Apologies for the 65 annotations I shared on Goodreads (I had 82 total but I kept some of the meanest ones to myself...you're welcome), but apparently it's one of those books where something makes me mad on every other page.

I only picked up Powerless because I knew I probably wouldn't enjoy it. If you're looking for a review from someone who actually gave this book a chance, look elsewhere...I just wanted an excuse to read something that I knew would be predictable and probably make me mad because sometimes I enjoy that. If that makes me a bad person, sue me. In my defense, this book basically plagiarized The Hunger Games and Red Queen. I'll go into more detail below my official review (because I referenced a dozen different books in my annotations).
The plot? Paedyn Gray is a thief who doesn't have powers but saves the prince (so she can steal from him) and somehow gets voted into the local Hunger Games Trials. Now she and Kai, the prince she definitely doesn't have feelings for, end up in the Trials together. If you've ever read a romantasy book, you already know where this plot is going...all the typical tropes included. It's extremely predictable, but the pace was fast enough to keep me from getting too bored. My main issue was the lack of worldbuilding. Why did we start the Trials? What do you get for winning? Why do people vote each other in? Why the heck do we need a ball every other page? (If these questions were answered and I missed them, I apologize, but it really didn't feel like we mentioned much worldbuilding at all beyond "evil plague gives people colored hair and magic and supposedly it's deadly but no one really dies from it"). I don't know if I'll end up reading book two, but I don't expect it'll be much more unique than book one.
As with most romantasies I read, I wasn't a huge fan of the characters. Paedyn is just Mare Barrow and Katniss Everdeen's more lusty child who is so special for literally no reason. I also wasn't a fan of Kai because the brooding, dark-hair "I was trained to kill love interest" is present in literally every book ever now and he didn't have anything fun except his power. The side characters are so incredibly flat that I didn't care for any of them either: Blair is the token Mean Girl who just wants the Guy and hates Paedyn for it; Andy is the token queer cousin; Adena is the token POC friend; Jax is the token expendable younger brother...you see what I'm getting at. The only character I liked was Kitt because he reminded me of August Galipei from Immortal Longings...
If you're a fan of super trope-y books or stories that follow the set romantasy outline without much new to offer, you'd probably enjoy Powerless much more than I did.

3.25/5

Things I Referenced/Tropes/Other Books with Similar Plots (EXCLUDING SPOILERS):
- Sophie Foster from Keeper of the Lost Cities: pretending your favorite color isn't your favorite color because it's your love interest's eye color
- Vi from Arcane: no elaboration
- instalust (the excuse used for why is the dumbest thing I've ever heard)
- Red Queen: two princes that act as a love triangle; mean girl who wants the prince; pretending to have magic; silver hair; best friend/sister who loves sewing ... (there's probably more but I haven't read it in over 5 years)
- The Hunger Games: the Trials; the "what's your favorite color" conversation; someone who sews dresses just for the balls; interviewing contestants; healer parents; underground resistance; archer FMC
- "not like other girls"
- knife to throat every other page
- Skyhunter: backstory stuff between FMC and MMC
- The Kinder Poison: stepbrother princes, one is happy and one is depressed
- comfort after nightmares
- ...the list could go on and on but I'll refrain