If you can be patient for the first 200-ish pages, it really takes off once all the players are established and the threads start coming together. A modern take on traditional high fantasy with female characters that are written like someone's actually met one. I enjoyed the ride and appreciated this was a self-contained story with closure at the end.

OMG for that ending alone, stick it out through this chonker. Some of the best blindsides I can remember come from this author but all the clues were there. I love it, jfc.

Worth restarting this 5 times. Once I got about 200 pages in I was fully invested and this book just melted.

Too bad. I am exactly the kind of ice-blooded, rotten-hearted girl he fears I am. And I am fine with that.

May he stay unsettled.

I mean, after how the second book ended I had to find out what happens next even if it was 4 in the morning. Somehow over the last day I've absorbed this book. Some things were a little too neat at the end (and I have to believe Jude has been willfully blind about obvious things throughout) but overall I'm very happy to have lost the past couple days to this trilogy.

I liked it so much more than the first and devoured it in a day, almost in one sitting. This was what I wanted the series to be.

"Your ridiculous family might be surprised to find that not everything is solved by murder," Locke calls after me.
"We would be surprised to find that," I call back.

I can't say it lived up to what I was expecting from the hype but here I am immediately reading the next book. I think a lot of what's supposed to make the prince "cruel" is kind of overblown or assumed or just downright unsupported but maybe that was in the blurry first third of the book I read at a bar. I'm definitely appreciating the book more for Jude's transformation and scheming.

I have loved this book. The chapter titles are very accurate chaos throughout. It's a lot of fun.

"A lady stays tranquil and poised under all circumstances. Instead of panicking, she squares her jaw, protects her heart, and ensures that she has enough ammunition to gun down everyone in her path."
--Lady Armitage

Wow! This girl makes a lot of decisions based off of assumptions... I think I just expected more growth from her in this second book.

"Ah, yes. That story. That is what happens when men tell your stories. Would you like to hear the real story?"

Guinevere shook her head. "The real stories are always worse."

"Yes. They are. I am going to tell you anyway." Morgan le Fay leaned close, her voice low and melodic as she rewrote everything Guinevere knew.

"That was the other lie of stories. Even when the stories told were true, they never talked about what happened after the quest. About all the wounds--visible and otherwise--that lingered long after the neat close of the tale. They had rescued the damsel. The end. But the was still so much pain there, and perhaps there always would be."

I can't say that everything I wanted to have happen happened in this book but this is also one of the few times I've read a Camelot story and NOT had a good idea of what was going to happen at every turn! I devoured it in a day and a half and am excited to see where it goes from here in book two.

"There was a dangerous magic in pretending. Pretend long enough, and who could say what was real?"

WELL. This makes me feel some things about people that are a little tooooo into slasher films and maybe makes me take a second look at what I find fascinating about true crime media and it often depicting violence against women (safely still in the realm of not idolizing killers but having a morbid curiosity so maybe I'll be prepared and it doesn't happen to me one day). But another great Hendrix book! Once it got going I couldn't put it down.

This book was absolutely great. I haven't been kept guessing by a mystery quite like this in a while. It pulled me in and ate my day.

"We'd like the publicity," said the decorator, “but I don't know how our clients will react. You know how it is; whenever the boys in Washington find out a taxpayer has wall-to-wall carpet in his bathroom, they audit his tax returns for the last three years."
---------
Okay, gross. Just about every "modern" (circa 1970) design choice in this book is a tragedy being addressed on HGTV somewhere...

I picked this up and put it down a couple of times in the beginning but in the end was really, really vibing with it.

I started out thinking I was going to rate this as "so-so" but as I'm remembering how much I was invested in this story and music by the end, I must pick it. This isn't exactly my genre of music but this was the book I needed during a ride on the struggle bus.

Oh god... The book started out mildly creepy and then it just floored it. I'm not super into body horror and I can safely say this was the limit of what a novitiate like myself can read and still enjoy! There was definitely a really weird nap near the end, heavily influenced by this book, where I was chased through a haunted Ikea. lol

I was looking for something similar to Beach Read by Emily Henry and while it did scratch that enemies-to-lovers itch it was also surprisingly incredibly uplifting! Sometimes we have to choose joy on purpose before we can experience it again and heal. I'm trying to learn how to put that into practice.

