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The Prince of Demons by Hana Hahm
So this is the first in a series that I will absolutely not be finishing. I found this book on TikTok and boy was that a mistake. I know, I know: most of the books that are being advertised by their tropes, snippets, characters, etc. tend to be kind of bad at everything else. I've definitely DNFed a few bad TikTok recommendations--but I have actually found some decent ones. There's a whole series that I've enjoyed and there are a few upcoming releases advertising on TikTok that I actually think will be pretty good. The Prince of Demons is not among them.
The Good: The only thing, and I mean the only thing, that I found myself even mildly enjoying was the way recruitment for the "houses" goes. Mostly because it is word for word exactly how sorority recruitment goes. I'm not even joking. It was hilarious to read as someone who's been through that process on three different sides.
The Bad: Pretty much everything else. I was lured into this book by a well chosen snippet and character description of the love interest. The book did not deliver on that at all. The writing is in serious need of several more eyes on it, the dialogue cheesy, all of the characters pretty flat, motivations all over the place. It felt like an attempt to capitalize on the popularity of the Zodiac Academy series. The main character has like five different plotlines, including a couple that I get the feeling were only included to make the argument for certain types of diversity representation. No matter what kind of tantalizing facts you hear about the romance in this one, don't fall for it.
So yeah. Not a good book. And the only part that was enjoyable wasn't even an original idea, it was just a highly accurate depiction of a real life system. I dunno, there were a couple of points where I thought "huh that might be a good idea" but the writer never managed to follow through on those.
Grimdale Graveyard Mysteries books 1 & 2 by Steffanie Holmes
These books I'm putting together instead of separately because, frankly, they take place one right after the other so seamlessly that it was essentially a single reading experience. If the third book had been out when I finished the second, I probably would have rolled right into it--but honestly I'm not going to finish this series. It's not nearly as terrible as Prince of Demons but it's not worth keeping an eye out for the next installment. This is a pretty self indulgent smutty ghost story, and to give credit where it's due Holmes does not hide that in her descriptions. She describes this series as a "spooky kooky" romance ghost story and yeah that's what it is. The books introduce us to Bree, who's been able to see ghosts since she was a kid to various life-ruining effects. She befriended a trio of ghosts living in her parents haunted B&B but then had a falling out with them and fled home for several years to travel the world. Following her father's Parkinson's diagnosis, she comes home to mind the B&B while her parents get to do their own travel. Oh, and she gets seduced by her ghostly childhood friends.
The Good: I mean, this book is pretty up front about what it wants to provide. It's a smutty ghost story, and that's what it excels at. The smut is spicy, Bree is honestly pretty realistic for a woman in her predicament, and the conceit of the story makes sense to an extent. At least in the first book--the second one's plot goes a little off the rails.
The Bad: The ghosts are over the top in their personalities, which can kind of upset the reading process. I get that this is meant to be "kooky" but sometimes it was just too much and super annoying.
Overall, if you're looking to consume some smutty ghost stories really quickly, I totally recommend this. It hit the spot, I won't lie. But as I said above, this might not be the kind of series that you get so hooked on that you're eagerly awaiting the next release. If you've got Kindle Unlimited, add it it the queue y'know?
Babydoll by Thea Lawrence
This is the first in the Revolver series, which again... I'm not going to be following up on. This was a pretty quick and dirty read, and it entertained me for what it's worth--but it is also fanfiction with the serial numbers filed off and it's painfully obvious. Granted, the author advertises this fact, and most likely her primary audience is there for that very reason. I knew going into it that this was previously written as a Bucky Barnes fanfic thanks to the author.
The Good: I mean, the story is somewhat entertaining and I enjoyed the descriptions of the historical music scene. It's got mild Daisy Jones vibes in that way. And I will admit that I enjoyed trying to guess which character was which from Marvel. Not that it was hard for some of them (Troy Sullivan = Tony Stark, it's painfully obvious from the get-go).
The Bad: There were a lot of characterizations, plot points, and tropes that frankly don't work outside of the world of fanfiction. The way some of the characters (particularly Troy) treated the main character would have made sense in the context of an Avengers fanfic, but don't work anywhere else. There were a lot of dramatics that could have worked due to the setting, but didn't quite land right most of the time. And the amount of times things like miscommunication came up? Meh. Could've lived without it all.
This wasn't the worst example of fanfiction repackaged for mainstream publishing, and I do think the author is smart to include in her advertising that this was originally fanfic. That being said, it definitely need to go through more rounds of editing to get some of the characters buffed up and some of the story smoothed out. It just really started to grate on me over time that the main character was treated like a child by the majority of the characters in a way that would only fly in a straight fanfiction.
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