This book was one of the biggest dissapointments I've ever read. Its nothing like the Hunger games, makes absolutely no logical sense in terms of world building, and repeats the same scenes over and over and over again. If I hear about Pae using a dagger it'll be too soon. Also, can someone please explain to me what these trials are even for? Because pinning elite children against EACH OTHER and watching them DIE defeats the purpose of proving how POWERFUL they are. Thats like the Hunger Games throwing in kids from the Capitol after they won the war. It defeats the point. Also, I dont think the world building existed. Only Loot was the only town mentioned, the trials were one note and added NOTHING, and no political aspects were explained. How does the King govern, why is there only a child enforcer, who is the current enforcer, who was the previous, and what the hell happened to cause the powers to emeger and WHY do they think ordinaries drain powers!? In the first chapters an ordinary girl lived with her adopted family and they never faced anything so why didn't Kai get tipped off from that? And all characters were so one note it was hard to read. In terms of Red Queen this book steels the concept without understanding any of the nuance or hidden messages laid throughout. Addituonally, I think its insulting to give more leniance to books simply because they are YA. There are hundreds of books labeled YA that are absolute masterpieces with better world building than any adult books Ive read (Hunger Games, Percy Jackson, Harry Potter, Shadow ans Bones, etc.). I dont think booktok authors should get a pass because they write for teens. Teens are incredibly insightful and can do better than this book by far.
It felt like Hunger Games fanfiction in the sense that someone wanted to capture the "death tournament" stakes of Hunger Games but didn't think it all the way through, similar to Immortal Longings did. Ultimately I got bored and gave up, but wanted to know what happened and it's hard to find spoiler reviews for stuff, so thank you 🙏🏻
I agree with you!! I read Powerless + Powerful in tandem and the banter, flirting and heartbreak made it fun to read, but the slow burn being so slow that it never even burned was incredibly frustrating and the trials were so underwhelming (especially if you compare then to The Hunger Games) but I want to read Reckless because my inner gossip wants to know what happens next lololol
I almost put the book down after the 100th time Kai himself mentions his cute habit (and I say cute sarcastically lol) of running around with his shirt off like that’s something a guy would feel the need to mention he does all the time? lmao. I overall liked the book and the end frustrates me enough to read the next one, but the tension that I feel the writer tried to create in the romance just fell short and I only felt tension at the very end knowing they weren’t going to kiss. But the banter to me sometimes didn’t quite feel like natural conversation and some of the narration I wanted to skip over. Lot of repetition too. Knowing that they weren’t going to progress romantically or physically in this book, the connection between them should have been written more slow burn. But instead we had Kai decided she was basically the one after knowing her for 5 minutes lol and then we had them touching and flirting obviously too soon which killed any tension that there could have been
I just like the book because of the romance but the rest of the story is not well developed, the ending i think is the most memorable moment but is not like wow. And the Trials are not that intense like the Hunger games because even if there is one winner others can survive so i cant see the threat of going to these trials. SPOILER: Someone die at the end of the book and the author want to make us cry with that but that character had like 3 appearances in the entire book 🙃
Oh thank god! I just finished reading this book and was kinda shocked to see that almost everyone loved it! But Why??? Every single trope in this book has been done bettet in some other novel. And Kai and Paedyn felt so forced to me that I actually preferred the prince dude. The romance was there but it did not feel natural at all. Who in the world dances when you're in a competition to death? I mean what??? It was nicer at the end though.
I recently read Roar by Cora Carmack, and it had the same romance problem. The author has previously written adult contemporary romance, and this was her first YA fantasy. The fantasy part was so good, but the characters couldn't have a single conversation without oggling each other. Like, the girl is fatally wounded and all she can think about it is how hot the guy is. And since it was YA, it never got spicy. It really made the book unreadable, which was disappointing because the worldbuilding was super interesting.
I loved the banter but I agree that something more should have happened because it was too repetitive. I did get Hunter Games vibes but it didn’t bother me. I liked the trials but it should’ve been more descriptive. I’m hoping the next book will be better and grow the relationship and story. I don’t typically like dual POV but thankfully they did because I enjoyed Kai way more than Paedyn. I also didn’t love the ending. Your ending would’ve been better 😂
I almost DNF... the whole book is banter, and it just was not for me. There were so many holes and things that got my eyes rolling. I don't know how this book got the hype it got. I will not continue.
This book was one of the biggest dissapointments I've ever read. Its nothing like the Hunger games, makes absolutely no logical sense in terms of world building, and repeats the same scenes over and over and over again. If I hear about Pae using a dagger it'll be too soon. Also, can someone please explain to me what these trials are even for? Because pinning elite children against EACH OTHER and watching them DIE defeats the purpose of proving how POWERFUL they are. Thats like the Hunger Games throwing in kids from the Capitol after they won the war. It defeats the point.
