Sarah

A surprisingly hopeful and reflective book that is a good reminder to appreciate small moments and life for what it is. I'll definitely re-read. 

I'm so glad I read this. I enjoyed the variation on the goose girl and the Russian references, plus the hefty doses of snark and humor and realistic reluctance teamwork turning into more... I loved this, I'm looking forward to having time for the next books and so glad there'll be a third.

Smart young main characters where it's actually shown they're smart and think things through (rather than “this teen is the smartest and best at everything and everyone can't help falling for her even when there's a wildly creepy age and experience gap of hundreds of years”) has been rare in my admittedly limited experience of YA. This was refreshing. And I appreciated the low spice, throwing smut in wouldn't have fit the story/relationship development at all.

Biggest waste of time of a book in years. Main character is neither likeable nor does he grow or change from the “great love” (who's never fleshed out as a character or even given any reason for liking him, so she may as well be an object). A -3 rating is more appropriate. Wish we could give negatives.

The huge overload of positive gushy blurbs on back cover really should have been my clue that this one would be massively boring and poorly written. (A book that's actually well written and interesting just does not need that many blurbs swearing it's great in order to lure readers.)

Reading this was as painful as mowing a large lawn in the height of a South Florida summer with blisters all over every inch of your feet and hands. I didn't care about any character on any page. Didn't seem like the author did, either. I wish negative stars were an option.

I think few people would turn down a chance to check out a favorite fictional place, even with a strong chance that it'd turn out to be wildly different than you'd imagined. But the sexist, racist and ableist streams running through this make it super tedious to read.

There are interesting moments in this, until they're done with school. The characters are just so unlikable and spoiled and immature. I understand they're all early 20s when they go to Not-Narnia and most people are making very stupid choices then, and a lot of “well how do I actually live as an adult?” missteps are understandable.  But every main character seems set up to be as unlikable and un-interesting as possible - which is actually difficult to achieve. Quentin's misogynistic, everyone's arrogant and bored, it was just impossible to care about any of them after they finished with the school. (And they weren't interesting before they finished.)

The writing quality seemed super inconsistent. I'm glad the author apparently got help for his own depression after writing this, but it would be hard to find a book that makes obvious depression in characters less sympathetic than this does - which is sad, as a reader struggling with that. I'd suggest avoiding this entirely, if you also struggle.

Interesting at first, but became really repetitive and felt thinner and thinner on historical basis. Disappointing.

This is one of the most creative and engaging settings for a series I???ve read in a long time, and I'm glad I waited until I knew there would be many more stories in it.

disappointing followup. Dollar seemed savvier in book 1, but surprised/unsuspicious here. So much description of torture really didn't improve anything.

really dull.

A quick, funny, sweet romance, and the spice made me wistful. I appreciated that the characters are mutually supportive, too.

heavy nostalgia for sleepaway camps, which I never went to, but a very interesting twist with the impact of the camp on the town

Starts a little slow for a first book, but that allows for more detail and character development and the setting is interesting. Nice to see a character who's not got much magic ability, due to tragic injury as a kid, who still has a decent sense of who he is and principles he lives by - not just “oh, I'm getting offered the role I've wanted, I'll go along with anything.”

I liked the way his life was approached - the horrible deeds with the (ultimately useless) linguistics work. Focusing on the linguistics and his supposed genius first, then the murders and robberies, would have seemed ridiculous or biased towards the “oh but he's so smart, he should be free to keep living and working” side. The information on phrenology and how it was discredited, and the start of trying to understand and identify psychopaths, was really interesting. 

If this was fantasy, it'd seem like “grimdark” would fit, but this is just bleak drama. 

pretty standard for the author, read once, never think of again, sadly

Kept a 4-1/2 year old entertained by reading the whole thing, surprisingly.

I kept thinking “what a weird little snarky fever dream of a book” as I read this, and I love it. I wish I'd read it sooner. 
Yes, some of the characters are flat, but that's true of the reality TV and pageants it mocks. And any girls being encouraged to care less about others' opinions and see the world differently and plan for the future as a teen would only be a good thing.
It's a dark little funny story. I loved it. 

Self-indulgent and boring. I was expecting to not mind that if “let me just do nothing and find oblivion as much as possible” was more obviously depression-based. I ended up really frustrated at how terrible the relationships were.

Surprisingly tedious and empty.

This is closer to having a plot than this series has seemed to require in a while, but it's so painfully repetitive. Characters insta-hate Anita, for all the same ol' same ol' reasons; a pile of lovers praise how great she supposedly is with relationships; she constantly swears it's no one's business who she's having sex with and then never actually makes sure it's no one else's business, yadda yadda. Threat wraps up in the last five pages with a big lazy handwave that just seems like “eh, it's done because I say so and my page count/deadline is done.”

I keep skimming this series when I notice ‘em at the library because I rather enjoyed the first 5 or so, but they've just been boring an/or disappointing for so long. Handy for insomnia, though. Possibly also for drinking games, with the repetition, but that may prove fatal for most people.

We need negative stars for utter wastes of time.

I liked this, but it took a while to get used to the different POVs - and I like multiple POV books, I guess I'm just more used to a name or symbol at the top than I would have thought. (I suspect it'd be very frustrating in audio, if it's just one narrator.) I found the pace pretty slow and the writing could have used more editing, and trying to get back into the story over and over didn't help that impression.
I liked that there were several strong female protagonists, but just too many story threads for my taste. And again, I usually like that - just not here. Too much emphasis on winter and starving for reading this in November with winter, my least-favorite time of the year, coming on, probably... but I'm not likely to give this another chance in a different season.

Tedious with a predictable ending. Unlikable characters, stilted dialogue.

You'd die before finishing this cringey book if you make a drinking game for this story heavy-handedly bringing up any of the constantly brought-up subjects: 

- age gap romance (literally no one else actually cares about the age difference that matters so much to Julie)
- abusive mothers vs. “perfect mothers” 
- Nick and Dana suddenly remembering they're supposedly at the cabin to grieve and remember their dad, but recovering from that thought in 10 seconds each time
- Dana pining over her ex and being Determined to Not Take Him Back, and then, of course, dropping that plan instantly when he repeats their pattern
- apologizing for not wanting sex due to being injured/sick/upset because of course the partner will expect it anyway??
- Julie making grand gestures without thinking about them to indicate why she's the perfect mom/girlfriend/boss, and then agonizing about them and martyrdom
- shoveled-in inclusion of IBS and poorly handled chronic illness representation

It's not actually a festive story, it's painful and most of these relationships would be toxic in actual people.

This strangely felt like I was reading a young YA novelization of a Disney movie. It was sappy and a very predictable plot and ultimately as exciting as weak chamomile tea. Nothing particularly wrong with weak chamomile tea when you want something relaxing and light, that just wasn't what I'd hoped for from the description.

I liked the idea of honey-influenced magic, but the only relationship that didn't feel flower-petal thin was Marigold learning from and helping her grandmother. The “reveal” about Lottie was predictable as soon as she was so persistent about magic being fake and useless - a random person wouldn't be that stuck on it being a waste, even with the contrived romance clich?? like her explanation at the end, “I felt something for you immediately and didn't know what to do.” And the plot idea of a witch being cursed to never be loved is very overdone and the characters felt way too flat to make “they're breaking the curse through their believable love” interesting or effective here.