laur gluchie
God please take all of the one-star ratings from this book and give them to The Wren In the Holly Library.
I've had some time to research some of the opinions and think on my own for this novel and I have to say that, for my personal opinion, Sanctuary of the Shadow was unfairly judged and review-bombed- but it's also partially the publisher's fault for misrepresenting and misadvertising what this book is actually about.
Red Tower, while they are known for their gorgeous covers and deluxe editions, are also known to publish books that aren't regarded very well. Even Fourth Wing, which blew up on TikTok and I personally loved, has plenty of haters for their own reasons. When Sanctuary of the Shadow came out to much anticipation, it was given one-star reviews left and right which lead to a rapidly dwindling Goodreads average rating (it is currently at 2.90 as of my writing of this review). After reading many of the more popular reviews on this website, I've come to a conclusion as to why so many people disliked this book: misadvertisement.
Red Tower marketed this book as a fantasy romance (“romantasy”) set at a magical circus. The issue here is not that there is no circus, it's that the circus is featured a lot less than what the marketing team promoted it to be. The description of this book makes it seem that the circus is the main setting for the entire story, and even the cover of this book features a circus tent front and center. However, the circus itself was only featured in about 30% of the novel. Readers were, of course, disappointed.
I, on the other hand, went into this book with zero expectations as well as the knowledge that the circus did not play as big of a part as it was made out to have, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The writing wasn't perfect, but it was far from the worst I've ever read, and while I thought it was cute I didn't much care for the romance. What kept me hooked to this book were the characters and the world-building. I loved Harrow and Malaikah, Raith and Ouro grew on me after some time, and even the ringmaster Salizar and his assistant Loren had captured my interest. The world-building of the magic system, the queens, and the world's history was so rich and explained well. It honestly reminded me of The Wizard of Oz, with Queen Furie as the Wicked Witch of the West and the wraiths as her flying monkeys, and I would not be surprised if Ascher took inspiration from that for her novel. The worst part of this book for me was probably the spice, as I found it to be a bit too abundant for my taste and I ended up skimming those scenes. Overall, despite that one thing, I really enjoyed this book and I'm very excited to read Malaikah's (and hopefully Ouro's) novel when it is released. I only wish that this book had been sold to a publisher that knew how to properly market its products instead of using BookTok tropes and keywords to go viral.
If you've read this far, and you have any interest in Sanctuary of the Shadow at all, I encourage you to ignore the haters and please give it a chance. It's not a masterpiece, but it's worth much more than a 2.9 average rating on Goodreads. Thank you for coming to my TED Talk.
Pre-Reading Updates: I don't wanna read Sanctuary of the Shadow BUT THE PARASITES IN ME WANT TO READ SANCTUARY OF THE SHADOW I don't wanna read a book that has a rating below three stars on Goodreads BUT THE PARASITES THE DEMON IN ME IT WANTS TO READ IT
well. i've been having some shit luck with some of my reading choices lately.
lemme be honest: the writing wasn't great, it was pretty juvenile and bland at best. everything felt like it was happening too easily and too fast, and at points i felt like this would've been better off marketed as a middle-grade. all of the characters are extremely emotionally immature, especially fallon. the story wasn't the most original either, it's basically like a reverse shatter me with fae, and the names for all the people and places were a bit convenient or ordinary. also, i couldn't tell if this was high fantasy or urban/dystopian fantasy? it seemed like high fantasy but the characters used a lot of modern colloquialisms and phrases that had me doubtful (‘dude' ‘pizza' ‘bro' ‘bestie' etc). however. i did have fun reading this. overall this was a pretty mediocre but entertaining book. still gonna read the next one for funsies probably.
tl;dr this gets to go into the category of books that were objectively horrid but i still had fun and somewhat enjoyed them, along with the selection, american royals, and house of marionne.
Edit: ok. so. after taking some time to Think, i've concluded that this book was not as enjoyable as i originally thought tbh. there are books where the writing is bad but you're staying interested because of the plot, characters, pacing etc, and there are books where the writing is so bad that you're finding any way to force yourself into finishing it. i had gotten to a point where i was deluding myself into thinking this had some kind of redeeming quality when it absolutely did not. sorry to anyone who enjoyed this, but the writing was extremely poorly done.
