy and weird than anything. Reading it, I kept thinking to myself “does the author mean for it to sound like the main character is kind of into him??”

Nothing about it seemed intentional.

I really wanted to love this book. I went into fully expecting to be obsessed because it's the type of book that is right up my alley. But, I just couldn't love it. I hated the way the other characters treated Leta all throughout the book. I can usually handle characters being irrational, but they were all just so hypocritical. They would constantly lie or hide things from Leta and then get angry with her for doing the same and concealing things from them. They really threw her childhood trauma back in her face several times. The emotional moments of this book were really good and were what kept me going, but the relationship between Leta and her own brother felt incredibly toxic.

Arien often threw her attempts to protect him back in her face and would get mad at her for not telling him stuff or doing stuff without telling him when he was literally always doing the same thing.

I also felt the ending was very rushed. The relationship between Leta and the Lord Under felt very underdeveloped for what it felt like the author was trying to do.

When she was constantly saying she felt betrayed by him, it made me wonder why she put any trust in him. He also lied to her multiple times and she was always acknowledging how ruthless and cruel he was. I feel like there weren't enough moments where he was nice to her or kind beyond that one moment when she was a child to have it make sense how much trust she put in him.