Hi, hey, hello!
The past few reading weeks have been the weirdest yet. I’ve picked up books that I should absolutely love and have been disappointed them. I’ve picked up books that are intimidating and aren’t in my comfort zone that I’ve absolutely fallen in love with. I don’t understand either. Grab yourself a snack or a drink because this is going to be a long post full of pent up feelings on my most recent reads.
The books I’ll be discussing today are:
- The Wicked King by Holly Black
- The Diviners by Libba Bray
- The Queen of Nothing by Holly Black
- Fix Her Up by Tessa Bailey
- The Kiss Quotient by Helen Hoang
- Serpent and Dove by Shelby Mahurin
- The Duchess Deal by Tessa Dare
Let’s start with what I’ve loved recently. My most recent favorite books have to be “The Wicked King” and “The Diviners”. “The Wicked King” is a fantasy novel, FANTASY. It’s full of political drama, a slow burn romance, a perfectly well done enemies to lovers trope, and some heart wrenching betrayals. I never knew I’d love political settings until I picked up The Cruel Prince series and now it’s all I want. There’s something so gripping about political court drama that keeps me wanting to read, read, and read some more. One of the major reasons I loved this book is because it’s the second book in the series and it’s also the best book in the series. Series usually suffer from second book syndrome but not this one! Even though this book was so short, it delivered on everything I wanted and gave me a lot more than I expected, which is of course, always welcome.
“The Diviners” is one of the best audiobooks that I’ve ever listened to in the twenty-two years I’ve been alive. I turned twenty-two this past Saturday so I’m allowed to say twenty-two years now which is both exciting and a bit terrifying. Any ways, this book was all types of creepy and gripping. I finished this book in the dark and I may or may not have bitten my cheek in anticipation of the massive explosion I knew the book was going to culminate on and gave myself a tiny bruise. It was worth it. The narrator did an amazing job changing her voice and setting the tone for the novel. Each and every chapter was a work of art from both the author and the narrator’s side. I’ve met some of my new favorite characters and relationships from this series and am so excited to be finally starting my listen of the second book, “Lair of Dreams”.
Now onto the continuous streak of disappointing books I’ve been picking up one after another. The most shocking book to you on the list may be “Queen of Nothing”. I didn’t really like this book as much as I thought I would. I read this series so fast, I completely devoured it. The first book got me out of my fantasy slump, the second book was just amazing, and the third one was just meh. I think that’s why I’m really disappointed by it. The third book felt like what I thought that the second book would feel like. It didn’t do much for me at all. I hated how Taryn was woven into the third book. I also felt like there were some plot holes in this book, is it just me? Also, there wasn’t much romance to satisfy my Jude and Carden needs at all. The book was too short and did very little.
The rest of the disappointing books are mainly romance centered. Somehow all these romance heavy reads I picked up one after another are all centered around a fake/forced dating/marriage trope. I’m thinking after the slew of disappointments, I should maybe take a break from this trope. First on the list is “Fix Her Up”. This book had a fake dating trope that I didn’t like at all. The main character was too much of an alpha male and there wasn’t enough plot to satisfy me. It was mainly smut and for me, I like my romance reads to have some plot. I was disappointed by “The Kiss Quotient” for the same reasons. The book was just sex. I knew going into the book it’s about the girl main character trying to learn how to be good at sex/relationships from a male escort. I just thought there’d be more depth alongside the smut like there was in the second book in the series, but there wasn’t. The fact that I didn’t like this book really made me sad because I absolutely loved reading “The Bride Test”, it’s one of my new favorite reads, and was hoping to have a similar connection with “The Kiss Quotient”.
“Serpent and Dove” was one of my most anticipated fantasy reads this year. I was excited going into it because it was romance centered and had an enemies to lovers trope. I was NOT satisfied with the romance in this book. The basis of their relationship, their morals and beliefs, made them enemies to lovers but it was too insta love for their relationship to truly count as an enemies to lovers trope if that makes sense? For me at least, it was a big downer. I think part of the reason for my disappointment is because I kept comparing their relationship to Jude and Carden which is a very high standard to live up to when it comes to the enemies to lovers trope. I know this was a debut novel and I can see so much potential for this author. The ending of this book really saved it for me and I’m excited to see what happens in “Blood and Honey,” the sequel, but the first half/ three quarters of this book was full of bad world building and the writing was a bit iffy for me. When I go into fantasy, I end up having higher expectations because there’s a whole new world and such a diverse/different set of characters to get used to but this book didn’t really challenge me. It challenged me in the bad way of trying to understand how some of these characters came to the conclusions they did.
I also read “The Duchess Deal” by Tessa Dare. It was a fun read, I liked reading about Khan but that’s about it. I wasn’t as invested in this book as much as I was with “Say Yes to the Marquess”. It’s going to be a while for me to find a Tessa Dare that has a character I’ll love as much as Rafe. I definitely had more fun reading about the side characters in this book, specifically the staff of the house trying to get the two characters together. Khan was a hilarious character to read about, the poor man went through a lot in this book. I wouldn’t say that this was a disappointing read as much as it was an okay read. It didn’t do anything for me but it was a quick filler read I had available on my phone that I flipped through when I was bored.
What makes my thoughts on “The Kiss Quotient” and “Serpent and Dove” weird is that they’re very contradictory to the majority of people who have read them. These two books are very hyped and very loved so please take my thoughts with a grain of salt. My opinions are my own, every reader has their own reading taste so don’t expect mine to line up with everyone’s.
Let me know what you thought these books! What are some disappointing reads you’ve read recently?