A Court of Thorns and Roses

TikTok bought me here, and it felt like beauty n the beast re-imagined.

I’m not the target audience and don’t read romantasy so I was coming to this read fully prepared to not like some aspects, but I was hoping for at least an interesting and captivating story since it’s one of the NY Times Best Sellers and it’s so popular. Lesson learned, never again! I stopped in the middle of the book, I can’t force myself to continue in expectation that it’s somehow gets better. I was feeling second hand embarrassment for a good part of the book for so many things, to the point that I had to stop on every paragraph thinking about why I’m reading it. The writing style is too modern to sell the idea that the story is happening around 17-18 centuries (based on technology level described in the beginning) and some of the characters are supposed to be 500+ years old. It’s really noticeable in dialogues and it’s breaking the immersion. Characters motivation is weak and forced and only works if you don’t think about it much, which I’m not sure is possible from a reader perspective, there is a very limited quota for believing in suggested circumstances no matter what till it becomes unbelievable. Weak motivation breaks cause-and-effect relationship and creates insufferable and irritating characters because you don’t understand why they say what they say, why they do what they do. At the same time you can predict what is going to happen because of excessive usage of cliches, which by itself is not bad. It’s the question of how we’re getting from the beginning to the end of it, if everything in between is broken, but you still getting to the end, the cliche is no longer working and you left with questions why it’s written the way it is. On top of that you’re getting punished for having imagination and being attentive to what author is describing, finding main protagonist and her friends in a very goofy situations that are not acknowledged, so I’m not sure if this book was proofread enough to realize what is being pictured by a reader. The first watery bowels mention is followed by being rescued by the main love interest and them going to the sunset after being fully soaked in blood. Unless the main heroine has a second pair of trousers being changed somewhere in the process, the blood was not the only substance she was soaked in. And this is how I will remember this books. Thanks everyone and have a nice read if you dare.

It’s an amazing combination of mystery, fantasy, and imagination.

okay i really wanted to hate this book but honestly the only thing i can think to make fun of right now is how often watery bowels were mentioned

Loved this book and can’t wait to read the next

Just a beautiful story!

too good to pass up!!

Such a great book! Loved the characters so much!

None of the actions of the protagonist made any sense to me. This was a dragging read full of eye rolls… you need to give up control and say “sureee anyone would react that way… this all makes total sense” Towards the end it gets kind of interesting. I only pushed through because I’ve been told the series “gets better” Here’s hoping.

Better written than most romance novels - could have more erotica but very good read.