I really needed this right now. The idea of a multiverse where maybe you're living a better life if only you did this or that differently--I've spent too much time caught up on that myself. Sometimes things happen in life that leave you feeling changed and hopeless and maybe you distract yourself with someone else's problems but also maybe it's okay to be kind to yourself and make the steps you can. You can still be happy.

Wow, that was LONG but also a fitting end to all major players' stories.

Well, that was a dark second act...

Aside from actively hating someone I think was meant to be a love interest, this was a really compelling read! I love Nahri, I love the court intrigue and the epilogue... *chef's kiss*

ON TO BOOK TWO!

This was way longer than it needed to be. You can tell it was written with the intent of it being turned into a movie series. The author peppered in swearing in unnatural places as a cheap way to make the book feel "adult," borrowed from the Alien movie series pretty heavily, and just kind of left me ranting in angry bursts my partner wasn't interested in as I tried to figure out what about this author was so irritating... But I finished it...

Couldn't get into the characters or finish. Being a garbage pet parent isn't cute and quirky.

"Bad becomes unbearable only when contrasted to expectation."

I feel like it took me a little bit to get into it but I love the subtle introduction of magic to a fairytale and the ending was much more than I expected it to be at the onset.

Bought the next book immediately and regretted putting off the initial reading as long as I did.

Ok. With this being a part of a free set from Amazon (books 1 through 3), and having a silly name, my expectations were in the basement. This series was definitely a nice surprise and got better as it went. I love the combination of Norse mythology with other world myths and the ending of this first story arc was perfect. On to books 4, 5, and 6!

Having picked this up as a read from a random Facebook ad, I am not disappointed! I don't think I've read as capable and brutal a character as Lada in a long time. This story was very hard to put down.

After a month of reading fluff I'm finally on to an anticipated release! Time to speed through 600+ pages...

The last 20% of the book was much better than the 2 and a half books that came before it. The ending was beautiful.

Sad that it's finally finished but content with the ending. I love a series that makes you as invested in the majority of the side characters as you are in the main characters. Super pick!

Enjoying the book but dreading the end of the journey.

Oh my love for Delilah Bard knows no bounds. I enjoyed this book much more than the first. The characters feel a lot more fleshed out. The copies I've read from this series have all been from the library but I'm definitely going to end up buying these for my own collection.

Weirdness revolving around grown men chasing a 14 year old girl aside, I really like how Dani's character fleshed out and this kept my attention more than I expected even though it felt like a side adventure.

I feel a little awkward about all these grown-ass men obsessing about a future with a 14-year old girl... I can't be the only one.

"Bedevil the devil and devil be damned. I fear no devil and bow to no man."

I don't know. I liked this one better than the first book. Sue me.

This is either a romance series with a boatload of urban fantasy story or it's an urban fantasy story with quite a lot of adult romance. Either way, it's been a great distraction.

I've been devouring this series. I'm glad to see the books get longer, and better, as they go. These books were definitely a pleasant surprise. Cliffhanger ending so make sure you have the next one lined up!

The first half of the book was very slow and struggled to keep my attention. I had a hard time connecting with the characters and actually gave up after 48 chapters of constant indecision on the protagonist's part. I'm sure others might enjoy the novelty of the back story for a villain but this was a little too light and silly for me.

Super pick! ACOTAR was pretty disappointing for the first 70% while ACOMAF is not only better written but feels like an apology from the author for the first book condoning such lame, "nice guy," misogynistic prince charmings.

Can't wait for the third book.

This may be an unpopular opinion: I'm not a fan of Chaol.

Probably one of the better books I've read in a while. It took a little bit to ramp up at the beginning but I love how the multiple POVs still made it possible to be caught off guard repeatedly.

Super pick.

This was my favorite book in the trilogy by far. I'm not really down with the religious focus but the author does a great job with characters and the romance here is much more grown up and evolved compared to the first book.

I love how everything weaves together throughout the story but especially at the end.

By telling you anything at all I'm at least believing in you, I believe you're there. I believe you into being. I tell, therefore you are.

So I will go on. So I will myself to go on. I am coming to a part you will not like at all, because in it I did not behave well, but I will try nonetheless to leave nothing out. After all you've been through, you deserve whatever I have left which is not much but includes the truth.