Also, I dont think the world building existed. Only Loot was the only town mentioned, the trials were one note and added NOTHING, and no political aspects were explained. How does the King govern, why is there only a child enforcer, who is the current enforcer, who was the previous, and what the hell happened to cause the powers to emeger and WHY do they think ordinaries drain powers!? In the first chapters an ordinary girl lived with her adopted family and they never faced anything so why didn't Kai get tipped off from that?
And all characters were so one note it was hard to read.
In terms of Red Queen this book steels the concept without understanding any of the nuance or hidden messages laid throughout.
Addituonally, I think its insulting to give more leniance to books simply because they are YA. There are hundreds of books labeled YA that are absolute masterpieces with better world building than any adult books Ive read (Hunger Games, Percy Jackson, Harry Potter, Shadow ans Bones, etc.). I dont think booktok authors should get a pass because they write for teens. Teens are incredibly insightful and can do better than this book by far.
It felt like Hunger Games fanfiction in the sense that someone wanted to capture the "death tournament" stakes of Hunger Games but didn't think it all the way through, similar to Immortal Longings did.
Ultimately I got bored and gave up, but wanted to know what happened and it's hard to find spoiler reviews for stuff, so thank you 🙏🏻
I agree with you!! I read Powerless + Powerful in tandem and the banter, flirting and heartbreak made it fun to read, but the slow burn being so slow that it never even burned was incredibly frustrating and the trials were so underwhelming (especially if you compare then to The Hunger Games) but I want to read Reckless because my inner gossip wants to know what happens next lololol
I just got Reckless on audio so I’ll be finding out too! Let’s hope the burn burns!!
I agree with you 100% !
I almost put the book down after the 100th time Kai himself mentions his cute habit (and I say cute sarcastically lol) of running around with his shirt off like that’s something a guy would feel the need to mention he does all the time? lmao. I overall liked the book and the end frustrates me enough to read the next one, but the tension that I feel the writer tried to create in the romance just fell short and I only felt tension at the very end knowing they weren’t going to kiss. But the banter to me sometimes didn’t quite feel like natural conversation and some of the narration I wanted to skip over. Lot of repetition too. Knowing that they weren’t going to progress romantically or physically in this book, the connection between them should have been written more slow burn. But instead we had Kai decided she was basically the one after knowing her for 5 minutes lol and then we had them touching and flirting obviously too soon which killed any tension that there could have been
I literally told my friend that the first 150 pages of this book felt like Celaena and Dorian fan fiction but with more explicit hunger games vibes.
I definitely could see Celaena and Dorian, but also very Mare & Cal!
I just like the book because of the romance but the rest of the story is not well developed, the ending i think is the most memorable moment but is not like wow. And the Trials are not that intense like the Hunger games because even if there is one winner others can survive so i cant see the threat of going to these trials.
SPOILER: Someone die at the end of the book and the author want to make us cry with that but that character had like 3 appearances in the entire book 🙃
Oh thank god! I just finished reading this book and was kinda shocked to see that almost everyone loved it! But Why??? Every single trope in this book has been done bettet in some other novel. And Kai and Paedyn felt so forced to me that I actually preferred the prince dude. The romance was there but it did not feel natural at all. Who in the world dances when you're in a competition to death? I mean what??? It was nicer at the end though.
Funny I actually liked the brother too!
I recently read Roar by Cora Carmack, and it had the same romance problem. The author has previously written adult contemporary romance, and this was her first YA fantasy. The fantasy part was so good, but the characters couldn't have a single conversation without oggling each other. Like, the girl is fatally wounded and all she can think about it is how hot the guy is. And since it was YA, it never got spicy. It really made the book unreadable, which was disappointing because the worldbuilding was super interesting.
I loved the banter but I agree that something more should have happened because it was too repetitive. I did get Hunter Games vibes but it didn’t bother me. I liked the trials but it should’ve been more descriptive. I’m hoping the next book will be better and grow the relationship and story. I don’t typically like dual POV but thankfully they did because I enjoyed Kai way more than Paedyn. I also didn’t love the ending. Your ending would’ve been better 😂
Oh hell yes, it would be a great ending if Kit (the next king in line) killed Pae's father because of that green eye reference. Epic idea of yours!
Glad you liked it! Lol
I almost DNF... the whole book is banter, and it just was not for me. There were so many holes and things that got my eyes rolling. I don't know how this book got the hype it got. I will not continue.
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