The author's note at the forefront of this book was well-warranted; this was not just another Ali Hazelwood STEM rom-com.
This wasn't swoony, or humorous, or super science and academia-based like her previous works. And no, it's not a paranormal vampire-werewolf arranged marriage story either. This is entirely new territory that leaned into the contemporary fiction more than the contemporary romance, focused more on a business scandal in the science industry than the science itself, and is more emotional and sexual than funny and cute. And I gotta say, I wasn't as disappointed as I expected to be.
I'm a huge fan of Hazelwood, having now read all of her published novels all in this year, and I would consider her to be one of my favorite authors of all time. Not to say I haven't had a bump in the road with one of her stories in the past, but she's one of those authors where I come away from her books feeling emotionally drained and pleasantly empty every single time. With her smol sassy and lovable main characters and her big swoony simp male love interests and so much scientific information packed in that I'm forced to remember that I graduated high school with a 2.4 GPA, I can't help but love her works better than most.
However, this was nothing like those works. Not In Love was a story of healing from past traumas, some of which I could relate to. Dealing with food insecurity and an unstable home life is something I'm no stranger to, so I felt a connection to Rue right away. She's not your typical Hazelwood FMC though, as she doesn't come off as an adorable, likeable ray of sunshine. While it was refreshing to see a new kind of FMC, it kind of made me miss Olive, Bee, and Elsie. I also loved Eli's story, and the mystery behind Florence was so well done- better than the one in Bride, in my humble opinion. I also liked that this was Hazelwood's first foray into a fully dual point-of-view novel. I've been wanting to see dual-POV since reading the Adam's POV bonus content in The Love Hypothesis and I hope she continues this style in her future rom-coms. Plus, the fact that all of her novels are intertwined and set in the same universe is awesome. I loved the Check & Mate reference, it literally made me freak out lol.
In the end, I think this is another great novel from Ali Hazelwood- so long as you go in knowing what to expect. <3
this is one of the greatest, if not the greatest urban paranormal fantasy novels i've read in a long time... or maybe ever.
from the well-written characters to the incredibly deep worldbuilding, legendborn is a gem in a world full of booktok fodder. the way this novel intertwines such unique characters, a brilliant multi-faceted magic system, romance, trauma, grief, racism, sexism, stigmas, and arthurian legend in a world so parallel to our own is unfathomable to me. i'm proud to say that this story is set in my southern home state of north carolina and focuses so much of itself upon that fact. it's long for a first in a series, but it's worth it when you realize how much great lore it has to pack in. if you are a fan of urban paranormal fantasy or just great literature, please, please give this a chance. it's basically arthurian shadowhunters.
also i was firmly team bree and nick but y'all... that ending may have turned me into a bree and sel shipper bye
Pre-Reading Updates: i see “unc chapel hill” and i instantly go into fight or flight mode we-
tw: mentions of drugging, rape
k. so. what the fuck was that.
idk what y'all know about this book, and i honestly don't care, but i was expecting a story about a kid who survives an abusive home life getting a second chance and ending up on a sports team and a m/m romance. basically a somewhat angsty sports-romance heartstopper. this is what i wanted okay the pastels
and this is what i gotttt: emo shit that would not fly or make sense irl, the most unlikable characters ever, some batshit mafia plot, bully romance gag, and just straight-up glorified abuse?? whyyyy
big sigh let me just summarize this for y'all.
this book follows a boy named neil but neil has a ✨ dark past ✨ because his family was abusive and involved in the fucking mafia, so neil is basically hiding his true identity all the time. neil gets recruited to this college sports team for a fictional sport called “exy” and i don't really understand what it is because i hate sports so please don't ask me. there are these three (sometimes four?) guys on the team who are essentially bullies to neil but neil can handle himself because of his ✨ dark past ✨ so whatever. but then the boys drag neil out to a club and drug him and get borderline rape-y all because they believe he's a spy for the other team. then neil decides to stay on the team even after that because why the fuck not. (by this point in the book the author has used every slur and derogatory name for gay people btw.) then there's a bunch of sports scenes that i skimmed because i don't give a shit. i think i was so mad that i blacked out because i cannot remember how this ended at all. ain't no way this wasn't a fanfiction turned into an original story for publication. also one of the shit ass bullies is neil's love interest so there's that.
