For all Elise’s touting that she’ll never be tied to just one man, Ryder and Gabriel have been equally damn insistent they would not be sharing. The fact that Elise consistently disregards that and attempts to steamroll their boundaries and feelings is equally infuriating as them disregarding her feelings about it. She just feels more and more selfish as the series goes on, but especially in this book. Dante may be cool with their arrangement, but Ryder and Gabriel keep setting the boundary and Elise just keeps steamrolling it.
The guy’s POV’s are endlessly exhausting and I feel like they all need a lobotomy. Plot who? Personal autonomy who? Everything is about nothing but Elise and her golden pussy.
I had such high expectations for this series because of the praise for Zodiac Academy, but I’m just feeling majorly let down and like I should’ve DNF’ed at chapter seven like I wanted to and just moved on to Zodiac Academy.
I think I wouldn’t mind the lack of plot so much if the authors put more of a focus on the dynamics between the guys and how they impact each other/how their relationships with each other grow and evolve through the series outside of Elise. With Leon’s big heart and endless love, it’s sweet seeing him drawing closer to Ryder and Gabriel. The Christmas excursion wasn’t enough to convince me they have any reason to come together/enough in common outside of Elise. I want less “this is what Elise wants”/“this will make Elise happy” and more of why Leon as an INDIVIDUAL wants to grow closer to them.
So much of this was redundant. Holy shit. More than a quarter of the way through, and all we’ve gotten is Elise begging to ride various dude’s dicks because she loves them soooo much but none of them want to be with her if they have to share her. Not even halfway through and I was beyond tired.
Dante is becoming less insufferable as Elise becomes more-so. I do love him rescuing her from that situation with Old Sal, but I would have liked to see just a bit more self sufficiency from her. She’s supposedly powerful, too, it’s about time she starts acting like it.
I realized if I look at this series as romance driven with fantasy elements rather than fantasy driven with romance elements, it’s not so completely insufferable to get through. What I can’t get over, though, is the character assassination Elise went through in this book.
Ryder and Gabriel remain my favorites and I’m obsessed with their budding friendship. These books should truly be exclusively from their POV’s.
I am… genuinely disgusted by Elise saying she wouldn’t want the version of Ryder that didn’t live through Mariella. Ryder has CPTSD and should have never endured what he did. As someone with CPTSD, I would be appalled if my husband said anything at all to me like what Elise said to Ryder in this scene.
What the fuck kind of bullshit ending was that? It’s ridiculous that the book is 78% smut and 12% plot with the last 10% being left at the end of the story for progression.
At this point, all I can ask is what the fuck is so special about Elise? She’s broken Ryder and Gabriel’s resolves, she’s convinced Ryder and Dante to work together despite the fact that they’re fated enemies or whatever nonsense is going on there. She has the three most powerful fae in the school plus the fourteenth most powerful fae as her sources. Why? Why is she so special that she can accomplish all of this when she’s clearly so lacking in power that she couldn’t even stop King from abducting her long enough to make a break for it. They say they need a powerful vampire and she is her father’s daughter… Okay? I’m not seeing power. I’m seeing a damsel in distress who constantly needs to be saved by one or more of the four kings.
While I’m truly glad the Felix plot line has resolved, I’m ready for this book series to be over. The Mariella stuff should have wrapped in book two, the Felix stuff in book three, and the Gareth/King stuff in this book. This is being dragged out to hell and back and I’m tired of it at this point. I don’t care about Elise enough to root for her, I don’t care about her enough to be invested in her evolving relationship with the kings. Gabriel and Ryder’s friendship genuinely interests me and I’m passively interested in their dynamic with Leon. I could not give a shit less about Elise. She does nothing to drive the narrative other than get kidnapped constantly. Power where?
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