anyways. this was a miserable experience. fuck this, fuck haikyuu because y'all told me this would be like that for some reason, i'm out!
gonna go play the newly-ported gay lawyer investigations game because i'm tired. i'm so tired.
hm. okay. i think i liked this one slightly less than Fangirl Down. it was a bit more unrealistic and cringy, and the spice wasn't as bad this time around or maybe i just knew what to expect now. i didn't really like Tallulah as a fmc as much as i liked Josephine, but i did like Burgess way more than Wells. Chloe was entertaining af tho, glad she's getting her own book.
Pre-Reading Updates: Did a book trade with my friend and co-worker Madelyn! I gave her Ali Hazelwood's Bride and she gave me this book, Tessa Bailey's The Au Pair Affair! I'm going to read Fangirl Down first though, since it seems to be the first in the series. Can't wait!
2.5 Stars
i'm not sure what to say. i feel so, so conflicted right now.
so. i thought the opening ten chapters or so were fine. then, until about page ~350 i thought that this was one of the most slow, boring books i'd ever read, and that it would be competing with The Wren In the Holly Library for my least favorite read of the year. then it finally started to pick up and i kind of liked how it ended. all of this to say, i've given this a very tentative 3 stars for now but i may reduce it to 2.5 or 2 when i have more time to think on it i have reduced my rating to 2.5.
i liked Harper and i found that i could relate to her; we both have disabilities and have experienced what it's like to have a mother diagnosed with cancer. Rhen, though, i didn't start liking him til the very end. i found him to be very confusing, like he'd say he cared about this or that but i could find nothing to support that, or otherwise was just bland in general. Grey was fine i guess.
the plot was super interesting, but it was hindered by some very slow pacing and sloppy writing, especially in the middle. the scenes changed so fast sometimes that i couldn't tell where the characters were or what was going on. sometimes, i wasn't even able to tell who's point-of-view i was reading, and i would have to flip back through the pages to check which was super annoying. one of my biggest bookish pet peeves is when an author writes multiple povs but doesn't do much to distinguish between the characters in them.
the romance though was subtle and not in the way i usually like. it was subtle as in i couldn't even tell it existed until like the last 50 pages, so i hope to see some development there in the future. also, i had no idea Grey was supposed to be a part of a love triangle between him, Harper, and Rhen until i read someone's review that pointed it out. for me, it didn't read that way at all. idk, that was just really odd.
anyways. i though this was fine overall. i'll give the next books a try too, even though i haven't heard as great things about them compared to this one. i liked the cliffhanger though, and i think i fugured out who Grey is...
now this. THIS. is a duology worthy of the hype i've seen it get. i wouldn't consider myself a fan of wwii stories or just war-focused stories in general but this one just hits different yk. iris and roman are probably one of my favorite book ships ever, probably because even if their romance is on the subtler side. i don't typically love historical fiction but i do love magical realism, and i know a lot of people were complaining about how this focused more on the gods and magic side of the story compared to the previous book but honestly that's why i loved this one so much more. ugh. so brilliant.
Pre-Reading Updates: had to go to 2 targets to find this y'all i better not be disappointed!!
i genuinely want to know why this was the most hyped-up book on here, tiktok, instagram, literally everywhere back in like 2021 when this is one of the most boring books i've read in a while. this had so much potential to be brilliant, but the writing let this down real bad (and yes i know chloe gong was a young college student when she wrote this). the pacing was slow as literal christmas, the characters were so bland and uninteresting, the romance wasn't romancing, and the story was nearly boring me into a nap up until like the 80% mark. istg some of y'all have to be liars because why does this have so many five-star reviews. genuinely why. gotta give credit where it's due though, and ms. gong can write a hell of a cliffhanger epilogue. now i'm going to have to read the next book aren't i. smh.
i'm allowed to be happy that i finally finished another series i started almost a decade ago + read three books in a day (with this being the third) methinks :)
anyways. oh audrey rose. she is so book-smart when it comes to death and corpses but is not with literally anything else. tho i do have to say i'm a bit proud of her for almost pulling a pip fitz-amobi in as good as dead at the end there. like. go girl give us the ending i wanted but then don't. whatever. thomas cresswell is still a perfect blend of annoying and charming. liza is just annoying. all of the other characters exist. what a perfect ending. <3
also vv excited for the new covers kerri announced on instagram the other day, the sjtr one is gorgeous n i can't wait to see the rest
i love evie and the villain so much like omg. wdym i have to wait til 2025 for the next book. wdym. but also that last chapter about evie being "unmasked" was hella confusing. didn't they already address that in the beginning of the book? idk why it was brought back up as some cliffhanger thing but whatever i still loved this.
3.5 Stars
this actually wasn't that awful. the plot and romance were good, if a little bit unrealistic and cringy. the spice was so unhinged tho, and there was a lot more than i was expecting (i mean A LOT a lot). i really liked josephine. wells (age 29), unfortunately has the same brash, violent bully personality as my student wells (age 5) which made him almost completely unlikable for me, but one of them is getting play therapy to help with it. take a guess which one. josephine u deserve beter bbygirl
3.5 Stars
I honestly had no intention to read this after un-DNF-ing the first book, but I'm a completionist at heart so...
This was pretty similar to book one, in that the first 50% or so is just a bunch of boring filler, followed by the actually entertaining part, and it's written in the most presumptuous way. There's still no explanation as to what is going on, who are these people, why does all this random magical shit keep happening, what does this old ass king have to do with anything, etc. It's just continued confusing and prose-y bullshit.
Whatever. I was entertained enough. I wish this one had more of Blue's point-of-view, though. Her family is so spiritually wacky like my own, and that's probably my favorite aspect of these books.
This was a really cute story. I love the classic Disney princess films (the animated ones, not the live-action ones), and I'm a big fan of Disney Dreamlight Valley, so I picked this up and gave it a try. It's not a super deep story, not the greatest writing, and this could've probably been better off being a light middle grade novel, but it was a fun read.
For going a decade between reading the first book and its sequel, this was brilliant. Though there were some things I couldn't remember, and a few things I was confused about, I slipped back into the world of Legend as if I had never left. I really enjoyed June's point-of-view chapters, and Day's began to grow on me closer to the end. I loved the way Marie Lu wrote the political intrigue, and the twists were so expertly devised. I'm going to be thinking about that ending for the next three-to-five business days. Reading the third book ASAP.
3.5 Stars
I was not expecting King's Cage to be better than either of the first two books in this series. I honestly thought it would be on par with book one (and hoped it would be better than book two). I'm pleasantly surprised with how much I enjoyed this one. This still isn't my favorite series in the world, but I definitely am happy I continued past Glass Sword.
I've received an Advance Reader's Copy of this book through a giveaway hosted by the author. This has not affected my rating in any way.
Amanda Foody and Christine Lynn Herman's All of Our Demise picks up right where All of Us Villains left off; in the wake of massive reveals- including a very much alive Hendry Lowe. What follows are alliances made and broken, a string of unsolved murders, and a plot to break the Blood Veil once and for all.
I'm very happy with how this story concluded; in fact, I'd go as far as to say I predicted the ending well before it happened. That's not a bad thing, by the way. I also like the pairings of the characters, and while some were unexpected, each relationship was portrayed so well that I'm not mad about any of them. The action was amazing as per usual and had me on the edge of my seat each time. I'm very sad about the fate of one specific character, though if it had to be one, of course it would be them.
My only complaint about this novel would be the pacing. Compared to the fast-paced first novel, All of Our Demise was much slower. I grew bored at times, and I ended up having to skim some parts, especially in the middle. And honestly, had I not skimmed, I thought I might not have finished this (that, or it would've taken me a year to complete and immediately put me into a reading slump). However, the beginning and end were of that same fast pacing we see in All of Us Villains.
Regardless, I still enjoyed this duology very much. I'm excited to read A Fate So Cold, the next dual-written novel by Foody and Herman. But for now, I give All of Our Demise 4 out of 5 stars.